Cesc Fabregas. I say overall game because Cesc’s defence splitting passes sent shivers down my spine, but that aside, Santi is far more fun to watch. The way he gets out of tight spaces with his little speedy feet is a sight to behold. Does anybody look more graceful when they spray the ball across the pitch with a pass? It looks even more enjoyable when it is done with his ‘weaker’ foot.

Santi Cazorla is back in training today everybody! This makes me very excited because like I know all of you, I love the little fella. I was watching a superb 25 minute clip of him by @CulannDavies on twitter who makes excellent compilation videos and it made me yearn for some Santi action once more.

It made me realise that when I watch Arsenal play, I get the most enjoyment from him compared to anybody else in the squad and for that matter, anybody else for sometime.

*Controversial sentence warning* In fact I enjoy watching Santi’s overall game far more than I did Cesc Fabregas. I say overall game because Cesc’s defence splitting passes sent shivers down my spine, but that aside, Santi is far more fun to watch. The way he gets out of tight spaces with his little speedy feet is a sight to behold. Does anybody look more graceful when they spray the ball across the pitch with a pass? It looks even more enjoyable when it is done with his ‘weaker’ foot.

Then it made me think about how he could improve as a player. It is an interesting question because personally I do not believe he can do a great deal more to improve on his side of the bargain, I do believe though that he was somewhat restricted creatively. Oliver Giroud whilst an impressive target man, especially in his first season, he was never really much of a threat in behind. Lukas Podolski had an up and down campaign dealing with adaptation, then injury. And he hardly made runs off the ball so he could be found, something I hope he works on.

Often Santi’s only outlet was that of Theo Walcott who often was asked to stay wide to open up the pitch.

I have vision’s of Santi scampering across the edge of the opposition penalty area from left to right looking for passing options but often having to play the simple pass to Sagna because options were limited. Especially towards the end of the season when we were conservative going forward.

This is where a striker of top quality could take Arsenal and the players around them to another level. A player who can find spaces in the penalty area or that could spin into wide areas allowing the wide forward to occupy the central space will make players like Santi Cazorla even better because they can give Santi more options do be dangerous rather than having to make the safe option.

According to reports, it looks as if Real Madrid are pushing to get Gareth Bale hard and should they pay a ridiculous amount of money on Bale, it could mean that Arsenal could be the only realistic option for Luis Suarez assuming that the likes of Chelsea and Manchester United were not interested in him.

So this is what I make of this £40,000,001.00 bid. It would not make any sense to make that bid just to talk to the player when we would have a perfectly simple route to the player via his agent. His agent would know what we were willing to pay, what the manager plans to do this summer etc etc. So I do not believe it is for that reason.

What has been spoken about is that there is a disagreement on the terms of a plus £40m bid. Suarez and his agent feel that the deal was that if a Champions League club was to bid past that magical mark then he would be free to toddle off to whichever CL club that would match that fee. Now Liverpool rightly argue that Arsenal are not in the Champions League, we have a qualifier to get through. So as things stand Liverpool can demand what they like, even £100 million. But what if we successfully negotiate our way through the qualifiers into the group stages?

Does that bid still stand? Our do we have to add an extra quid? Either way I suspect that both Arsenal FC and team Suarez have looked hard at the contract and think that the bid lodged should be enough to land the player. So I do not expect there to be any meeting of half way. Seeing as he cannot play until September then it doesn’t really matter if we have him in the squad now or not.

Anyway, it seems as if Gervinho is off to Roma which is both good and sad at the same time. Sad because the guy has more talent than many, many better players but given his age and the unlikelihood of improvement then I think it is the right move for both us and him. A player who could unlock the door but who just could not bloody walk through. Like I have said in the past, Gerv reminds me of a player who has spent his whole life learning the game with a ball at his feet on his own dribbling around the streets but never learnt to pass, cross or shoot until it was too late.

Bernard who it seemed may have been his replacement looks to be heading to Porto so I wonder if Gnabry will be the player to take that slot or whether Arsene will look externally. There seems to be more pressing issues so it will be interesting to see how it all unfolds.

Anyhoo, I am off to book some tickets for the Emirates cup.

’till tomorrow.