The transfer window is but two months away and with Chelsea hoping to pull a Sion to get out of their avaricious predicament, the press has started to put two and two together, coming up with another group of players to add to the already voluminous Arsenal midfield. A Daily Star story about Arsenal looking at Lorik Cana has picked up speed despite the fact that the rag failed to register that the player signed for Sunderland in the summer. Cana had a trial arranged with Arsenal when he was 16 but failed to clear customs at Heathrow when he arrived, presumably the fear being that he would abscond if he failed to make the grade. Wenger apparently kept in contact with the player but never pursued his interest in signing him further.

The midfield is exceptionally well-stock if suffering through injury. The African Cup of Nations is going to have nowhere near the impact that it has in previous seasons, the number of first team squad players eligible for the tournament is down. Even so, Song will be a big loss but Denilson can come in to replace him. Arsene may decide to dip into the market and bring in some cover on a short term basis hence the Vieira stories which surfaced in the summer. There is no necessity for Arsene to do so; the experience gained by the squad is often masked by their age. To put some sort of context on this, if the squad remained at Arsenal, they would dominate the list of all-time appearances such is the level they have reached now.

Wenger leaves implications hanging in the air at times though with other positions. It is clear he is looking at strengthening the centre of the defence, the injury suffered by Djourou a big blow in that respect. Ahead of tomorrow’s game, he added almost in passing, that Senderos would be available for the squad. The Swiss international is the forgotten man in terms of first team football, the Carling Cup squad at the moment in his search for club football. He should however take heart from the paths trodden by several of the squad. song and Eboue had long battles to win people over and did so. Almunia likewise. None left the club on loan with the obvious intention of being sold, Song was always coming back from Charlton Athletic no matter how that spell turned out. That Wenger admitted to strongly considering re-signing Matthew Upson shows that leaving the club is no barrier to being reconsidered in the future.

The manager referred to the ‘crisis‘ at Liverpool, drawing parallels with the 2008-09 season for Arsenal. Even if they beat United tomorrow, it will require a Herculean effort on the players part to draw Liverpool into the title race rather than looking on from the sidelines. The current snaffling of shares by Stan Kroenke is feeding a drip-drip of stories about takeovers, something that will not go away until the issue is resolved one way or the other. The template on how not to takeover a club is Liverpool, internecine sniping by the owners driving fans to protest. Whether the American wants to follow the Glazer’s path to excessive borrowing to buy the club may in part be defined by the licensing process that UEFA and FIFA put in place, ostensibly to control English clubs and their excesses.

Sepp Blatter is meddling in the composition of the squads which according to reports this week is going to be nowhere near as draconian as first portrayed with Fabregas, Clichy, Eboue and Denilson all likely to be considered English for their purposes. Such rulings seem to make a mockery of UEFAs intention to curb youth transfers, rendering them almost essential rather than enhancing the quality of native players. If the financial controls being effected are equally obscure, nothing will really stop Kroenke or Usmanov from loading debt onto Arsenal should they become sole owner of the club. What impact that will have is hard to digest without proper details of their plans.

For Arsene, he has made it clear to both of them that interfering on the playing side is a total no-no. It is easy to say that on paper and there is no suggestion that either will simply buy players that the manager does not want. However, Abramovich has done so at Chelsea, to a hugely detrimental cost financially and in his relationship with an ego larger than the Russian’s bank balance. Can either of Arsenal’s suitors afford to make such a basic error?

’til Tomorrow.