Villa and Newcastle Moves Complicate Arsenal Transfer Situation

36:27In 2026, stop waiting and start selling with Shopify sign up for your$1 per month trial and start selling today at shopify.com slash arsenal vision that's shopify.com slash arsenal vision go to shopify.com slash arsenal vision hear your first this new year with Shopify by your side one other quick update want to let you know that we do have an app coming I'm excited for it iOS first, Android will follow it'll be a free app of course you can listen to all the episodes in the app and they'll drop quicker I know sometimes like with Apple for example the podcast feed just doesn't update right away this will update right away uh you'll be able to vote for stocks your stock rising stock falling in the app you'll be able to connect your patreon if you want if you only want to hear the patreon episodes and not the main you can just click a button and only hear those we'll have um you know the ability to do things in there that you want to do in there and the things you don't want to do in there you expressly will not do in there that that is important wanted you to know about that okay paul the transfer merry-go-round before we get into the specifics how much of this interconnectedness do you believe in people lose their mind when this when this club's going for this player it's going to affect us going for that player do you think there's as much interconnectedness as we believe or do you think that's more fan vibes sentiment than it is the reality of the transfer market uh for dealings with newcastle i think it's completely interconnected connected um it'd be one thing if we were going for bruno guimoresh and he was the first one out the door but given that he's their captain they're only remaining midfielder of any note and like uh kind of a a legend in the making for them if they ever won anything which they hopefully never will no yeah and so i think they were leaning on the fact you can sell to nally because we got Guy Muresh, you know, it's like, that's a choice.

38:21We'll take the money. We didn't want to lose him, but so be it. And Anthony Gordon, let's not forget. For sure. And like, so then they'll have lost Isaac last season, Anthony Gordon, Tonali. It looks like it's a fire sale. And I just don't, unless they have the guy that they can brag about to come in for Guy Muresh, I don't think he can get done. or it gets done at such ridiculous money that we're not going to pay completely ridiculous money for Gimares. We'll pay slightly ridiculous money or fairly ridiculous money, but not completely, absolutely nutty money. And I would hope we don't go all season in some kind of war of attrition trying to get the player out of there.

39:08It's not going to do anybody any good, I think, at the end of it. So, yeah, they need to have the option in place where they can say, look, we took Arsenal to the cleaners for 80 million, but we bought this guy who's really great and we're building for the future, which seems to be their current narrative, even if it isn't a narrative choice. It's the narrative of this is why we sold players we didn't want to sell and took all that money. Tim, what do you make of that? I mean, it is hard for me to believe that a club of Newcastle stature or whatever we perceive it to be, and maybe that stature is changing, can lose Gordon, Tenali and Gameraish and be sort of gazumped from Unzombie, who I think would be a really interesting addition.

39:55And by the way, I think a really savvy move for whoever wants to go get him and, you know, and still have any ability to compete, really. I mean, it's just such a talent drain without anything clear coming in to replace it. And I think the order of operations does sometimes matter because if you're Newcastle and you've already lost Gordon and you've already lost Tenali and Manzambi is now seemingly going to Villa. I don't think you can sell Gimreich until or unless you've got something of value in I mean you've got the cash has come in so I think you need to do that I think the idea that we can get Newcastle to say yes to a fee that we would be okay spending absent them having brought something in is a fantasy I could be wrong that could be fan mindset and I know Kia Jirabshian is involved and Kia tends to get the things done he wants to get done but what do you think of that the idea that newcastle might have to bring something in before they could possibly countenance accepting a fee let alone a a sort of reasonable fee for bruno gemerich yeah a lot of this is how much face are they willing to lose here um it feels already lost a lot yeah yeah yeah it feels like um and i don't say this pejoratively like but kind of bad pr as much as anything because really what newcastle are in is they need to do a bit of a rebuild um and getting a lot of money for a 28 year old who's got two well i believe it's emerged he's got two plus ones so they've effectively got him for for three years um but plus ones can be different sometimes it can be player side sometimes be club side but anyway like again economically it would make a lot of sense for them to make that sale even having lost to Nali and Gordon because you know they keep bumping up against these regulations both UEFA and Premier League and you know frankly they put this group together and they won a League Cup which I think they would have hoped was the start of something and not the culmination of it but it looks like with this group it's going to be the culmination and they've kind of got to go again and to be able to go again they're going to have to raise funds and they have been messaging about that um quite quite clearly not even back channel they've been saying look the reality is we're going to have to we're going to have to sell to buy and we're going to have to get good at that now um so but obviously having already sold to nali and you know uh and and gordon that does potentially make it more difficult i guess what gives me pause though is whenever this kind of stuff comes out like on one hand i can't think of specific examples off the top of my head i'm certain we've lost out on targets before because of this because it's like well they'd already sold player x so they wouldn't budge on player y i'm pretty sure that that's happened and that's quite a normal thing that happens on the other i feel like what comes out in public like there's a there's a trail on that right i'm pretty sure that like the tonali thing to tottenham that was widely reported but for a long time before it happened and even before something's reported i'm certain people in football know about it before like you know even someone like david ornstein that's presumably who he gets it from in the first place so like there's still a lag on information coming into the public so when arsenal are courting a player like bruno guimarese i don't think they find out that like tonali is going to spurs for 100 million because of a david ornstein tweet i'm pretty sure they already know that and you know the stuff about villa um hijacking one of their transfers um way to way to unite against the red cartel guys by the way um you know i'm pretty sure that people inside the game know that a few days before or at least know which way the wind's blowing so that yeah that does just give me a little pause where it's like i'm i'm sure that none of this is a mystery to a club like arsenal now there's some reporting out there that maybe we were misled on like what this would actually cost that there's Some reporting that 50 million would have gotten it done.

