Eugh. Full of cough/cold and relatively little sleep, coupled with the fact there’s bugger all happening in the Arsenal world, means this is one heck of a crud-diddly-udd way to start the working week. The only saving grace of positivity for today was that a new family member entered the world last night in the shape of a new nephew for yours truly here. 

The only down side is his dad – my brother – is a West Ham fan and so the child will probably never know the awesomeness of being a Gooner. It will be a shame. If he found his way to the world of Arsenal I could lavish him with so many stories about a wonderful club. But instead he has to be raised sporting claret and blue and shouting ‘irons!’ In an unsavoury and somewhat irritating manner.

Maybe I’ll get lucky. Maybe he’ll naturally gravitate towards the right way. As long as he doesn’t stray into the path of extreme darkness and start favouring Chelski though, I suppose, because that really would put both father and uncles noses out of joint. In fact, it would probably mean needing to rip our noses off, set fire to them and shoot them out of a cannon in to the River Thames if there was any hint of a West London interest. At least that my brother and I can both agree on.

Don’t get me wrong, I’d love to have my influence on the wee nipper, but I’ve made a promise with the sibling not to confuse the child. So whilst he is still looking like a potato and unable to tell us his preferences, then I’ll get a few snaps in an Arsenal baby grow and accept the poor nippers fate.

Anyway, anything else to talk about? We could look at the Benzema rumours, but does anybody believe that it would actually happen? I mean, really? There’s been a lot of talk about Ramos to United in the last few weeks, but if you look at most of the more respected journos (I know, I know, ‘ha!’ right?), a lot are hypothesising that this is a ploy from the Ramos camp to get a better deal at Real by toying with United for their affections. I think it’s similar for Benzema. He doesn’t have as little left on his contract as Ramos, but with a new manager in and talking of Ronaldo playing as an out-and-out number nine, his agent briefing the press that he might consider elsewhere works in his favour to both sound out potential suitors but also to test Madrid’s desire to keep him. 

Even if the plans for Ronaldo are to move him to a good ol’fashioned number nine, are Madrid really going to let go their other option in that position? Not to mention the fact he’s one of the best at it in Europe! 

Sure, we all thought similar of Özil and I remember us first being linked to our German and thinking ‘we’ve got no chance’ in a similar way that this Benzema story has pushed its way front and centre, but unless they have another megastar signing lined up like they did with Bale when we got Özil I can’t see it happening. 

So that’s it for today from me. I need lemons, honey and a way to indocrinate new born babies without parents or anyone else knowing.