Arsenal Unveil New Second Strip Plus Jenkinson And Sanogo Latest

As the new season draws closer Arsenal unveiled their new second strip yesterday to follow on the launch of the new first strip from a few weeks ago. The launch took place on the team's tour of Singapore and it looks pretty good to me on the first view as you can see below. I suppose it could be described as a gold shirt although it looks more yellow than gold to me.

Yellow has been the traditional colour of the away shirt for many years now and the team have had many glorious nights in that colour. The last time they wore a gold away strip they didn't do too badly either as they ended up winning their third league and cup double in 2002.

In other news Carl Jenkinson signed an extended deal with the club and then proceeded to go out on loan to West Ham for the season. He did quite well on loan with them last season and hopefully he will continue to progress. His chances at Arsenal would be limited this season with Mathieu Debuchey back from injury and the emergence of Hector Bellerin. It's hard to know if Jenkinson will have a long term future at Arsenal, but his experience gained at West Ham can't do him any harm. 

It looks as if Yaya Sanogo could be the latest player to leave the club and like Jenkinson he could be loaned out for the season. If the reports are correct Ajax are interested in taking him and again it looks like a smart move for both the player and Arsenal. Ajax look to play good football and Sanogo would get the chance to work with Arsenal legend Denis Bergkamp if he was to make the move. Since he joined Arsenal he has spent an awful lot of time on the injured list and he needs to go through a season relatively injury free if he's going to progress. 

Even though the season hasn't started Arsenal have already had their first injury setback with Tomas Rosicky set to miss the start of the season due to the knock he picked up on international duty. Rosicky isn't a first team starter any more, but when he's fit he still has plenty to offer on occasions. Hopefully he won't be out any longer than the projected four or five weeks, but his past injury record doesn't fill me with confidence on that front. 

At least Danny Welbeck should be back in time for the kick off of the new season as he looks set to eventually recover from the injury which saw him miss the end of the season and of course the cup final. It was such a shame for him to miss out on the cup final after he scored the winning goal in the quarter final away to United. Hopefully he can stay injury free this season and maybe get himself a nice shiney winners medal before it's over too.

Finally for today the first pre season game gets underway later today when Arsenal play a Singapore Select team in the Asia Trophy. The winners will play the winners of Stoke and Everton on Saturday while the losers will play the losers of that game. The game gets underway at 1.30pm BST and is available to watch on Sky Sports 1 or to listen to on the Arsenal Player.

Arsene Wenger has said a few fringe players will get a chance to impress in Singapore with players like Gedion Zelalem and Dan Crowley possibly the most like to make a breakthrough. Besides those two players Chuba Akpom, Alex Iwobi and Chris Willock are all likely to feature too and will be anxious to show what they can do. It will be great to get the first view of the team this season and it's hard to believe that the Community Shield is only two and half weeks away.

As usual this season my fantasy league is up and running again and it's open to all comers with a €50 prize (out of my pocket) to the winner. You can join up by using the league code 48497-14043 after you have set your team up here and good luck to all who play. There were over 1,000 teams in my league last season and I'm hoping for even more this season.

I'm also running my Predictions League again this season and it's very enjoyable even if there's no cash prize for the winner. The code for my league is FD757-ARR after you have signed up here and of course both games are completely free to play. 

This's it for today.

See you tomorrow.

Arsenal Name A Strong Squad For Singapore Trip

Pre season training has only just begun and Arsenal are already off on a trip almost halfway around the world to Singapore. The days of a trip to the Austrian mountains for conditioning and to build up the players strength and fitness are long gone with the need to build up the club's international profile considered to be so important. The Premier League has become such a global product that Arsenal need to make these trips to build their profile and increase their fan base.

There are very few absences from the full Arsenal squad for the trip with 27 players in total boarding the plane. The notable absences are Alexis Sanchez, David Ospina, Danny Welbeck and Tomas Risicky who all miss out for various reasons. Both Welbeck and Rosicky are carrying injuries and won't travel while Alexis and Ospina are still on their holidays after only recently finishing playing in the Copa America. 

Alexis won't be back at the club until August 3rd and will surely miss the start of the season, but Ospina will be back a week earlier. Of course the rumours of Ospina's departure persist and there's every chance he could be on his way out of the club before then. There's no doubt Alexis will be missed in the first couple of games after his fantastic performances last season, but there will be plenty of other players looking to make an impression in those games..

Besides the majority of the first team squad making the trip to Singapore there are still a few youngsters getting the chance to ply their trade. There are great hopes for players like Dan Crowley and Gedion Zelalem and we will hopefully get a chance to see what they can do in the next week. The team start off with a game against a Singapore Select team next Wednesday and will follow that with a game on Saturday the 18th. 

When they return from Singapore they will work hard for another week before playing in the Emirates Cup. A week later it's the Community Shield game against Chelsea and then the league season kicks off the following week. It still feels like the football season just ended, but the new season is only four weeks away.

In other news Lukas Podolski finally made his exit from the club when he signed for Galatasaray. His chances at Arsenal would have been severely limited next season and the only way he was going to get a game was if the team suffered a huge injury crisis. Hopefully that injury crisis won't rear it's ugly head and Podolski won't be missed. 