44:15We were told 50 million was an acceptable number. But then there's reporting that we've made two bids in excess of that. So why would we be told 50 million or get it done? We'll just pay 55 because we're really generous. Well, we are rich. We'll just add on 10 % for the hell of it. And without naming too many names, I think there is some reporting around Newcastle that can be difficult to trust. should we say. So I think we are going to have to wait and see on this one. The bottom line is, of course, it won't make it any easier, will it? It doesn't mean it won't get done, but it's certainly not going to make it easier.

44:55Yeah. Paul, because I want to get to this sort of Villa angle on this. This is where people can get mad at Arsenal, but you have to realize that there's sort of an ecology of transfers, right? There's this symbiosis. So Arsenal think, Newcastle have said, look, we're buying Manzambi. When we get him in, we're prepared to consider a bid for Gamer-Eich, but we really are not going to close that deal until then. Villa Gazump, Newcastle. We go to Newcastle and say, what does this do for the Gamer-Eich bin? They say, well, at this point now, we can't move him. Arsenal reasonably believed they were going to get Gamer-Eich based on conversations they had around what Newcastle were bringing in.

45:32Newcastle lose that player, and they have to change their stance to us. And then people start going, what's Berna doing? And it's like, well, we're all sort of somehow downstream of what each club is doing, right? There are dominoes here that affect each other. And so I wonder what you think of that. And it goes even further now because it looks like United maybe getting Tielemans. Tielemans supposedly has a release clause. Villa lose Tielemans. They get Manzambi. Well, you know, Onana's just done his ACL. can they lose Onana, Tielemans, and Rodgers with just Monsambi coming in? Again, I don't think so.

46:14And I'll tell you something. I don't think the Rodgers deal is close. I don't think we should just assume we're getting Rodgers. And I think until Newcastle have someone they believe they can get in midfield, I don't think the Bruno deal is close. And that's not me being negative. I think that's me looking at the reality of the clubs we're trying to buy from. look at the if the shoe was on the other foot and we just lost odegaard and we just lost ethan and we just lost i don't know zubomendi and we had a replacement and someone was bidding for rice and the replacement goes to another club there's no way we could sell it now i realize it's hard for any of us to put ourselves in that position because we're the biggest most successful most cherished club in the world we're we're the most valued club in the world obviously only we buy We never sell.

47:01It's actually close to true. If only we had some experience of losing, I don't know, Cesc and Nasri. But if you did that, you couldn't be a big club, as a manager famously said. But again, to bring this back to some type of question, do you think that either of those moves, Rodgers or Guimaraes, can happen unless and until those clubs have a sense of how they're going to deal with serious, significant losses in those areas and no real replacements lined up? No, not really. You create a very compelling case. It's a little depressing. When you look at the Villa situation, it's very hard to see how Rogers gets out of there until they work out how they line up their ducks.

