Ramsey

4th August 2015: Ramsey bigs up Walcott as Akpom heads to Hull

Posted on by TremendArse

Alright Gooners? Good.

With any new ‘world class’ striker highly unlikely to join until 5.59pm on Tuesday, September 1st (the window shuts at 6pm this year), if at all, the goalscoring potential of our current contenders for the role is obviously well worth reconsidering.

And Aaron Ramsey has been doing just that today, praising Theo Walcott’s finishing and self-belief as a goal-getter. The Welshman told Arsenal Player:

He did very well at the end of last year. He’s had a good pre-season. He looks sharp, he looks strong and he can be dangerous. He is a goalscorer – he has a load of goals for Arsenal and I think he can carry that on and maybe get into the 100 Club this year. He’s a very strong character. He believes in his abilities and he definitely has a lot of qualities to offer. He can finish – one of the hardest things to do in football is to put the ball in the back of the net and he’s done it on numerous occasions for Arsenal. Hopefully he can continue doing that.

Hard to argue with any of that but the main thing for many people when it comes to Theo playing upfront on a consistent basis, is his failure so far to produce against defences as physically uncompromising as Chelsea’s, for instance, was on Sunday, when the England international, despite picking up an assist, had a pretty quiet game overall.

Although, that said, Theo’s outings as a sole striker for the club have probably yet to reach double figures and so to expect him to immediately adapt from playing as a wide forward to the central role is fanciful, as it would be for anyone really.

Theo Walcott

I’ve no doubt he’d improve considerably given time to get to grips with the role but unfortunately for him, with the position we find ourselves in now as genuine title contenders, carrying huge expectation from the fans, it’s the worst time possible for him to expect patience from management, team-mates or the terraces.

And when you consider the immediate impact Olivier Giroud made in terms of offering a ‘presence’ at the tip of our attack when he replaced Theo at Wembley on Sunday, the Frenchman, to many, will seem our best bet to lead the line from our current set of players.

Danny Welbeck is obviously the other main contender but will need time to gain form and fitness after missing our entire pre-season programme through injury. Once he has however, I’d be far from surprised if he eventually proves to be the best of the three as our central striker because I think he has all the raw materials to do it.

As much as I’d love a Robert Lewandowski, Karim Benzema or Gonzalo Higuain – and in that order of preference for me – I actually think we have enough of a variation of attributes, and goals, within our squad as it is, to mount sustained challenges for the two big trophies. I’d far rather we secured another defensive midfielder given a choice of one or the other. But who knows, maybe we’ll get both before the end of the transfer window. We’ll see.

Moving on and as expected for a while, the club today confirmed Chuba Akpom’s season-long loan move to Hull, which sees the teenage striker link up with Arsenal team-mate Isaac Haydon, who made same switch last week.

It should be a great opportunity for the 19 year old to showcase his talents at a club expected to chase promotion and in a league which will undoubtedly aid his physical development. I’ll certainly be more inclined to watch Steve Bruce’s men on a more regular basis now that two young Gunners are on loan at the KC Stadium and hopefully will offer thoughts on their progress here as and when possible.

Elsewhere, there’s still talk of Palermo interest in Joel Campbell, Wellington Silva’s done a disappearing act from the club presumably, because there’s no mention of him whatsoever, anywhere, and Alex Oxlade Chamberlain’s responded to Roy Keane’s observation that Arsenal players are quite keen on personal grooming and social media by basically telling the Irishman to get with the times a little.

Yep, it’s that quiet. Give me Mourinho being Mourinho to talk about any day, over Keane being Keane.

A bit brief but that’s all for today folks, see you tomorrow.

30th July 2015: Ramsey reveals armband ambition

Posted on by TremendArse

Evening all. It’s Thursday already, which means just three more sleeps until we get to see Arsenal finally end our Chelsea hoodoo, with an emphatic five-nil win in the Community Shield at Wembley on Sunday.

According to sources close to the player, Aaron Ramsey will open the scoring with a speculative thirty yard effort, which will ricochet in off Thibaut Courtois’s perilously long nose, before Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain bags a brace – bullying Cesar Azpillicueta into an on-pitch breakdown along the way.

