Another news round-up volume 1

As the Blackpool game approaches I thought it would be a good time to start a quick review of the week's news, something we shall aim to do here on a completely random and intermittent basis, if I were unemployed then it would be a regular fixture but unfortunately I do have a job which does get in the way of being at all reliable with sticking stuff up on the blog.

Our injury curse has struck and Samir Nasri is out for a month. It sounds like he must have sustained a meniscal tear (the sport's cartilage in the knee) against Liverpool which has been tidied up today with some keyhole surgery. That's bad luck for Samir who has arguably looked our best and most determined player in pre season, still at least it's in a position in which we are very well covered. With Koscielny suspended this weekend, Johan Djourou is set to make his first league start for many a moon, provided he doesn't get injured between now and then. Armand Traore looks to be on his bike and that would make sense when he is so far down the pecking order.

When I had a browse of the web earlier today I stumbled upon a hell of a lot of positive media reaction to the Arsenal Fanshare scheme, it does sound like a great idea and I did no hesitate in sticking a few quid into it without telling my other half. I reckon it could be rather popular and it's a great way in which the average supporter can get involved to have a bit more an influence than they may otherwise have had. I just wish I were rich enough to buy a few whole shares, maybe one day.

The reliability of the Internet was shown perfectly by these two stories, one claiming Schwarzer was having a medical and the other claiming that this was nonsense. It's an interesting Internet phenomenon that one can attract more readers by making sensational claims than one can by being boring and pragmatic. I suppose this is why everyone should let comments to their articles go uncensored (obviously there are some extreme exceptions), anyone routinely censoring or hiding from comments must have something hide from in my opinion.

The keeper situation has been subject to much debate in recent days and I have to say I have found all the banter fairly interesting. I think the Cannon gets things pretty near the mark, overall I am convinced the goalkeeping situation has been mismanaged in this pre season and this had made things very hard for Manuel Almunia to carry on, harder they may have been if things had been managed better in my eyes.

Certainly another thing that has become clear is that goalkeeping statistics are completely useless and unreliable. The stats commonly used like % of shots saved and the number of shots saved/game are not good predictors of goalkeeping quality for several reasons, one main one being that the way one's team defends has a massive impact on the number of shots and the difficulty of saving these shots. Dave Seaman reckons Schwarzer should be signed and we shall see if this happens in the next few weeks with the transfer window due to close shortly.

Mick McCarthy has backed Arsene Wenger's comments on the new rules that restict Premier League teams' squads. It was interesting to read about yet another ridiculous new rule from FIFA that will enable players to scrap their contracts if they don't play enough games. FIFA are truly a bunch of absolute monkeys, on one hand they justify not introducing video technology because it would be too complex and not perfect enough, however at the same time they keep introducing new rules which make the game ever more complex and which will undoubtedly make a lot of lawyers a lot richer. They really make me fume with their inconsistent and incredibly incompetent approach.

As you can see above, the famous clock end is back is back! We are all to be asked to take to our seats a bit earlier this weekend as the stadium ends are to be renamed the new clock end and the new north bank, not forgetting the east and west stands. Most importantly I wonder what people will sing? Will those such as myself who resided in the old clock end at Highbury continue to sing as if clockenders, or shall we become north bankers? The mind boggles.