47:46And like, maybe we're all going, remember we used to all be financial accountant experts because that's what you needed. I continue to be, just so we're clear. Net spend, all that good stuff. Maybe we're all about to become far, far more familiar with transfers at Newcastle and Aston Villa and their financial and market positioning and their relationships with their supporters. because, yeah, it doesn't look to me like we've got the easiest exit plans for those players. And, you know, it is part of the problem that we're now very committed to buying from the Premier League. And there's at least a 50-50 chance that the key target you're going for, probably greater than 50 % chance that he's in the top layer of the table.

48:40and you know here's two clubs we've and I think rightly so pissed off along the way Newcastle Aston Villa there's a we've now got real beef with these clubs and it's fun and all to come in for their best player and totally piss them off but there's a premium you pay for all of that that keeps inching the the cost of the player up and up and I think makes Bruno Guimaraes less and less likely um i still think rogers there's going to be a way to get that done somehow because michael normally gets his number one choice during the summer historically and that feels to me his number one choice but the bruno one i mean there's definitely a price at which we say this is silly and uh there's a silly price for rogers that we stay in for quite a while but yeah there's a series of moves but those clubs need to make those moves and have a plan for them now we're relying on their ability to execute in the market it's a lot of dependencies there are a lot of dependencies and and this is the thing and this goes back to my point about we just won the title so we love all our players and we don't want to say anything negative about them the team the club any of that but we want to continue to go and build on that season we just had i would argue of the past four seasons.

50:09Last season wasn't our best from a performance standpoint, but you don't control all the variables in a title-winning season. And over the four-year stretch, we definitely deserved at least one title, and we got one. That's how I kind of think about it. And it happened to be this one season. I'm very glad we did. And it was the depth of our squad that helped us get there during a very attritional season. If you told me we don't win the title this coming season, I do not think it's going to be because we ship a ton of goals. It's going to be because we don't score enough goals. I mean, I think we would all agree that if you had to pick one or the other, that would be probably what you'd think, right?

50:45And Tim, I mean, we scored 71 goals this past season. Now, it was a down season for goals, but the last time we did that, we were 10 points off the title. I don't think we can score 71 goals again and assume that we'll be winning a title or even really in the title race. Now, maybe we will. Maybe the league is changing. but I think we have to approach this summer with the position that 71 goals won't do it. And I think Mikel Arteta has spoken to that, by the way, that we need more goals. And that means being clear-eyed about the talent we have in the attacking group. We've really locked into Rodgers, which suggests to me that Mikel and the club must feel that Rodgers is how we get more goals.

51:25But let's just say for a second that that's not a clear and obvious approach. I mean, is there a world where we say this villain Newcastle stuff is too dynamic, it's too fluid, it's going to be too hard for us to pull off, and we go and we look at players who are actual, genuine forwards, attackers, players who can come in and get goals. And that leads you to a name like Barkala, but I'm wondering, you know, where else it leads you, and it goes back to my point about how few clear options there are there. So is there another approach that you think that we could pivot to at this point in the window to look at more natural attacking options who ensure that it isn't goal scoring that causes us to fall short this season?

52:13Yeah, maybe. Maybe we change the whole medical staff and that solves all our problems. We have. Yeah. Good point. I was burying the lead there. Well, all right. Can I give you a hypothetical? Quick hypothetical. And I'm going to ask you both just super quick. Sorry to cut across you, but I meant to ask this sooner. I am going to offer you one of two things. No transfers at all. None out, none in. So Leo's not going to, nobody leaves, nobody comes in. But you're guaranteed every player is 100 % fit the entire season. Every player, you can pick them for every game. Or I can't guarantee you fitness.

52:49You have to roll the dice on that. But you can have whatever signings you want. Which are you taking, the fitness or the signings? or if it's whatever signings i want yeah then i'm taking whatever if it's who we're linked with credibly i'm probably taking the fitness i'm probably saying yeah saka have a urdegaard i suppose with urdegaard it's as much form am i getting the form with the fitness that's still take the fitness every game of saka every game of kai or yokris every game of leo or martinelli if you want to play Ezzo over there, it means you can, you know, Odegaard and Rice and Zubomendi and Miles and all the defenders.

