Friendlies, Fernandes And Futures.

Plenty of friendly games today as the English clubs started off their pre-season schedule with Man City, Arsenal and Liverpool all in action. These games meant that the press could have a word with all 3 managers and some interesting comments were made.

City used the occasion to announce the signing of Switzerland Under-21 captain Gelson Fernandes from FC Sion for an undisclosed fee, thought to be around 3.8 million pounds. He is pretty highly rated and should see some first team action this season as the City squad is still looking relatively empty. It is another decent signing from Sven, and there should be a few more signings on the way for City with Giuly apparently becoming a transfer target. City, at the moment, are like a pint of Guinness that has only just started being poured...they still need to fill up the rest of the glass and wait for it to settle, so patience is the order of the day for City fans. Still, when the Guinness is finally ready, it tastes damn good. I think City are moving in the right direction under Sven, and they'll be a very difficult team to face this season.

Over to Liverpool where Rafa might still buy a couple of players depending on what the new owners think. I still think they need another out-and-out winger if they really want to challenge for honours this season, but their team is looking very good at the moment.

At Arsenal, Wenger made some good comments about the state of the team and his own future. He was happy that Cesc wanted to stay (obviously), was pretty sure that Reyes is heading off to Madrid, and didn't want to talk about his future as it wasn't the right time. Reyes is a player with huge natural talent, and still has time on his side, but if he's unhappy at Arsenal then there's no use trying to play him, and the spanish climate is a natural place for him to move back to. The fee will be interesting, and it wouldn't be a suprise to see him leabe for about 7 million quid as everyone knows Arsenal want to sell.

The comments Arsene made about his future,
"I have shown my commitment in the past...I will come out at the right moment...maybe when you don't ask me question."
They were said in a good natured way, and he has always waited for the right moment to announce his contract extensions in the past, so I don't think there's anything to worry about here. If you think about it, Arsene is pretty much in complete control of Arsenal football club, and while it remains that way there is no way that he would want to move to a club where he would not be able to wield complete power over the team, such as Real Madrid. He'll definitely be at Arsenal for one more season, then it will be a matter of seeing if Kroenke has taken over Arsenal or not...until then he'll be concentrating on challenging for the title.

Not much transfer news, the usual rumours doing the rounds, though it does seem that Wigan are on the verge of signing Marlon Harewood from West Ham in a 4 million pound deal. I'm not a huge fan as I don't think he has the footballing intelligence to become a top striker, there's no doubting his raw pace or his work rate, but a good enough defender should be able to force him out of the game by channelling his runs into non-threatening areas. I'd use him as an impact player in the last 15 minutes of the game when the opposition are tiring and he can use his pace to force them to defend deep, allowing pressure to mount on the goal, which usually leads to defensive mistakes and the possibility of a goal. Still, 4 million does strike me as slightly too much.

Pretty quiet everywhere else, good to see Dean Ashton playing today, if he regains his form then he'll be a real threat for West Ham, but who knows how the injury has affected him. Copa America final tomorrow night, should be a cracker, Argentina to win 3-2 with Riquelme to open the scoring...wonder what the odds are? Night all.