Arsène Wenger told the media before kick off he turned down Levante’s attempts to try and loan Fran Mérida because the Spaniard was good enough to force his way into the first-team. 87 minutes and a stunning strike against Liverpool last night proved the Frenchman right.
Yet as Mérida finally came of age and showed the world what he can do, his long-standing contract dispute rumbles on. Although Fran claims he is awaiting the offer of a new deal, his agent has already confirmed that Arsenal have had a 5 year contract snubbed as the Spanish Under 21 international weighs up his options.
Atlético Madrid and Sevilla have both sent representatives to monitor him while a selection of smaller Premier League clubs are interested. His classy performance against what was a decent Liverpool team boasting Dutch, Argentine and Slovak internationals proved he can cut it at the top and the future will only see Fran blossom. Wenger must now do all he can to secure his future or risk losing a future gem.
For full ratings from yesterdays fixture, check out Young Guns commenter ‘TomMusso’ who has offered his views on last nights game Here.
Article By J.Sanderson
To be honest it will be best for him to move as he will get more chance for 1st team than with us as Ramsey is also ahead of him.
very good but thought young Eastmond was better
Would rather keep him than Rosicky, much as it pains me to say as I am a big fan of Tomas. Merida, like Vela, should be given a real contract and a real chance. Along with Wilshere and Ramsey they will either win us things or bring in some tidy profits.
All of them should be playing before Diaby or Eboue (not in the RB position though…of course).
Can people going to the derby please put up some big banners with that message on ‘KEEP VELA AND MERIDA PLEASE’
Wenger said on the BBC last night that the deal to keep Merida is progressing well and almost complete.
anyone know what happened to vela?? no metion of him on the news report from AW’s post match chat, even though he mentioned an injury to fabianski and rsicky still being out?? strange he’s off the radar so abruptly??
rosicky has to get an extension ans will,absoloutely class. if vela and ramsey are good enough they will push him out
The biggest problem facing Arsenal is that, in football, only 11 players are allowed on the field and only 7 subs can be named. AW has an embarrassment of riches…….which won’t go away.
@ASHGOON according to the site yesterday he has picked up a knee injury recently.
Cheers for the link, J hope the ratings were helpful!
apparently vela was injured, but i dont know when, how or what he injured.
Lets not lose him and do not think of leting rosicky go.
@nicky too true..As much as it pains me to say it, I still do not think Merida is ready for a starting berth in our first team. I feel that Rosicky provides more guile and workrate at the moment and that Eboue is really kicking on this term with his play and all round attitude.
Vela is a different matter. I think he is deserving of a sub role, which to be fair he is getting when available, but I feel he could be getting more.
That is bordering on blasphemous though, seeing as in Wenger I do trust! :P
Lets not lose merida and do not think of leting rosicky go.
Why is it a must that he signs for us, because we have Aaron Ramsay and Henri Lansbury who are just as good as him,and will probably be better than Fran Merida in the long run, and let us be honest here for just a second because if he was really that good, he would have forced his way into the starting XI by now yet he has not, and is still a fringe player here at Arsenal IMO.
I think with Rosicky we are waiting to see how much he can play before he signs. It is only natural – if he is only going to make 5 – 10 games a season then we shouldn’t offer him a new contract. Don’t get me wrong, he is one of my favourite players currently at the club but we need to be ruthless at times. If he is able to stay fit then I’m sure he’d jump at the chance to sign a new contract with the club that stood by him through his troubles.
LOL at you just using some commenters ratings. I think he was unfair to give Randall a 4, he has almost become the Eboue or Diaby of the reserves (easy target) but overall fair ratings.
I’d like Merida to stay but am not naive enough to think that a kid who came here on a free to further his career might go elsewhere if he thinks its better for him.
Kentpaul: Why? Only Cesc really forced his way into the first XI UNDER 20. Denilson, Flamini, Clichy, Song, Bendtner, Theo, Djourou, Senderos – have been 19/20 or older. He is starting to make waves around the first team the same way most of these players did at the same age and unlike Cesc and co. the players he is competing with won’t be sold off because of their age and declining ability, making it harder for him to achieve sustained first team football.
lets get real..we have ALOT of good young players..BUT… a squad can only realistically have 3 keepers 8 defenders 7/8 midfielders and 4 strikers at a push if you wanna please everyone!..this means that of the 40 odd players we all go on about as being future superstars at this club,alot are not going to make it and even if they do then somethings got to give..we cant have ramsey/merida/cesc/rosicky/nasri/arshavin/lansbury/denilson in a squad together also song/eastmond/coquelin/frimpong in a squad together…we need to be realistic
Agree 100% with the headline. After Vela, Merida is our biggest prospect imo. He may even be on a par with Carlos. I’ve always thought he is very similar to riquelme in style and ability.
I disagree that ramsey’s development will necessarily hinder merida considering merida proved he can play the forward role yesterday. Ramsey made a few “schoolboy” errors yesterday as well. Although I agree he has massive talent, and is possibly more suited to premiership football, he still has to iron out a few things in his game. Particularly trying to dribble out of defence all the time. Merida should be rated ahead of him atm imo.
in my opinion merida should go on loan next season but to a prem team with the calibre such as fulham everton west ham. Hes just not going to get the playing time, except the odds 5mins in here and there and a few CL games. Especially since their our players such as fabregas denilson diaby ramsey nasri who play the same position.
Like Wenger said, Merida is a late developer and that’s the reason he hasn’t played more for the first team. He is ahead of Wilshere at the moment and only Ramsey is ahead of him of the young midfielders. Cesc, Nasri and Song are our first team midfielders but after them I think the order goes: Rosicky, Denilson, Diaby, Ramsey and Merida.