I hope he does well at his new club, but I never really felt he fitted in perfectly on the pitch with Arsenal though. He was quite the expert on social media and made himself popular among many Arsenal fans with some clever posts on occasions. At this point in his career he needs to be playing and it was obvious he needed a move for that to happen.

It was also announced that Mikel Arteta has extended his contract at the club and will be an Arsenal player for another year at least. Last season was a frustrating one for him as it was ruined by persistent and recurring injuries, but hopefully things will be a lot better for him this season. I can't see him commanding a regular place in the team, but he still has a lot to offer.

He's still the club captain and you would imagine his influence in the dressing room and with the younger players is quite important. I know he's not the same type of player as Francis Coquelin, but he will probably fill in for him on occasions as Coquelin won't be able to play every game this season. There's still talk of another player coming in to challenge Coquelin in that role or even to play alongside him on occasions and any purchase would really hamper Arteta's chances.

He has had his detractors at times, but I always thought he was a very good player being asked to play a role which didn't come naturally to him. When he joined Arsenal he definitely wasn't seen as some sort of defensive midfielder, but he has had to adjust his game to suit the team's needs and he did it quite well. I hope we get to see a fair deal of him this season in what could quite easily be his last season as an Arsenal player.

That's it for today.

See you tomorrow.

Arsenal Win 3-1 in Japan

Arsenal played the third match of their Asian tour earlier today when they took on Nagoya Grampus in Japan. After putting seven goals past both an Indonesian Dream Team and the Vietnamese national team in their first two games this looked like it would be a tougher test for Arsenal. Nagoya are in the middle of their domestic season at the moment in what is a fairly strong league in Japan.

Arsene Wenger picked a pretty strong team for his return to the last club he managed before taking the reins at Arsenal almost 17 years ago. What was noticeable was that Arsenal started with three full backs in their defence after Laurent Koscielny picked up an ankle knock in training. With Thomas Vermaelen out for a few months with a back injury Arsenal's central defensive options already look quite limited and the boss is surely going to have to seriously consider bringing in a new central defender very soon. 

Arsenal started quite well and Olivier Giroud got his sixth pre season goal with a header from a Tomas Rosicky cross after three minutes. Arsenal continued to attack and it looked like only a matter of time before they added to their lead. The second goal came shortly after the mid point in the first half when Giroud was felled in the area and Ryo Miyaichi stepped up to score the penalty in his hometown. 

Arsenal were 2-0 up at half time and as per usual on this tour the boss made plenty of changes to the team. One of those changes was the introduction of 16 year old Gedion Zelalem who had already impressed when coming on for the second half of the previous two tour games. He took only 10 minutes to have an impact on the game when his excellent pass paved the way for Theo Walcott to score Arsenal's third goal.

A three goal lead seemed to be more than enough for Arsenal and so it proved to be despite their opponents scoring themselves with 20 minutes to go. All of the attacking players were changed during the game but only Kieran Gibbs was substituted in the defence as Ignasi Miquel was the only defender on the bench. When the full time whistle went it was all smiles and cheers as Arsene made a speech which went down very well.

Next up it's a game against Urawa Red Diamonds on Friday to finish the tour off before the team heads back to England for the Emirates Cup. I've said before that I'm less than happy with the club's opponents in the Emirates Cup and I can only imagine how many fans feel about Galatasaray being invited to play. Some of those Arsenal fans would have been in Copenhagen for the UEFA Cup Final in 2000 when Galatasaray fans started what turned out to be some very serious violence.

I have no doubt that there was retaliation from Arsenal fans, but it was the Galatasaray fans who went looking for trouble in the first place. Maybe the club will feel they are building bridges with Galatasaray, but there is the potential for trouble at the game and that's something nobody wants to see. I hope it all passes off peacefully but I can't help feeling the club have made an error.

Away from actually playing games there is little else happening at the club as there is still no positive news on the transfer front. Personally I'd love to see Gonzalo Higuain arrive as soon as possible and Bernard looks like he's a pretty good player too. I'd be happy to see either Marouane Fellaini or Lars Bender arrive also and a centre back must be on the bosses mind too. 

I have no desire to see Luis Suarez in an Arsenal shirt and I can't imagine too many Arsenal fans would choose him over Higuain. They're both top class players in my opinion and would add an awful lot to the team, but Higuain doesn't bring the baggage that Suarez does. The squad needs a top class striker though and the sooner one arrives the better.

Any top class striker needs players to make goals for him and there are few players in the game better than Cesc Fabregas at doing so. Manchester United have made their pursuit of him public knowledge and apparently have had two bids rejected by Barcelona. My understanding is that Arsenal have first refusal on Cesc if Barcelona decide to sell and if they do I really hope Arsenal exercise that option.

It's been only two years since Cesc left Arsenal and things haven't gone quite as he might have hoped at his hometown club, but I would be surprised if the new Barcelona manager decides to sell him when he is appointed. Players like Cesc are few and far between and I can't imagine too many Arsenal fans will hold a grudge against him for leaving. He has always said he would have finished his career at Arsenal if Barcelona didn't come in for him and it would be a huge blow to see him sign for another English club.

His departure was one which really hurt and the last time an Arsenal player's departure hurt like that was when Liam Brady left in 1980. Brady ended up back at the club in a coaching capacity and it would be great to see Cesc come back as a player. I won't be holding my breath but I can always hope for it to happen.

That's it for today.

See you tomorrow.