The recent victory for Arsenal over our old rivals Manchester United was a key point of the season for a number of reasons. It ended a long Old Trafford hoodoo for the Gunners, put the label of big game bottlers further behind us, kept us in with a good chance of another trophy and was further evidence that Arsenal are on the up after some lean years.
But it also gave Arsenal fans the chance to taunt our rivals for the same thing we have had to suffer in the last decade, seeing one of our former players doing well at another club. For Danny Welbeck to hit the winner against his former club in a very impressive performance made it all the sweeter- and helped to heal the wounds caused by Robin van Persie a couple of years ago.
According to a report in The Mirror, Arsenal fans could have another reason next season, because Arsene Wenger is apparently keen on bringing the England international defender Chris Smalling to north London to join his former team mate Welbeck.
Smalling’s contract with Man United will have just a year to run this summer and with van Gaal ready to throw another mountain of money at his struggling squad, Smalling could well decide that he needs to leave Old Trafford to further his career, and the way Welbeck has thrived with Arsenal might be all the encouragement he needs.
Wenger has been keen on the centre back since his Fulham days apparently and is ready to offer around £12 million to persuade United to sell. So what do you think about this Arsenal transfer rumour Gooners?
Chris Smalling is world class he won more medals than anyone in the team apart from Welbeck, Ozil and Alex
We should take ur boy Falcao on loan IF the price is right.
Noooooooooooooo!!!!!
I can think of other defenders id rather have
Subiotic
Ginter
Godin
Howedes
Baines
Clyne
van Dijk
Unfortunately players like Hummels, Verane, Ramos, Alaba, Silva, Boateng etc are out of the question
Smalling doesn’t seem very ambitious to me
Also would he be worth £12 Million?
thats alot of defenders but are they considered as home grown?
or should we just ignore the quota and spend big?
@Hafiz,
What kind of a question is that? Are you starting to doubt our new transfer strategy?
SPEND SPEND SPEND!
Maybe there’s still a chance on Ramos. The world class hard worker CB is underpaid by Madrid (among 60-80K per week). The real “galacticos” in there is one and only Christiano Ronaldo , and Madrid it seems rotates around him. Even Bacary Sagna gets his dream of 120K weekly as a bench warmer. But this Ramos story was a bit expired. I’m not up to date on it.
Maybe Madrid finally renewed his contract. Did you know?
Falcao guarantee goals….
hes in the same league with Cavani, Lewandoski and co..
Yeah before world cup 2014 he was. Right now? He’s completely lost in space. He’s a strong candidate to be ManUre’s flop ever. Lucky for them, he’s just on loan.
I wouldnt write him off totally yet, i believe a certain system could bring the goals back. It would be a bit like wondering if Sanchez first half season goalscoring is over and done with so should we only go by what we see in latest form. With Sanchez his goals dried up for second part of season whereas Falcao basically the entire… but that can happen even to top players especially after a move.
Luckily for us Sanchez brings plenty besides just his goals… and we know if/when he gets the chances he will eventually destroy nets.
Believe me, he’s not even on Arsene shortlist.
Cant see this happening. Smalling has really improved his performance and has been a regular feature under lvg. Welbeck was never wanted by lvg so he sold but cant see any other player being sold to us.
How United have conceded so few goals this season I’ll never know.. I’d like to see a lot more of Gabriel before we buy more defenders, unless we’re buying a proven top class defender. I’d like Mertesacker to be replaced, but who’s to say Gabriel isn’t good enough? I can’t tell how good he is yet, but he certainly looks promising. Really glad he got a call-up for Brazil, hope he boots David Luiz out the squad.
Have to say they their defensive organisation is improving and that is one of the major reason. And then they have a world class keeper who has had a big influence.
But its unbelievable how they have overcome the odds and are still in top 4. I wont take them lightly.
Only players I’d take from United are De Gea and Di Maria.
But off topic, I just looked on whoscored and apparently, statistically we’re the second best attacking side in Europe, behind only Bayern Munich. Tellingly however, we’re 44th defensively… But still 5th overall, the highest of any premier league side.
Yes it’s all seemingly meaningless statistics, no way are we better at attacking than Barcelona, we haven’t even scored the most goals in the league.. And if we’re supposedly the best side in the league, why aren’t we top? But I find it interesting to look into nonetheless. I wonder how low our defensive ranking was before Koscielny came back and Coquelin joined..
Sorry not interested! Wouldnt mind getting de gea though, if possible! Coyg!
Not gonna happen in real life. Besides, what’s wrong with Ospina?
Wenger is clearly building an English foundation.
I think Smalling will be a good addition, it will bring our english players closer than ever. I can imagine Chambo, Gibbs, Chambers, Walcott and Smalling havin a laugh.
But quality wise, he is no where near our best defender quality, Koscielny. But he is a good replacement for Mertesacker.
English players are always welcome at Arsenal
another central defender if only BFG leaves ,i think we have enough defensive back up and it would great that our academy players gets some chance to play and show their class.
We have Kos, Chambers, Gabs and Mert.
We only need if someone leaves, we still have Jenks who is Rb, but can play there.
Smalling just doesn’t do it for me.
While I definitely think Smalling would improve with Arsenal, I’m not keen on him coming to the Emirates, we can definitely do a lot better for £12m.
smelling.. nonononononono.