Arsenal Is the Second Richest Football Club in the World: Time To Spend

Friday morning/afternoon is upon us again, and it brings the weekend with it thankfully. I have a very busy weekend planned and I'll have to make the most of my time to ensure I post my blog every day.

After tonight's game of football, I'll be off to the Dun Laoghaire festival of International culture tomorrow before going to watch the Bray air show on Saturday. It's all happening within a couple of miles of my house so it makes it too good to miss.

With the Arsenal players getting stuck into the hardest part of their pre-season training in Austria and no game for another four days there isn't too much to talk about but I'll do my best to talk about the little there is.

Firstly, the boss spoke about the groin injuries to both Denilson and Bendtner and he said that they are not big. He thinks that both players will only be a week behind the rest of the squad but I'm not quite sure how he works that out as Denillson should have returned in the first week of July along with the other players who weren't at the World Cup and Bendtner should have joined up with the squad this week in Austria. Maybe they're both back at Arsenal starting on their training programmes already.

If the rumours are to believed Campbell will be staying with us after all when he comes back from his honeymoon but Almunia is facing an exit from the club. I wouldn't mind Campbell staying but we all know he won't be playing more than once a week and we will need to make sure that either Koscielny or Djourou are capable of playing at the highest level too. If they're still a bit short it's a big risk entering the new season hoping that they will reach that level.

The rumours about Schwarzer joining us won't go away but I would imagine the situation is not being helped by Fulham's lack of a manager. Hopefully they will have one very soon and we can either sign him or move one. I still have a sneaky suspicion that the first choice goalkeeper will be decided from performances in the pre-season games and that Fabianski is favourite at the moment.

The boss also said yesterday that we are not in the market for a replacement for Eduardo and I thought he would say as much. Chamakh was signed and he has decided that we have enough cover in that department with RVP and Bendtner to come back too. There's also the possibility of Walcott playing as a striker as it is his favoured position and the boss has always said he will do before too long. The way I see it though we didn't replace the ex 25 when he left last season and we are still in need of a top quality replacement for him. I suppose you could argue that Bendtner has stepped up to take his place but I'm not sure exactly how good he is yet either.

The latest player from Barcelona to add his name to the list for all Gooners to hate is David Villa as he took his turn telling Arsenal to let Cesc go to Barcelona. I wish that Barcelona and their players would just let it go as Cesc will not be signing for them. They talk about healing rifts between the clubs but with their players talking about Cesc on a daily basis the rift is only getting wider.

The Forbes rich lists for sports clubs came out yesterday and "Manure" remain on top of it but interestingly enough Arsenal are sixth and the only other football club on it are Real Madrid. That would seem to make Arsenal the second richest football club in the world. It means our policy of not actually spending any money is paying dividends to our bank account but surely it's about time to invest some real money in the squad.

Thierry Henry made his debut for the New York Red Bulls yesterday against The Spuds and he did what we all hoped he would and scored a goal. Unfortunately despite that lead goal from Henry the Spuds went on to win 2-1 but at least he showed the Arsenal fans in the crowd how to score against them.

Finally for today there's the small matter of my Fantasy league and the fact that it now has over 100 teams in it which means that there will be a trophy for the winner. If you want to sign up the link is here and the code to join my league is 33954-12064 after you have set up a team. 

If you do sign up please take the time to join Captain Arsenal's league too as he has been a great help to me in promoting my blog on Twitter. The code to join his league is 13028-5211 and he would be delighted to welcome you to his league.

Here's Henry's goal against the Spuds yesterday.

See You Tomorrow.