Sunday 21 June 2015

Petr Cech to Arsenal - Head Scratching Moment

Here I am trying to make sense of Arsenal & Arsene's desire / longing / plan / wish to sign Petr Cech.

Fantastic Goal Keeper in his time as Chelsea Number 1 don't get me wrong. He was worth the mythical 10 points that pundits throw at you without any data / stats to back up their usual release of hot air from their well manicured derriere.  PUNDITS. Don't get me going.

To be fair, I remember Cech was on Arsene / Arsenal's radar in 2004 before he joined Chelsea. And for those who only started watching football yesterday and are enemies of Google, Claudio Ranieri signed Cech.

I don't know if Cech knew in advance that Jose was coming or believed it was easier to displace Claudio Cudicini than to do same to Jens Lehman. I wonder if these considerations prompted his choice of Chelsea. The rest is history and I doubt if there is a more successful (domestic & European titles / trophies / stats etc) goal keeper in the modern day history of the EPL.

Is Professor Wenger in love with that 21 year old he nearly signed? Or is he in love with the Cech that is number 2 at Chelsea? I don't have the answers but I am very dubious about this signing.

My pros of the signing are as follows:

1) He is not any better than our current GKs. So in effect we are not really going back if we sign him and sort of maintain status quo on the quality scale. Not a wholehearted pro but you get my point.

2) Wenger will be weakening the Chelsea squad. By Jose's own admission (lies and damned lies, that's anything he says by the way), they have the two best GKs in the EPL. So taking one away from them is definitely weakening them. Except they can persuade a top 5 GK who is number 1 in his club to join them and sit on the bench, I think they are weakened.

3) Jose didn't want to sell Cech to any team in the EPL especially not Arsenal. So a bloody nose to Jose and his coterie of Okada driving fans in Nigeria is always welcome.

4) Many on social media have commented about the potential similarities with the Edwin Van De Sar to Manchester United move. If this happens, there will be no opposition to renaming the Emirates Stadium as 'the house that Arsene built' and simultaneously renaming the club as 'Arsene FC'. Time will tell my friends.

5) I am somewhat in the Wenger knows best camp and will have to see how this one pans out. The man has had some turkeys and some absolute flyers in the past. For his sake, I hope Cech is one for the later category.

Now to the cons:

1) See point 1 above. Why not go for a GK with a better pedigree than we currently have? I have jokingly suggested that we approach Marc Andre Ter Stegen and make him a huge offer to be our number 1. I am aware that he will cost north of £30m but I think if we believe we need a new GK, that is the kind of player we should be aspiring towards.

2) A GK is as good as the back four in front of him. If we bring Cech in and play him at the back of a shaky back 4, he will look ridiculous and the signing will likely unravel. So I hope to God we are planning to improve our back 4 too.

3) Please Google 'petr cech howlers' and realise that he is not a miracle worker and he is not the cure all for all our ills as a club.

4) The rumours are that Ospina will leave. I think this is unfair except if this is down to Ospina himself wanting the move. I doubt he will want to go to Turkey though. I love Ospina. Admired him at the Brazil World Cup and wanted him to succeed at Arsenal. Same way I love Szczesny. I was delighted that Wojciech was joint winner of the Golden Gloves two seasons ago. I hope in turn this love will be transferred to Cech when he becomes Arsenal number 1. We shall see.

Back to Ospina, I don't think he has done much wrong. His stats prove it although as I said before, your performance as a GK depends on how good your back 4 are. Before Ospina had even played a game for the club, some notable Arsenal bloggers had written him off. My suspicions are that this was down to the fact that Scz is Arsenal through and through and they only expressing their bias. Although to be fair to Ospina's critics, you probably want to say there were some question marks with some of the goals he conceded especially the one against Swansea at the Emirates.

In my opinion, looking at the little I know of human nature and adding 2 and 2 together to arrive at 22, I believe the defenders were a lot less nervous with Ospina in goal than they were with Scz. The latter is somewhat more erratic and regularly prone to doing a FULL ALUMNIA.

So why should Ospina make way? Unfortunately it is football. It is the kind of career they signed up for. I am surprised though as Wenger has a reputation as one of the big great romantics of the game and I find it difficult to believe he will ship out Ospina sharp sharp just like that.

As with most things. Time will tell. As a fan, I just need to get on my bike and praise sing Petr Cech when he appears for Arsenal and kisses the badge and accidentally goes FULL Toni Schumacher' on John Terry.



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