Sir Alex F has said his club “have hit a brick wall

By Tony Attwood

It was in all the papers so it must be true.  Sir Alex F has said his club “have hit a brick wall in their attempts to sign Robin van Persie from Arsenal.”

“We have made a bid and they [Arsenal] have been trying to negotiate with other clubs.  I don’t have a gut feeling on it at the moment, I must admit. We’re not getting any breakthrough with Arsenal. It’s difficult to say why they’re operating this way. I don’t know what their thoughts are because they’re not giving anything away.”

So perfidious Arsenal – talking to other clubs.

Err, what other clubs would that be?  Juventus whose manager has just been banned from football for 10 months?  Man City whose manager is waging a very public war against his own Director of Football for not bringing in enough new players and moving the old riff-raff like Adebayor on fast enough.  Oh and paying Wayne Bridge’s salary while on loan at Brighton.

The papers have been full of RVP flying to Manchester for a medical.  Then when it didn’t happen the papers were full of the report that “Some papers have suggested RVP is flying to Manchester for a medical”.   Not them of course – other papers.  It is always other papers.

“We are trying our best,” said the old trade unionist, “and hopefully it will come our way but there’s no progress at this moment in time. We just have to persevere.”

Part of Sir F’s annoyance is that Lucas Moura went to Paris Saint-Germain for €45m rather than Manchester!  Paris instead of Manchester?  Who ever would have thought!

“I find it quite amazing that a club can pay €45m for a 19-year-old boy,” said Ferguson getting into the swing of things.   “To tell everyone that PSG are here they’ve signed Thiago Silva and Zlatan Ibrahimovic. They must have spent about £150m in the last month.”

Goodness, who ever would have thought a billionaire funded club that utterly failed to win the French league last season would spend the dosh.

Anyway, the fact is that Arsenal are annoying Sir F and that surely is a good thing.  In fact the one very good thing that has come out of the Billionaire Clubs issue is that Sir F and Man U are slowly coming to realise that while clicking your fingers might have all the media running up behind you, it doesn’t mean every other club will lie down and say, “yes please take our players”.

What Arsenal are doing with RVP is clever.   One more year out of him at his old salary is undoubtedly worth a gamble.  He might get injured, but that doesn’t matter since we’ll get nothing for him in the new year.  And if we re-signed him at his reportedly current demand level of £200k a week plus £10 signing on fee – that will be £20m – which is about as much as we would get if we sold him which is still an option – a good trade if we can get it.

Screwing Man U around is always good for morale in north London, and keeping RVP for his final year of decent football is a good move, since it is at the old salary.

But there is also the question of whether Man U really want him at the price he is demanding.  Sir F can’t say no, because the fans expect him to be dealing, and Sir F has repeatedly said that the Glazers have never once held him back in terms of transfer money.

Maybe by the time this is published RVP will have gone, but if so it is because Arsenal will have got what they wanted out of the deal.

But even if RVP does go to the northlands, there is the point that slowly Arsenal are moving away from the image of a year ago that clubs just had to click their fingers and Arsenal players would go running.

  First, it is clear that some clubs are thinking about FFP.  Second it is clear that there is a turn in the mood against clubs that buy everyone and then loan them out.  And third, very, very slowly I think players are recognising just how many ex-Arsenal men have screwed up by leaving.

In fact I think the Arsenal ought to hire a few ex-players like Hleb, Bentley, Flamini and the like to talk about what happened to them when they left Arsenal in order to get a better deal, more playing experience and the like.  Or if our beloved club won’t do it, perhaps we could persuade Billy the Dog and Sir Toby Belch to interview these beloved gentleman of the winter game, and talk to them, man to man (or in Billy’s case, canine to man) about life in the world beyond Arsenal.

I feel an interview with Nasri coming on.

And the news that with Man U hooping to sell shares for between $16 and $20, but cutting the price just prior to kick off to $14 – (effectively reducing the income of the Glazers by  $100m before they started).  Shares have risen by 5¢ after Wall Street describe the venture as “merchandising” rather than anything serious.

In later trading shares fell back.  No one wants last year’s shirt.