RVP to start – Let’s get right behind him
August 12, 2012
I love how the final events of the Olympics segue so seamlessly into the start of Arsenal’s final pre-season match against FC Koln this afternoon.
It’s almost like somebody somewhere doesn’t want us to be bored for even a second. What do they think? That if we don’t permanently have something to distract us we’ll all start thinking about the banking crisis again and within hours there’ll be rioting in the street?Errr…
Anyway, I’ve been happy to have the distraction. To take the edge off of the Arsenal withdrawal. It’s not been quite as good as the real thing but has just about kept me going. I particularly enjoyed Mo Farah’s performance in the 5000m last night. Always nice to see a happy Gooner. And of course astonishing how comfortably we’ve held on to third place in the medals table. I’m looking forward to the giant bronze medal that we get for that, draped around the neck of the country with a huge piece of ribbon like they used to do when Jimmy Saville had fixed it for fifty schoolgirls to tapdance with Roy Castle on the roof of Buckingham Palace.
As I said yesterday, I think the starting line up this afternoon will tell us a great deal about Arsene Wenger’s intentions for the season ahead and the big news this morning is that Robin Van Persie is expecting to play. Louis Van Gaal has revealed that Robin has reassured him that he’ll be ready for international duty:
Robin will play his first game this Sunday. He has told me he is at least going to play 45 minutes this weekend.
That’s huge. First of all it’s a message to Manchester United and whoever else is still interested in taking him off our hands this summer. Don’t think we’re going to make this easy for you. If you don’t stump up the cash we’re looking for that’s fine. We’ll keep him. He’s in our plans. Unlike Cesc last year he’s willing to continue playing for the club so you don’t have us over a barrel. We’ve still got options.
But I’d be surprised if this is just a political gesture. It looks to me like, new deal or no new deal, we’re very serious about the possibility of keeping Robin at the club. The season starts next week and if he’s playing today then expect him to start against Sunderland. Now is not the time to be messing about. The players need games and if RVP is in that means that the likes of Giroud or Podolski will miss out, at least in their preferred central striker role, possibly altogether. If we truly are expecting RVP to leave I think we’d want to give the new boys the best possible chance of learning the role.
Robin’s inclusion obviously begs a number of questions of its own. Chiefly, how will the travelling Arsenal support react to him and vice versa. I hope we get behind him. There’s plenty of time for abuse and recriminations if and when he actually jumps ship. Let’s not start booing players who are still wearing the shirt. From all the reports emanating from the camp, Robin has been the model professional on the training pitch this summer, working hard and doing whatever’s been asked of him. You might say that’s the minimum we should expect from a man still pulling in c£80,000 a week but there are plenty who have been in his position who have not bothered.
Apart from anything you still get the sense that his future is completely in the balance. If he performed a U-turn and announced that he’d signed a new contract after the game today I guarantee that we’d all find a way to forgive his transgressions and learn to love him again. The promise of another 30 goal season would definitely help with that process. Why tip the balance in favour of him leaving by giving him abuse?
Let’s hope we remind him how lucky he is to be an Arsenal player by showing him how classy this club can be.
If You Liked This...
- Inevitable overreaction to City game makes today all the more important
- Arteta bringing best out of those around him + Frimpong off?
- Robin instructed to stay but could still throw a tantrum + Wenger prepared to let Theo go?
- Our biggest match in years and everyone’s talking about the summer + Yossi’s off
- Van Persie running out of options as FFP bites + Yossi decision will show us how ambitious we plan to be
Comments
21 Responses to “RVP to start – Let’s get right behind him”
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I love that idea but pls we need him bad thanks
So true back him r.v.p to stay
Well said!!
And the Rvp soap opera continues, Quality post MH, but am sure you don’t need me to tell you that.
Now check it, Rvp scores today, sets up another teammate for a goal, signs a new contract tomorrow – And then i woke up sweating in the middle of the night, it was all a dream.
FUCK Van Pussy Fuck Him Deeply Fuck him in n out Fuck him wherever his injury prone ass ends up fuck him n the rest of his doomed career.Fuck him 4 biting the finger that fed him! May he choke up in the pay per week he gets whereever his perfidious ass end up.Fuck him!!!
Ladies, ladies, would it hurt to tell the blog owner how good his blog is?