53:29I mean, like, I don't see anybody challenging us if every one of our players is fully fit for the season. Now, by the way, you can't have that. That's the whole point. But I don't think we have a deficit of talent. And you have to plan that that's not going to happen. Right. Which is what we did last season as well. And it didn't happen and we were right to plan that way. And to your point, we have to plan that winning the goal was 71. Only three Premier League champions have scored fewer. So it's not unprecedented. One of which was us, actually, in 1997-1998. One of which was Leicester. And we're likely to need a lot more open play goals because the PGMOL is coming for our corners.

54:10Yeah, because there's a big moral panic about scoring from corners. Yeah, exactly. And we might be fine. we might like i i actually think given what they're proposing with corners i don't expect it'll impact us too much because like well no because lots of people like have just assumed because we're good at corners that we're like we've got everyone in a headlock and actually when you look at our corners what happens is everyone goes to the back post and runs in like there's there's there's actually not that much physical contact at all um it's almost like so you're saying the rule is gabrielle magliese has a free run at the six yard box oh no don't do that yeah yeah exactly but what i would kind of plan on is that there is pressure on the premier league for some reason to have fewer goals from corners i don't know why i don't know why equivalent moral panics don't exist i don't know why if we have like a season of lots of players scoring from long range do lots of just some influential people say i don't like goals from long range get rid of them i don't know i don't know what this is all about but that's um that's another rant altogether but i'm with you paul let's plan on the fact that we will probably get goals from corners ruled out for no reason for no other reason than probably the referee will feel under pressure like there's a quota or something like oh uh yeah i've got to disallow this for some reason we have seen that during the world cup so yeah plan on all the disaster scenarios definitely so um yeah yeah if you if you offered me uh one of those two i'm taking the fitness but i also know that's very unlikely to happen particularly off the back of a world cup year our two best title challenges really have well our three best to be honest have come off the back of non-tournament summers and you could argue that the first one the mid-season world cup had something to do with it maybe it didn't i don't know but it was there and we weren't as good after it so um you know it's it's maybe semi-unprecedented for us to really put together a title challenge uh under michael arteta off the back of a of a tournament so we have we have to disaster plan 100 well okay yes agreed but and we we won it last year because we did because the disasters happened yeah not the big injuries and we mitigated against them and and the squad came through and they did and and so now paul to my to my point about is it rogers that boosts the attack is it game race that gives us more of that progressiveness there is another player back on the agenda that's kind of re-entered the picture and that's julian alvarez um atleti seem open to selling i don't think they'd like to sell to barcelona i think it's possible we're being used in an inevitable move to Barcelona.

57:06I mean, we've seen this before, where a third club gets sort of brought into the picture to force the other side to the table in a proper way, but Lillian Alvarez obviously just scored a brilliant goal in the World Cup, so now he is once again the best player in the world and the one we should be going for, after having not really impressed in the World Cup prior to that, but that's beside the point. I really rate the player. I am dubious about whether he wants to be in England and at Arsenal when it's pretty clear that Barcelona is his first choice. Now, the idea that a player comes to you when you're second choice and then doesn't work his ass off and try hard to win, I don't buy that.

57:46I think if they come, they play as hard as they can and they try their best. But I certainly think that would be an issue for some. I think Mikel Arteta is someone who only wants players that really want to be a part of the project what do you make of those rumors resurfacing the extent to which there could be a there there and whether that is the player who could boost our attack to the goal level that it needs to hit yeah so um look I've obviously got no sources so yeah yeah I'm with you on that Which is great. I got a clean sheet of paper here. There's a chance. There's absolutely a chance.

58:24Let me make the case for why there's a chance. Barcelona would probably go deep into the window, stinking the place up to make it very difficult for Julian Alvarez to stay with Atletico Madrid. but Atletico Madrid really don't want to let him go to Barcelona and would welcome any other option. So he may not be quite as ridiculous for us price-wise as he would otherwise be. Mikel's worked with him. So they either like each other or they hate each other. It's very probable they like each other a lot. Alvarez left the Premier League because he wanted to go back to Spain but Spain's a small place so if you're going to go back to the Premier League a place that maybe he decided wasn't his favourite thing for his style of football at least he's gone back to Miguel who he knows and the Barcelona thing may not pan out in terms of a deal so what are the odds maybe 10-15 % the problem might be if it happened so late in the window that we'd you know with Bruno Guimaraes and Morgan Rodgers wearing the red and white of Arsenal, we might be going through the petty cash tray and finding£5.23.

