Well, the great news, Arsenal, is that it isn’t your football that is making Hleb want to leave you - no, he loves the style of play - it’s your city, your home, your people. They’re the problem.
Like most agents, the man who does all of Hleb’s talking (Nikolai Shpilevski) doesn’t like to put words in anyones mouth, but still chose to air exactly what is going on in the busy mind of the bendy-legged Arsenal man, at least as far as he can tell.
“Alexander is just tired of the noisy and chaotic life in the British capital and feels like living in calmer surroundings,” he sighed, “if any clubs want to add Hleb to their ranks they should talk to Arsenal.”
The big talk in the various underground drinking holes of North London is that the promising French midfielder Lassana Diarra is going to continue his whistle-stop tour of Great Britain with a prolonged visit to Spurs. That’ll be his eighty-ninth club this year - or his third.
And yet, how useful would he have been on the other side of North London at Arsenal, had Wenger maintained his chilling ability to see into the future? Plus, more importantly, are we wrong to be losing faith in the proven football scholar?
Of course, miserly Arsene Wenger is not a man to splash the cash. Or so everyone thought yesterday. Today it transpires that the scholarly French gentlemen forks out astonishing amounts of money on young players, and now he’s barged the big guns at Man United out of the way to sign Lyon youngster Hatem Ben Arfa.
The zippy left winger was supposed to be heading off to United for £14.4 million, but the player has confirmed that he talked with Arsenal, and may yet be off to North London instead for around £16 million - which is £500 zillion in Wenger currency.
“Today I am at Lyon, we will see what tomorrow is made of,” said Ben Arfa, steeping his sentence in gorgeous mystery.
While Wenger has spent years convincing the world that his eagle eyes can spot potential a mile off, Rafa Benitez sees the Arsenal man’s methods in a totally different light - he said this to liverpoolfc.tv:
“I think we are signing fantastic young players but not spending big, big money. I think that is the massive difference between Arsenal and us. They have spent big money on young players for a long time.
WAG gives strong indication that contract battles are nearly over
There’s a whole lotta kerfuffle over Alex Hleb and his contract buyout, but his wife - former WAG of the Day and Belarusian popstar Anastasia Kosenkova - has given the strongest indication yet that Professor Wenger is losing his battle to keep the midfielder.
According to a source at her fancy-pants Esporta gym, Anastacia cancelled her membership yesterday. Could a toned starlet with such hard-to-maintain abs live without her plush workout space? Of course not, but there are plenty of high end fitness clubs in Northern Italy…
Visit a North London pub at any time during the week, and you’ll see two grown men ferociously bloodying one another’s noses, bellowing profanities about Tottenham and Arsenal. The debate as to which is better will rage until the end of time. Except in the Jonathan Woodgate house.
Newcastle boss believes the traditional handshake is so passé
As Harry Enfield’s ‘Big Bob Joylove’ proved beyond reasonable doubt, nothing endears you to a rival, colleague or casual acquaintance quite like a good pat on the face.
Kevin Keegan is a strong advocate of palm-to-cheek affection, and has been avoiding the handshakes of players and managers up and down the country since his nineties prime.
Take a look at the inspirational gallery below and remember - why shake someone’s hand when you could invade their personal space?
Look at the more successful managers in the league at the moment (Ferguson, Wenger, even O’Neill) and they appear to have one thing in common - they build their teams, slowly introducing players, always maintaining a good balance of old and new.
At United, wise old heads like Scholes and Giggs know that they won’t play every game, but their importance to the team is never underestimated. Other newer faces like Nani, Hargreaves and Anderson are happy to wait their turn. Likewise, Wenger manages to keep his bench pretty happy, and it’s rare that you’ll see a thunderous face fidgeting in the dugout.
Winger snubs Arsenal’s anti-English policy via bespoke footwear
A thoroughly trustworthy friend of The Spoiler has sent us a tale concerning David Bentley’s unorthodox departure from Arsenal:
When Bentley was at Arsenal, he kept putting in transfer requests which were rejected. He went on loan at Norwich, came back, and the same thing happened again.
By the summer of 2005, he was completely fed up, so had some special boots made. On one was written “English and proud,” and the other, “So I’m never picked.” The next morning at training, he called Arsene Wenger over and showed him.
As a Lampard-less Chelsea gifted two points to Wigan (and left my Betfair account emptier than Ashley Cole’s sense of morality), Avram Grant looked to be a man with far too much on his plate. Nipping on his heels as the next candidate to spend more time with the missus at weekends is mouthy Spaniard Rafa Benitez, whose threat to quit amid the boardroom shitstorm at Anfield should not be taken lightly.
So who will be next to go? It seems to be a two horse race between the Chelsea and Liverpool gaffers, but there’s always the threat of Arsene ‘Injustice’ Wenger calling time after a season of slow decay - could the Arsenal conspiracy theorists be right about his departure? And how about Fergie - he bottled retirement after a lukewarm season at Old Trafford a few years back, so why not go out on a high?
