So the question is- Do we go all out to take top spot or send the League cup side to olympiakos?? My vote is the latter. Who is our likely opponent next round, i haven't looked into it

Only English side to win in Europe this season :d

What don't I understand about this? I'm missing something.

I think he meant this week, and got a little sidetracked.

Ah, that makes a little more sense now :lol:

I don't think it matters where we finish. If we finish second, we'll draw Barcelona. If we finish first, we'll draw Real :lol:

Whoops lol, yeah I meant this week.

As for Champions League, I don't really care about finishing first or 2nd. Didn't really help us last season. Would much rather us send a bunch of 19 year olds to Greece. Plus, I can't see Montpellier getting anything against Schalke so don't think it'll matter in the end.

Edited by sydneycroatia58: 23/11/2012 10:28:46 AM

ooh yuck, is it too late to stake a claim for the Europa spot???:shock:
At least we can concentrate on winning the league and FA cup ;)

Rumours around that we will announce the renewal of our Emirates shirt sponsorship and also the naming rights to the stadium. The shirt deal will reportedly be worth 20m a year, double what we get in the current deal which runs out next season.

Also rumours that Adidas replacing Nike as out kit manufacturer is a done deal.

do you know how much adidas is forking out to manufactuer our kit?

Hate having our home ground called "Emirates Stadium". What a load of bollocks.

Has the stadium deal been extended, or has it always been until 2028? If so, 150mil for 16 years of stadium naming rights+ 6 years of shirt sponsorship is a relative pittance.

I think it always was, they're renewing it because even Emirates have admitted that they're getting too much value for money. I know the original deal was for at least 20 years anyway.

Its been extended by an additional 7 years. Unless I'm reading this wrong.

So apparently this seal isn't effective immediately? If so I think they could have done better

It's a 150m deal for 5 years until the 2018/19 season. That's 30m a year for shirt sponsorship and stadium naming rights, we currently recieve just 5.5m a year for shirt sponsorship.

Once this new deal kicks in, only United will have a bigger shirt sponsorship deal than us.

So hard to call it a relative pittance.

Edited by sydneycroatia58: 24/11/2012 09:26:40 AM

But the stadium deal has been extended until 2028, so is that money included in the 150m?

From Arseblog



So when you break that down, the deal is not worth 30m a year.

As it stands at the moment, Emirates are paying 5.8m a year until 2021 for the stadium naming rights. If we factor in the extension at the same price it is now, that 7 years is worth 41m, and means we haven't improved on our stadium deal, which at 5.8 mil a season is a relative pittance for a club like ours. But if the stadium deal has improved, the shirt sponsorship is worth less etc.

I think we had the potential to do better.

On more positive news regardigng our finances, rumour is that the Adidas deal is going to be worth 22m a year, which is about 15m more a year then our current deal with Nike, which is great news.

From the BBC



Just waiting for Swiss Ramble's article on the deal.

Edited by sydneycroatia58: 24/11/2012 12:43:20 PM

This confuses me. Either way, there's no excuse now to pass the money onto the fans through ticket pricing and to spend money on decent footballers.

I still hate calling the Grove "Emirates Stadium".

Then call it the Grove. Just because it's called Emirates Stadium doesn't mean you have to call it that. I don't understand why people get so worked up about a big logo being fixed to the outside of the stadium, especially not when the club's getting however many millions it is a year for it.

Starting XI vs Villa: Szczesny, Jenkinson, Mertesacker, Koscielny, Gibbs, Arteta, Ramsey, Cazorla, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Podolski, Giroud

Big call to drop Vermaelen, although it'll be passed off as giving him a rest, still a big call.

Also loving the look of our bench today, Mannone, Sagna, Vermaelen, Wilshere, Coquelin, Arshavin, Gervinho

Best news is that there's no Darren Bent in the Villa squad today. Has a ridiculous record against us.

Pathetic performance. Ramsey, ox and Jenks were the only ones who looked like they wanted anything from the game.

Gervinho was at his consistent best, dribbling straight into players and not even attempting 1 single cross in 20 minutes of play.

Why if we are chasing the game do you sub Giroud off for Coquelin?

I do call it the Grove- make a bit of a point of it actually. I don't necessarily understand the mentality of 'not caring about its name'; it's our home, the heart and soul of this club. We gave up Highbury for this.

On to the game:
I don't think we were good enough. We really lacked that clinical edge and I have to add to the criticism of Gervinho. Was he present for training during 2-touch possession games? Stop standing on the ball and move the thing on man! We really need to be winning these games. Having said that, credit where it's due, Villa were immense. Must do better.

Couldn't we for once just string a run of more than two wins together.

We weren't great . Villa did their jobs and can't hate on them they stuck to their tasks for 90 mins . What the hell was gervinho doing ?

I knew a Draw was good odds for this game. :lol:

Sigh.