59:42And that's always the problem with Arsenal. But there's absolutely a path there. Improbable as it may be, I'd put maybe 15%, 20 % on it. Maybe that's a little high even because other options do come up along the way. somehow that we're not seeing in our universe where there's only two places he can go um but look there's a chance and there's a relationship and like Mikel's pretty good talking to players and he knows you know they speak the same language they have the same reference points uh he's from Barcelona uh himself so well from their academy they've they've so much common material to work with that it's definitely a possibility.

1:00:33And he's Arteta's maybe dream attacker. And that's got to be appealing to Julian Alvarez too. And we've been in the final of the Champions League, semi-final of the Champions League, which is something Barcelona haven't been recently. Not the final anyway. So we've a lot of chips to play with. Yeah. We can pay. yeah I really like Julian Alvarez like he's the kind of player I like you think he can influence the game in different areas he can move out wide he can play through the middle he can score you spectacular goals he can help create goals I realize his output for Atleti wasn't spectacular this past season but as we've discussed first of all the output from individual players in general is down other than Erling Haaland you know non-penalty goals from players are in the third sort of 14, 12, 10 goals in the Premier League.

1:01:26Those are your leaders. That's what you're getting. You know, our top goal scorer had, what, 11 non-penalty goals this season in the Premier League? And that was Victor Yocres, I believe. You know, or thereabouts. So it's, you know, you're not talking about who's the next 30-goal scorer for Arsenal. That's just not the era we're in. I think Arsenal have looked better under Mikel Arteta when we play with forwards who can be part of the buildup and combine and drop into midfield more. And we've had issues with that, certainly. There were times when Jesus was dropping too much into midfield. If you go back before that, when Lacazette was dropping too much into midfield and not getting into the box to support the attack.

1:02:02But I think our best attacks generally have an on-ball, build-up-involved attacker. And I think Julien Alvarez could be that guy. Tim, you have thoughts on him? yeah I'm I'm kind of I can understand why um you know this might be Arteta's first choice you know whether it's the most realizable I don't know but it kind of feels like he's a bit Morgan Rogers but he's a bit Kai Havertz as well I think that's kind of what we're getting at here like he's got that shot from the edge of the area and that seems to be of some importance I think to Arteta in buying Eza being interested in Morgan Rodgers he wants more way and Zubimendi as well like clearly he wants that kind of um that threat at the top of the box uh quite a bit more Alvarez gives you that but he comes back into midfield and he links and and he does all that nice stuff as well and I think because ultimately the the kind of I guess riddle with like an elite team is if you're gonna have like a truly elite goal scorer who can get 25 30 goals a season and this isn't new by the way quite often the thing they share in common is that they're not really going to be involved in the build-up like Harland isn't like Van Nistelrooy wasn't like Ian Wright wasn't um this is where Thierry Henry was a real unicorn like you're always making that trade-off and to make that trade-off worthwhile the player has to score 25 to 30 goals a season because like we're kind of losing something by you being there same with like you know we were talking about Jude Bellingham earlier they were genuine and I think understandable kind of articles about whether he should come to the World Cup Tuchel actually did leave him out sometimes those players do give you a tactical problem but basically if they keep scoring enough goals then that's fine and to your point Elliot I'm not sure that player is out there I'm not sure that player exists in terms of like this guy will score 30 goals a season and therefore all his other shortcomings won't bother us like Jokeres Jokeres has those shortcomings as well and the debate there will always be does he score enough goals to to make up for those shortcomings and people will vary on that whereas Alvarez feels to me like a bit of a hybrid between a lot of the players that we're that we're interested in so I can definitely see why if it was Arteta's choice and you took out all the usual factors that dominate whether you get signings done or not that Alvarez would probably be his kind of dream signing.

