Post Fulham and the Yoots

The Fulham game didn't throw up too many surprises. They were a bit meh, we weren't at our best and the score ended up at a professional 2-0. Granted in the first half it looked like we might be heading towards having 'one of those days' but a couple of moments of quality from a a quality player sealed the deal and we relaxed from then onwards.

I was at the game and I have to say it was pretty low on atmosphere. Fulham are quite a nice club but lack ambition like you wouldn't believe. It was always relatively comfortable. Some people counted it as a derby win but even geographically that's pushing it a bit.

Anyway there's very little to discuss so I'll move on to the more interesting story of the day, the CIES Football Observatory study. I'll hold my hands up: I'd never heard of it before today. Does that I mean I can't exploit its data to prove how great Arsenal are? Absolutely not.

As a bit of a statto, this survey is a delight for me. It provides even the most trivial statistics (Who knew that the Bundesliga was Europe's tallest top league with an average height of 183.8cm?) along with the really interesting ones. From an Arsenal perspective, it's gratifying to hear that our senior squad contains the highest proportion of so called 'home grown' players of any team in the League. We all know that statistics can be misleading and in this case the results are somewhat skewed by player like Frimpong who, despite qualifying as squad member, have no input whatsoever into the games we actually play. Nevertheless, I think it's a reason to be proud considering some of our rivals are so hell bent on killing football, that they give little or no consideration to the production of genuine talent in their respective academies.

This League high proportion (a figure of 32.2%) is a good thing for more than one reason. Firstly, it really highlights how we truely believe in youth development. Throughout all of Ivan Gazidis' chest thumping about financial strength, ability to compete, ambition, etc. the message has still remained clear; Arsenal football club is committed to producing our own players with the ability to become valued squad members at some point in the future. The figure published today proves that those are more than just words.

There is also a link to another Arsenal nugget from this week. After Liam Brady announced last year that he was to step down as chief of the Arsenal Academy, the search began to find his replacement. Many names have been mooted in the time that has since passed, including a highly rated Croatian, but this week it was finally announced that the position would be filled by Dutchman Andries Jonker. Once again, I'll hold my hands up and say I've never heard of him. But those who are in the know seem to think that it is a very canny appointment indeed.

All I know is that he was schooled by Louis van Gaal. Based on that, I wonder if, and this is purely conjecture, we may see a less personal approach to youth development. Zlatan Ibrahimovic, in his recently published autobiography, expressed his distaste for van Gaal and his machine like style of coaching. Ibrahimovic says that van Gaal referred to players not by name but by numbers which corresponded to their roles within the team. I fear that if Jonker follows a similar approach, he could alienate mavericks like Ibrahimovic within the youth sides. But that is pure speculation and his role is not that of a coach. Honestly I'm just trying to put a spin on a story I know very little of.

But the link to today. It is known that our Academy is not running perfectly. Our under 18's for example sit miserably at the bottom of their youth League. However, the League high proportion shows we can't be doing too badly. Players are successfully making the jump. That gives the new man Jonker plenty to work with which can only be a good thing.

Anyway. That's it for tonight. We play Coventry in the Cup on Saturday afternoon at three o'clock Friday night at quarter to eight so I should be back before then. Expect a Zelalem debut. For now.