Yesterday, amidst all the good news for Arsenal supporters, there was an announcement by the English Premier League that they are cancelling Setanta's contract for the 2009/10 season owing to the fact that Setanta could not make a £10m scheduled payment. The rights to some 46 matches are now going to be repackaged and sold to the highest bidder with Sky sports and ESPN the two most likely contenders.

This weekend was the World Cup qualifying climax in Africa, and there was plenty of qualification drama to go around. The winners of each of the five groups qualified for World Cup 2010, and everyone else missed out. But there was a pretty decent consolation prize for the ten second and third placed teams, as World Cup qualifying doubles as Africa Cup of Nations qualifying and the top three in each group qualified for the 2010 Africa Cup of Nations (also known as the African Nations Cup, ACN and CAN) in Angola.

Egypt is the toast of the Confederations Cup just like Turkey were in the 2008 Euro which lifted much above its weight class.

An agonizing 4-3 loss to five time World Cup winner Brazil over a disputed Kaka goal in the 90th minute and now a 1-0 win over five time World Cup winner Italy.

Arsene Wenger has decided to take a different tact. He has sold Adebayor and Toure and Eboue is due to follow. That is three of Arsenal's four Africans. The move can be explained as a massive u-turn by Arsene.

A few years ago Arsenal set-up an agreement with Beveren in Belgium, whereby the Belgian club brought players over from the Ivory Coast and Arsenal were to be given first refusal once the players acquired a Belgian passport.

Just when you thought the door of the Lyon's transfer season had been locked until December- at least if you believe Puel- with the arrival Bafetimbi Gomis, OL still have some unfinished business to attend to, though it's all "out-bound" traffic, in their minds that is. Really, Puel needs to have his head examined: his minimalist approach to recruiting is really irking the crap-out-of-me.

Matuidi

So here we are again, its not that long ago I was here throughout the Andrey Arshavin saga. Well, thats what it feels like anyway.

You can get all the rumours, confirmation of signings and general deadline day talk right here on The Goon Blog.

The most likely signings are Blaise Matuidi and Marouane Chamakh and the most likely departure is one Philippe Senderos who at one point, had a sealed move to Everton.

Talk of being blindsided. Here I am moaning about Eduardo's two match ban whereas a little known player called Gael Kakuta has managed to turn Chelsea into the house of Blues.

" A restriction of four months on his eligibility to play in official matches has been imposed on Kakuta. Chelsea are banned from registering any new players, either nationally or internationally, for the two next entire and consecutive registration periods following the notification of the present decision.

Howdy, another day of rest for us after many others played yesterday. Wins for Sp*rs and Mancini City keep things relatively tight at the top, tonight's game between Liverpool and Aston Villa is a very interesting one indeed.

From our point of view there's no team news as yet. One thing is certain though, there'll be no Cesc Fabregas.

Luis Felipe Scolari has been approached by the Angolan FA to manage the Angolan national squad. His contract, if he accepts it, runs to the end of the Africa Cup of Nations which is to be hosted by Angola in January 2010.

Angola has been overshadowed by its West African counterparts and Egypt until recently when they qualified for the 2006 World Cup and entered the quarterfinals of the 2008 Africa Cup.

In whats been a slow news week there has been a flood of stories surrounding our club over the weekend.

Big Phil, Swiss Tony or Senderlump, whatever you want to call him has now become a target for Steve Bruce's Sunderland. Senderslug has never really made the CB spot his own in his time at Arsenal and Wenger's decision to let him leave to join Milan on loan with a view to make the deal permanent, gave the impression Sir Arsene didn't really see a future for him at the Emirates.

Not in the mood yet?

Well we have been waiting for this day since May, even before that after last season fizzled out but we do not have to wait much longer. I love the little video above, Eduardo's Arnie like "I'm back" in particular.

We have been written off by everyone it seems, I think all the top four teams are weaker apart from us.

A very interesting day today, perhaps more so than initially meets the eye: much has been made of Torres and Gerrard both being out when Liverpool face Sunderland at three, it should also be remembered that their only remaining half decent player Macherano played two hard games in South America this last week, working like a demon to get Argentina to the World Cup Finals; the result being that he is unlikely to be on top form; Sunderland should get a draw at the very least.

Roughly a quarter of the way into the new season and the Big Four have experiences vastly contrasting fortunes. We have a look at them...

Chelsea

Won five from five, on a great run currently, Drogba firing, Lampard re-finding his goalscoring touch, defence shored up.

Guus Hiddink returns to Russia with strong indications of a full future Chelsea role. Abramovich could not be in a better position with such options. If Ancelotti fails, it sets up Hiddink's return after World Cup duty is over.

Big Phil in contrast takes up the Bunyodkor job. He could have gone to Angola.

Guus Hiddink returns to Russia with strong indications of a full future Chelsea role. Abramovich could not be in a better position with such options. If Ancelotti fails, it sets up Hiddink's return after World Cup duty is over.

Big Phil in contrast takes up the Bunyodkor job. He could have gone to Angola.

Christmas is my favourite time of the year and I hope everyone had a good one. Personally, all I asked was for a seemingly impossible win against Aston Villa. The West Midland giants have smashed Manchester United, Chelsea and Liverpool and are threatening to break into the top four.

The Arsenal apparently, the poorest out of these teams were expected to roll over and let the speed-demons take over at The Emirates.

Its still one match early, as Song is still available to play tonight against Pompey before flying off to Angola for the ACN, but one issue that is high up the agenda at the moment is who will play in midfield when Song is away?Song has had a great season and his good result in the blog vote for 2009 player of the year has surprised even me, one of Song's biggest fans.