1:04:40Yeah, and managers have this thing where they often like to go for a player that they were impressed by when they played against them. I don't know if this is the case for Emery, but obviously Manzambi, who Villa are going for now, plays for Freiburg. Freiburg played against Villa in their Europa League final, right? Julien Alvarez, Mikel got to play against him three times this season. I think he impressed against us. I do. and but but also those games what happens in those games is you might have a chance to meet their agent yeah talk to them shake their hand at full time put an arm around them see how you see the the martinez video after argentina switzerland where he goes up to sorry you've just said his name and i've forgotten his name the swiss manzambi yeah manzambi it's so funny he just goes up to him you come into villa and he goes yeah and that's no way yeah no i haven't seen it that's amazing It's so good.

1:05:31Yeah. Oh, that's hilarious. Yeah. And by the way, I mean, to that point, a lot of the silliness is starting. I don't know if you saw it, but Kaio Saka had an Instagram post of him wearing his England shirt. Just so happens, don't read anything into it. It's him standing next to Morgan Rodgers in his England shirt. Just the two of them. That's it. That's the post. You know, not shit stirring at all. I promise. So yeah, this is definitely a silly season for that reason. Paul, sort of a final thought there on how this works. because, look, Barcola, great player, would love him at Arsenal. Alvarez, great player, would love him at Arsenal.

1:06:03Rodgers, great player, would love him at Arsenal. Bruno, great player, love him at Arsenal. I would take all four. We've got to get back to reality. I don't think that's going to happen, and I think very clearly the remit has to be, can Arsenal bring in players who help us progress the ball and need to attack in third and create more goals so that we are not looking at next season saying we fell short because of goals and that was predictable and avoidable. That is the remit this summer in my mind. So do you think, do you see the Barkle and Alvarez thing as maybe where there's opportunity that the vagaries of what's happening with Newcastle and Villa means we shouldn't have all our eggs in those baskets?

1:06:42And most importantly, maybe, are you starting to get any agita, any concern, any feeling of saying, it's July 13th, you know, we're going to be in Dublin doing a preseason show in three weeks. We're going to be playing the Community Shield in four weeks. I mean, it sounds crazy, but it's probably time to get moving, you know? Yeah. Am I getting any agita? There's a word I've never used before. I'm probably getting a bit of agita. Agita. Is it agita or agita? Well, if I'm saying it, it's going to be agita because I'm Irish. Yeah, I think it's agita. I think you're right. I think it's pronounced agita but spelled agita.

1:07:24Yeah. Well, it depends where you live. A lot of things are spelt one way and pronounced differently dependent. I'm going to go with agita. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're right, agita. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So that's my answer. No, I've got agita about when the agita will kick in, basically. And I have that schedule for a few weeks out. Way too early, lads. Wait, I'm enjoying the World Cup. And I don't, how can I be getting agita without the World Cup being over? and like a week put in where like lots of photos of guys on vacation and then we go bananas about how Arsenal's done nothing but every other club has signed up all the players they wanted apart from the clubs we have a chain of events that need to be done before we get to.

1:08:13So there's plenty of time for that I think and yet so little time left in the summer because of the bloody World Cup. So you can schedule it. It'll be the week after the week after the World Cup. That's when everybody else will be going nuts, and therefore it will leak. It will pee in my pool, and I'll be getting wound up too. So we've got time for that. There's a place for it. There's a season. Turn to everything. Turn, turn. Turn, turn. Turn, turn. It's coming. Don't worry. I guess I'll give you, Tim, that this can be sort of where we wrap this because we've got a lot to do still. Like I said, we're going to do player ratings, pod we're going to get back into scouting some players probably julian alvarez scouting video are we saying julian alvarez or julian alvarez by the way tim thoughts there don't know or julian you could go with julian so of the three options go with the worst check got that um tim is it is it like like i want to be clear i i just don't have the energy to be angry at arsenal for anything at the moment but i acknowledge that we're getting to the the end of the world cup some of the players we are linked with are still there.

1:09:23So that is just a reality, right? Rodgers is still there. Julian Alvarez is still there. His middle names, I'm just looking it up, Ajita. No, it isn't. Are you ready? Are you prepared to say it's sort of getting to go time and that while none of us are angry, but you're prepared to start saying, okay, now we need to start seeing some movement in the market? Yeah, I mean, it's obviously to do with the World Cup because all the stuff you're seeing now is generally people who've just been knocked out. So, like, we're hearing about Trossard now, aren't we, going? Because Belgium just got knocked out and the Bruno Guimari stuff started after Brazil got knocked out.