As for our biggest talent than Wilshere tops that list by far. After that I would say Ramsey, this kid will battle it out with Nasri in the next years for a place alongside Cesc.
I actually dont think he’s good enough. I rate wilshire, ramsey and coquelin over him. eastmond looked good last night too. Unfortunately randall appears to be another place down the pecking order too – he’ll go soon, I’d say
His fate is pretty tied to Cesc’s. WIth Fab only 22, if he decides to make a career at Arsenal (say 3 more years)then Merida would be best served leaving.
I don’t believe Arshavin will stay with the club longer than that either. (perhaps 2 more seasons) Rosicky won’t be with us more than a few years at most.
If Ramsey, Merida, and Wilshere develop together, Nasri as an experienced anchor, along with Song/Coquelin (Nordtveit? as I’ve read he is getting time at DM in Germany) then it will be our next generation midfield and already looks good, let alone when they are all 22-23.
I hope we keep him and he is patient in his development.
Diaby needs to go and Eboue needs to stop getting PT in the midfield for these younger/more talented players to get on the field.
Merida is a very talented player.
There’s no way he is ahead of Wilshere though.
For the first 10-15 mins of the game last night, Fran wasn’t in the game. I actually mentioned to my friends i was watching the game with that he needs to drift inside and get on the ball more and that’s what he started doing, hence making him more involved and harder to track by the Liverpool players. He’s an immense talent and i’d be very upset if we lost this kid for £20m in the next two years, let alone for next to nothing at the end of the season.
Another thing. For the people that mentioned it on the match report article and for Samuel who’s mentioned it on this one – Randall has not become the Eboue/Diaby of the reserves. There is always a very good reason why a certain bunch of players are often critised and it’s usually the consensus among supporters of the club in question. If you’re clearly not doing enough to warrant a place in the fans’ eyes then you will get a backlash (especially with the extortionate prices fans are asked to pay nowadays) from the crowd. This happens at every club and not just at ours. There is a famous saying – the fans know best about their own club (or something along those lines). There is no logical reason whatsoever, why fans will decide to start getting onto a certain player of their own club for no particular reason. It’s not constructive at all and just plain stupid, quite frankly.
If you are an ardent fan of a club, know about the game (and i really mean KNOW about the game) and you can objectively analyse a game of football then you’re usually right about what you say. A lot of people may say things just to go along with the crowd but you will find, in most cases, that the majority of people that comment on a certain subject and moreover, put across an opinion on it are correct and it’s well warranted. There’s no smoke without fire, right?
On the other hand, you will get staunch supporters of the player who, in some cases, will vehemontly defend the player like Supergunner07 did with Randall on the last article and what Samuel is doing on this article.
Basically, what i’m saying is that if MR gets a lot of stick from a large percentage of Arsenal fans, it’s probably because they just don’t rate him as being good enough to get a look-in here right now. The same goes for Eboue, Diaby, Silvestre (i was very happy with his performance against ‘Pool in the second half but i still rate Senderos as being the better player) and one or two others that may come in for a bit of stick from a large percentage of the Gooner faithful.
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If he leave I will be disappointed but becouse I believe we have so many good players coming through I will not miss him too much. Conor Henderson is a big star in the makings. As is many more from the reserves and academy. I can understand why he may chose Athletico or Seville but hope he stay and have a bit more patient.
Jom said
October 29, 2009 at 1:36 pm
I have the game. randall had alot more than 4 touches and he passed the ball to the right adress alot more than 1 time. It doesn’t matter what Randall does nowdays becouse people have already made up their mind and they see what they want to see. 4 touches…. what a joke.
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@ TJ Da Goon, i have even rewatched the game to make sure, MR only gave the ball away once from many touches that he had. we were open towards the end because young players in midfield where getting tired.
Some support for MR!
It’s absolutely mental to be getting on the back of a 20-year-old who has played a handful of first-team games. I get bored of the people with knives out for Eboue and Diaby all the time, but this is beyond the pale.
So it looks like a bunch of armchair managers have seen him playing in the reserve league on ATVO and now think they can map out his career. Nice one, but it doesn’t quite work like that.
Well here’s an idea. Tell those fucking losers Denilson and Diaby to piss off and then space will be made for Merida.
Quite simple really.
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Merida is missing in PES10. And it’s the same with our kits and logo. Almost enough to send the game back to the store.
Because every year I need to re-design 18 fucking home & away kits – including the sponsor logos to make it feel like a real Premier League Competition.
But if Merida was in the game I would have given him a contract for life. I know we have other talents too but something triggers my fascination for him.
His goal against Pool just made me re-think again to trade PES for FIFA. But than again I am too much of a football fan to lose a good game over lack of appreciation from others. An experience that seems to be tied to Arsenal FC.
to dutchgooner:
chck out http://www.winningelevenblog.com. they made already an option file with all prem clubs. I agree with you about Merida. He has the talent for passing like cesc but has the shooting power of RVP.
I am sure we will see soon news about a long term contract extension from him on arsenal.com!!!
To Arsenal4ever
Hi, fellow Gooner yeah I know about this site. Last few weeks been a daily visitor. Problem is I own a Xbox360 and the option file is only for Playstation.
I would love to share my life like kit creations with other 360 PES-fans to help them complete their game. But as you probally know there is no way to export/send those files.
Anyway hope Wenger was right to say to BBCradio a new contract with Fran is close to signing. Hate to lose this guy for real.In the game I find it just bearable enough to keep it.
Cross my fingers they will release the promised patch real soon. (Shevchenko is still at Chelsea for fuck sake.)
Thanks for the link though. Appreciate the help.
Lets not say that there is no room for merida when there was a room for fab. What u should no is that there is always a room for a hardworker. Andy B talked about leting rosicky go, if u see him play first i don’t think u will think of that. Gunner 4 life.
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