There is a big difference between "midfield" and "central midfield", if you see what I mean.....What you are talking about is the latter!

Its difficult to conclusively gauge which team has the best midfield.....The only gauge I can think of is the number of trophies in the cabinet. The number of trophies won will reflect the nature of midfield a club has.

Make no mistake, a club with a lousy midfield will never win anybody any trophy.

Whereas aseno defence is taunted as the weak link in the team, I believe the weakness of aseno is bigger than their so called suspect defence. When a club keep conceding goals from dead-balls, its very cruel to keep on blaming the defence. The job of defending set-pieces is not a preserve of designated defenders only.

Even if aseno signed Samba, Jagielka and Cahill, they will still struggle to win the EPL so long as they continue playing without varying their game plan to suit various circumstances and oppositions.

You can't play against a team like, say,Man U the same way you play against,say, Stoke. Similarly, you can't continue keeping the ball on the ground when the other team is clearly on a different mission.

The aseno game entails swift exchange of passes between several players. The danger with that system is that when one pass goes astray or its intercepted, players are caught out of position and conceding silly goals becomes very easy.

@ Mwenza.....The only way to play against teams like Stoke and Blackburn is by having a strong defensive strategy. Most of our players don't have that physical presence which you need to defend against such teams.

Last season, Arsenal were the only team who averaged over 60% possession, had the best pass completion in the attacking third, had more touches in the opposition penalty area than any other side. We scored 72 goals, which was the second best in the league (Man Utd had 78). However, more than 50% of the goals conceded by Arsenal were from set-pieces....the highest in the league. Apart from Barca, i don't think there's any team which totally dominated Arsenal...almost kila wakati ni mambo ya goals scored against run of play, Why? Djourou or Koscielny caught out of position. Late comebacks & defensive errors were the biggest stories of last season. We have one of the best (if not the best) midfield in the league but we also have very weak centre backs who play with a high line in defense.

@ McReggae....My point is that i don't think Man Utd's defense would have been that strong with the likes of Evans and Smalling at the back all season.

@ Mwenza....Those midgets you're referring to are the same sort of players Barca have been using to thrash top teams around Europe. If you look at all the goals we conceeded from set plays, they were due to defensive errors from either Squillaci, Koscielny or Djourou nothing to do with the other players. Yes Drogba sometimes gets back to defend but then again are chelsea that good in counter attack football? You do not need to deploy other players to defend if you have quality centre backs.


Even with our weak defense we only conceeded 6 goals more than Man Utd and 10 more than the other top two teams....i don't need to repeat what i said on goals scored. We have Vermalen, like i said what we need is just one more defender with height to counter aerial balls. I have no problem with our players moving forward in an attack after all statistics are there to show that we've conceeded (like everyone else) very few goals from open play.

Well, our midgets are the only team to have beaten Barca in the CL last season and guess how we did it...Counter attack. C'mon Gibbs was playing in his first CL game .....kind of what Rafael experienced against Bayern. Instead of arguing you should compare how many goals we've scored from open play with that of other top teams.

Sorry i meant conceeded....i think i had already mentioned how many we scored.

Nasri AKA MacMuga is about to complete the much talked about move to Man City, unlike Fabregas i feel nothing for this player. He has betrayed the fans and the manager's trust by joining Man City because his move is more motivated by money than success....if he wanted to sign a new contract he would have done it a long time ago. Since he joined the club, he's only had one good season (last season) but now he thinks hatutoshi. We'll take the 25m and move on......

We used to have a player by the name Alex Hleb who after a good season left the club for Barca in a similar manner , last i heard of him was when Birmingham were being relegated.

The Defender Wenger Will Actually Sign!!

Arsene Wenger needs a centerback. It is the worst kept secret in the transfer market.

Wenger has been determined this summer in his pursuit of an additional defender.

On the heels of the Cesc Fabregas transfer and Nasri’s imminent departure, the boss has money to spend. He has said he will spend if he finds quality.

There have been nearly a dozen names bandied around Wenger’s radar, many of which are unsuitable to the Arsenal boss. Every Arsenal fan hopes for the Frenchman to ‘splash the cash’ and sign a big name to Arsenal’s first XI.

Let’s approach the subject understanding Arsene’s typical tendencies in the transfer market.

1) The transfer has to be cheap.

This is Arsene 101, it may as well be stamped on every Wenger transfer – “quality of player for dollar spent”. This more than likely rules out Gary Cahill. A fantastic defender but the 17.5M price tag would be Arsene’s most expensive in his 15 year reign. Add to that picture, Borussia Dortmund’s 18M-rated Neven Subotic.

2) The player has to be young.

Right below the first point should be this addendum. Arsene rarely spends on players over the age of 25 – notable exceptions in Tomas Rosicky (26), Andrei Arshavin (28), Chamakh (26) and others. This likely rules out Phil Jagielka (29), Christopher Samba (27) and former dark horse, Emir Spahic (31).

3) The player has international experience.

Arsene rarely has a preference for which arena the experience comes from, but it is necessary. It can be call-ups for the U-21 side or national teams of lower UEFA rankings (see, Thomas Vermaelen and Belgium or Marouane Chamakh’s Morocco).

This rules out Birmingham’s Scott Dann. The Liverpool-born defender has only registered two U-21 appearances and zero full national team appearances.

4) The player rarely has a long contract.

Leverage is one of Arsene’s favorite weapons in the market. When players are on the last year of their contract, their transfer fee greatly diminishes.

This leaves one player standing and he is an exceptional talent.

216 senior club appearances
26 years of age
75 senior international caps
11 months left on his contract
Rumored transfer fee of 6m-10m very ideal

Per Mertesacker, step forward. A 6’6 German national team stalwart – Arsene should rightly choose the Werder Bremen backline stopper.:-)

@TAZ - The Juan Mata move is almost complete. But not to Arsenal - Cesc's move to Barca notwithstanding.

Valencia Agree to Sell Juan Mata

We need to sign...convincing players to come will also be a challenge...recently heard Mata was to move to akina @Kingfisher...sad indeed...Wenger identifies, other clubs buy. But I think his decisions are based on qualifying for CL...it beefs up his coffers