The scoring will then be rounded off by a goal apiece from second-half subs Alex Iwobi and Jeff Reine-Adelaide, with the latter claiming the Man of the Match award despite only playing for four and a half minutes.

Well, either that, or Jose Mourinho will park his bus like the bus-parking, game-wrecking, misogynistic, enemy of football that he is, and they’ll nick it with an offside, fluke of a winner after their incessant diving and referee-haranguing, sees us reduced to eight men.

Anyway, Ramsey has been speaking to ESPN FC at a New Balance boot launch recently, about his worst period as a professional footballer, which followed the career-threatening injury he sustained at Stoke City back in 2010.

Here’s what he said:

It was a difficult time for me, but it’s important in those times never to doubt your ability, because if you start doubting yourself then you’re going to go down a slippery slope — and you never know, you can find yourself shooting down the leagues. That was important, never doubting myself — I always knew what I was capable of doing. It was just trying to figure out how I could do it. The boss [Arsene Wenger] always believed in me. He gave me a new contract in that period and he’s always known what I could do.It was just a case of figuring out how to put things to the back of my mind, psychologically, with what went on with my injury. Then I quickly rediscovered my form.

The Welshman then went on to explain how he worked on his game to become more clinical in front of goal – an endeavour which resulted in him scoring a remarkable 18 goals from 38 appearances in all competitions, from a deep-lying central midfield starting position during the 2013-14 season:

I’ve always been able to get into the box, but in the past I’d been very rash in my finishing, I wasn’t clear with what I was doing in the final third. When it came to shooting, I was very rushed, I wasn’t hitting the ball cleanly. Then [two seasons ago] I composed myself and was able to do it in front of goal, and I reaped the rewards from that.

Ramsey lining up another effort on goal

And he also expressed how he prefers playing centrally, would love to be handed the club captaincy one day having worn the armband in a preseason fixture last summer, and had a few warm words for his manager’s fabled skills in developing young, emerging talent. He said:

I much prefer playing in the centre of the park, that’s where I feel comfortable. I like to be involved as much as I can in the game, and in the middle you’re definitely the heartbeat of the team. When you’re on the right, you can go minutes without seeing the ball, and that’s a long time when you’re out on the pitch. I’ve made a load of appearances now, I definitely feel one of the leaders, but I feel this group of players all have their own leadership skills. It was nice to be given the armband, even though it was just a preseason friendly, but it’s something I would like to do one day, to be captain. It’s a great honour and achievement to do that, I’ve had experience of doing it with my country, it would be nice to do that [for Arsenal] one day. He [Wenger] likes to get young kids with talent and natural ability and turn them into world-class players. He’s done that on many occasions in the past – he’ll continue doing that. His experience, knowing how to deal with [young players] is quite remarkable. He gets his satisfaction from seeing them develop as a player – and as a person as well – and gives them information on the pitch, and opportunities to go out there, play, and express themselves.

I have to confess that Ramsey isn’t a player I’ve ever thought of as captaincy material before, I’m not sure why really, because if you’re looking for a player who leads by example and embodies the class of the club on and off the pitch, then there aren’t many better equipped than the former Cardiff man.

I suppose his relatively young age, plus the fact he doesn’t appear to be the most vocal of players on the pitch has something to do with that, but now that he’s thrown his hat in the ring himself, I’d be the last to trample on it.

All I would say is that there are plenty of contenders right now for that particular accolade and it’ll be interesting to see who Arsene goes with long-term, with Arteta now not first choice and in the twilight of his Arsenal career, and vice captain Per Mertesacker not too far behind him.

All that said, I’m not really one who places a great deal on emphasis on who wears the armband, especially when there are no absolutely outstanding candidates for the job like Patrick Vieira or Tony Adams were in the past.

If you’re basing it on experience then Petr Cech has a shout, on vocals, then I suppose Per gets it, on effort, it’s Francis Coquelin or Alexis Sanchez, on tenacity Coquelin or Wilshere, and if it’s based on coolness under pressure I’d give it to Laurent Koscielny.

In other words, take your pick. As long as they all compete as best they can, pass well and play with organised freedom, scoring goals and keeping clean sheets, I wouldn’t care if Hector Bellerin wore it, so long as whoever does is lifting at least one of the biggest prizes come May.

Back tomorrow.