Apart from the new signings on show today, i can’t wait to see Gnabry and Eisfield play, youngsters breaking through into the First team still gives me a high, figuratively speaking.
Btw, is Gnabry pronounced NA-BRY, that lil fucker is turning my tongue inside out.
@Khalifha
Yep. It was all a dream.
@@Khalifha
I think it’s the marble halls’ botty that’s turning your tongue inside out.
Hope some folks on twitter get †☺ read ds. No need †☺ abuse him now let him commit d crime 1st. Abusing him now will only increase his chances of leaving us. And blv M̶̲̅ε̲ if he leaves will b d worst loosers. No one let’s go of a 30goal forward and replaces him easily.
Ys.lets gt bhnd hm n i hope he wl stay.we need hm badly coz hs prsnce in da team has sum grt effct on our oponents dfnce so lets nt boo hm.
Is the game live on ESPN? It says five on the schedule but I think it kicks off at four?
Totally agree though, he is still wearing the red and white so we should stand behind him as we do with all our players. You never know he might just think, hey its not that bad where I am? But in all honesty I would be surprised that he does a Rooney. But stranger things have happened…?
No true Arsenal supporter will boo an Arsenal player. If RvP starts with the armband, he is likely to stay at Arsenal. If he starts w/o the armband, he’ll leave. Coming on as a sub, we cannot know what will happen.
Arsenal is stronger as a team with the current squad than in a long time. However, we still need to off load some and bring in a new GK. Fabianski and Mannone both want out and they are the only GKs that could have been considered back up for Szczesny.
@ NB – Seems ESPN are playing it ‘as live’ at 5.15. I think I’ll wait for that as I still have mental scars from the low quality of previous Arsenal Player feeds.
@ Khalifha – yeah, pretty sure it’s NA-BRY. And thank you again for the props. Don’t listen to Big Al. He doesn’t realise that without constant reassurance my fragile ego will wither like a Tottenham Hotspur title challenge
“ere, I ‘eard that, pardon”
Decent first half – I know we’re not playing a top team but you can see the seeds of something special happening between Cazorla, Podolski and Giroud – all are looking like they could be golden signings. Cazorla is obviously special but Giroud has impressed me too – almost like a traditional striker, very direct, great positioning and movement, hence the fact he got more goal scoring opportunities than anyone else. Walcott is looking sharp, Coquelin looks ready to take the step up this season – exciting stuff.
Still look tired and a bit too spacious in defence but it’s pre-season and I think we’ll see that improve over the year.
What Zinc said + Cazorla was a joy to watch, Walcott also.
Ha! Big al, you fucker, am as hard as steel but seeing as YOU never complement MH ‘s blog, someone has to.
MH, I thought as much.
The Bould Effect is definately showing signs, i can’t remember the last time we played a full match without giving away a clear cut opportuinity, love it.
MH deserves some brown nosing, along with ACLF it’s one of my only daily reads in the blogosphere or whatever it’s called for the next ten minutes. I prefer the comments section here, people are way less sensitive – if you criticised Wengers haircut over there you’d get as group of angry children asking for your phone and wallet, here it’s much more relaxed though we could do with some more contributers – you’ll have to say something controversial again MH.
I didn’t mention (in detail) a lot of players in my post, like The Ox and Podolski for example who both produced real moments of magic and look like they could be key figures in the year ahead. Even Gnabry looks like he has something to him despite him hardly touching the ball and looking very raw.
Yes, we all want to keep RVP but with this many options and all these promising youngsters pushing through we will cope just fine without his services.
Also worth pointing out is that we didn’t have Arteta, Wilshere or Rosicky today, Wilshere was one of our best and most important players the season before last, Arteta was the glue that held us together last year and Rosicky had a big rise in form in the back end of the season – our squad depth is finally looking really healthy, so much so no-one can come close to agreeing on a best starting 11 and who’ll be sitting on the bench each week.
Colour me cautiously excited.
This blog and Ashburton Grove are definately my favs Zinc.
As for missing players, You forgot to add Sagna/Ramsey, even Yennaris has put himself in contention for the Right back berth with his pre season performances.
@Jimmy……You sure made your point mate. For what it`s worth, I agree!
Yeah Khalifha – plenty of others unmentioned and to come back. You’re right about Yennaris, he should be competing with Jenkinson while Sagna is away.