Good morning all and happy Saturday! Tim Stillman here to take the reins this weekend until Andrew returns to his desk on Monday. While Andrew has been taking in pre-season in LA and Philadelphia, I have gone a little more low key (but no less glamorous). I am off to Lincoln today to see the Arsenal U23s (or ‘Arsenal XI’ as they are known during the summer for some reason) play at Sincil Bank.
I am only going because I have never been to Sincil Bank before and this will be ground number 70 of the 92 for me (the promotion of my local childhood club, Bromley, to League 2 this season bumped me up another one!) Anyway, I can cover that game off in tomorrow’s blog, which I am sure you absolutely cannot wait for.
The real place is to start is the confirmation of Emile Smith Rowe’s move to Fulham yesterday. The deal is reported to be around £27m with a potential further £7m in add ons and it is reported that Arsenal also hold a sell-on clause for the player too. The emotional impact of his departure hadn’t really dawned on me until now because, in my head, I have been fully expecting this for quite a while now and have thought that to be the best thing for the player and the club.
From Hale End to the first team. 55, 32, and then our number 10.
Once a Gunner, always a Gunner.
Thanks for the memories, Emile ❤️ pic.twitter.com/lgWWKHJfIL
— Arsenal (@Arsenal) August 2, 2024
I still don’t really understand why Arteta and Arsenal insisted on his retention last summer, other than maybe they wanted some security against a big injury somewhere that just didn’t materialise. I think one of the things that Arsenal fans have probably struggled with is a lack of real explanation as to why Smith Rowe fell so far out of favour.
At first, many suspected his continued omission was fitness based. Then many of us have guessed that maybe ESR doesn’t have the physical or out of possession properties that Arteta wants, but we have never really had that confirmed…
Source link : https://arseblog.com/2024/08/emile-smith-goes/
Author : Tim Stillman
Publish date : 2024-08-03 06:30:07
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