Barcelona Make Their Move For Cesc Fabregas and Arsenal Resist It

Good morning from a sunny Dublin and I'm feeling very refreshed after a lovely lie in. Four weeks off work is quite nice when the weather is good and the kids don't need lunches made in the mornings.

Barca Bid For Cesc

It has emerged that Barcelona have made a formal bid for Cesc and the club site is running an article saying that it has been rejected. They say that Cesc is under contract until 2015, a highly valued member of our team and a part of our future plans. Previously there had been two informal exchanges in which Arsenal made it clear that Cesc was not for sale. The club say they will make no counter proposal and will not enter into any discussion. Apparently Barcelona have publicly stated that they will respect Arsenal's position and Arsenal expect them to keep their word.

Arsenal are making all the right sounds that we hoped they would make when the offer eventually came in. It will be interesting to see if Barcelona now decide to respect our decision not to sell Cesc and back off. I don't imagine for one second that that will happen as Barcelona have no intention of respecting our decision. The ball is not even in their court now but it is out of bounds as we do not want to sell!

Walcott Snub

I suppose I should start with the news that Walcott didn't make the final cut for England's World Cup squad. While it's a blow for him it's good news from an Arsenal perspective as he will have a chance to rest this summer and be raring to go when the new season starts. His omission all goes back to his decision to play for the England senior team last summer before then playing for the under 21s in the European under 21 championship finals. 

In my opinion it clearly shows everything that is wrong with English football as they put a player's future prospects at threat to gain short term glory. Once a player is a part of the senior squad he should not then be picked for the under 21s to help them win a trophy. As it turned out he got injured and missed the start of the season for Arsenal. After that the injuries just kept coming and he never really got his form together on a consistent basis, so his omission is no shock.

I know the boss was furious about the decision to pick him at the time and ultimately the decision whether to play or not was made by the player himself. If I remember it correctly England were well beaten in the final and his efforts were in vain. 

The player himself took the news very well and he had the following to say for himself. "I am very disappointed not to be included in the squad going out to South Africa but completely respect Mr Capello's decision," said Walcott. "I would like to wish the team the best of luck and hope they have a really successful tournament." I'm sure that privately he isn't overly happy and he probably hoped that thoughts of his hat trick against Croatia a couple of years ago might have tipped the balance in his favour.

Some other very curious choices were made by Capello when he picked his squad and if he gets a few injuries he won't have the best possible players to fall back on in my opinion. Firstly I would question the choice of Heskey and then Wright-Phillips and Carrick. There are others too but surely if you're picking on current form none of them would have had a hope as they failed to get into their club sides and have looked anything but impressive in the England friendlies.

Ramsey Offered New Contract

The club have given Aaron Ramsey a new long term deal and it's a welcome boost for him as he looks to overcome his horrific injury which he suffered against Stoke a few months ago. I don't know when he is due to come back but I can't imagine that it will be before the end of this year and even then it will take a while for him to reach the level that he was at before the injury happened. If we lucky we might have him firing on all cylinders for the season following next season.

Other Notes

There's more talk from the Barcelona players in the Spanish squad about Cesc joining them and I am sick of hearing Xavi at this stage. I wish he would shut his mouth and I have decided that I will be supporting RVP and his Dutch team at the World Cup as I could not cheer for a team with Xavi in it, even if my hero, Cesc, is playing with him.

A few of our players played friendlies for the countries yesterday. RVP scored a penalty as The Netherlands beat Ghana 4-1, Alex Song played the first hour as Cameroon lost 3-1 to Portugal and soon to be ex Arsenal player Philippe Senderos played as they lost 1-0 to Costa Rica.

That's the lot for today but don't forget to sign up for my Fantasy World Cup competition.  We have 32 teams representing 11 countries so far and the more that join in the more fun it is. The link is here and the code to join the league is 221858-52981. If you do sign up I wish you the best of luck.

Here's a little bit of what Theo Walcott can do.

See You Tomorrow.