1:10:08So, like, that seems to be how things are kind of going. I still look at our, you know, broadly our competitors, like Liverpool have bought Jeremy Jacket, haven't they? I know that's not how you pronounce it No, no, no, that's in keeping with our pronunciation That is how I'm going to be pronouncing it Our protocol for pronunciation Let's just hope they don't coat him off if he doesn't perform very well Nice one And you know, that's kind of a youth signing, isn't it? And like, so United, what they've done like Andre Santos from Chelsea decent opportunistic signing looks like they're going to do a release clause for Tielemans again belgium went out a couple of days ago that's starting to ferment a bit so i do think there's a lot of that but personally i think i said this on the pod a couple of weeks ago i'm actually okay with some of these deals going right down to the wire if needs be because i don't think i think our squad is in good shape still basically i'm not saying i don't want any improvements at all or blah blah blah but i'm not looking at us and going oh my god like if we don't get that player i don't know who we're going to play there like the cupboards but i don't i don't think our cupboard is bare anywhere really i think what we're looking not even with the fitness concerns no i mean it wouldn't be ideal but with we're talking about maybe two or three games um you know i i could live with it in a way that like for example last summer i couldn't last summer it was like no no we need numbers as much as anything whereas here i think we're looking to put a cherry on the cake somewhere and I'm personally a bit more patient with that because I think we're in quite good shape it looks like we're going to be buying like Premier League ready players or Premier League experience players and therefore you know the whole missing pre-season thing so long as they're fit and in shape to be honest it sounds like most of them would miss pre-season anyway because of the World Cup so don't get me wrong it wouldn't be ideal I'd prefer for things to be done as quickly as possible i'm sure everyone would but i'm not quite in that now now now and now bracket no yeah and i think you have to take every transfer window in in isolation and accept that a world cup pushes everything later that our season ended properly ended as late as it ever has that some of the players we're looking at the tier we're shopping in now those players in order to get them, they're more complicated transfer sagas and they are connected to what those clubs are able to do to replace the talent you're taking away.

1:12:48You know, if you want to buy a Christos Solis from Brugge, they don't want to lose him, but they can use the money and they know there's a deal to be struck. When you want to buy a Morgan Rodgers at a Villa or Bruno Gimera, you know, the captain of Newcastle after they've lost two huge players already. If you want to buy a Julian Alvarez or if you want to buy a Bradley Barkola from clubs that are big and have huge ambitions and lots of money. Those are difficult transfers. They're harder to do given that the players are still at the World Cup, and they're further complicated by the agents involved in the clubs you're dealing with.

1:13:19So I do think we probably, like, it would behoove us to get some of the basics done. Leo's gone. Let's get that Solis deal done. You know, if we have some younger players we want to bring in or squad-type players we want to bring in or move out, like okay let's start seeing that activity get done if you know it sounds like the trossard and i'm gonna call him solace again because i like it it does sound like they're very linked in fact i think maybe fabricio romano said those two things are linked and basically as soon as the trossard deal is done arsenal will press the button yeah so so that'd be good a new player to get excited about we've scouted him you can go have a look um but the big deals they're going to take time and I don't think it's beyond the realm of possibility that this is one where we're looking at our major signings coming in quite late and that the start of the season is a bit tricky, that we're having to rest players who need rest and our new signings aren't bedded in and we're playing some players we wouldn't expect to play.

1:14:16But maybe that creates an opportunity for players like Ethan, Max, Miles. These are talented young players who could come to the fore. Could be a very exciting start to the season. You know what? Here's the cool thing. We're going to find out together. let's knock it on the head there. We'll have some good patron stuff for you this week, as we always do, but we will also have World Cup dailies. So there's something for everyone, and I hope you're enjoying that. I do just want to send our best wishes to Phil, of course, to get well. I really miss podcasting with him. I'm really enjoying podcasting with Timsy, but obviously really miss Phil.

1:14:46And so I want his voice to come back so we can get him back on the pod soon. He is a certified ball knower. To the others on the pod, I will say thank you. Paul? Woo-hoo! Yep. Tim, thanks, man. My pleasure as always. good luck to England of course and to me well you know what say whatever you want to me my chest is here hit me as Mikkel once said but don't I'm really sensitive I take it very personally we love you and we'll talk to you after Arsenal's entrance

1:15:28You