Good morning from a vaguely overcast, but more specifically hungover Edinburgh. I imagine this weather would make for ideal marathon running, or it would at least be much more appropriate than the glaring heat of summer we experienced last weekend, but that would've been much less fun for us spectators, and we all know marathon running is really about the spectators.

It's true. It's massive news.

I'm going on loan to Barcelona for the next 10 days. I've done a deal with the city whereby I'll drink their beer, eat their food, swim in their sea and walk around the place in flip-flops until it's time to return home. This is me and Mrs Blogs' first holiday for five years so we're kinda looking forward to it.

We currently sit marooned in the post season pre European Championships no man's land. It's sometimes a bit crazying to watch my fellow inhabitants of this post apocalyptic wasteland roaming the thunder dome for scraps of tumbleweed with which to forge transfer speculation – desperately looking to fuse liquid gold from its drying spores.

A day after two managers have left their clubs to go to bigger and supposedly better ones, can we really expect anyone in the game to show loyalty? Or what we'd define as loyalty?

Brendan Rodgers has had a great season at Swansea but when the plaintive Scouse cry was directed towards him, he was up and out the door.

I was in email conversation with a nice chap called Chris the other day, and he said something which got me thinking:

Lord only knows what people did in the pre-Internet days when Georgie Graham preferred to only spend money on Eddie McGoldrick and 14 centre-backs.

Although there were always rumours and chatter about certain players it was very much restricted in comparison to what we have today.

As you will know, this is a blog about Arsenal. Hence the name.

Obviously I have a keen interest in all things Arsenal. I want the the club to do well, to win things, to compete and to sign good players. When we sign those players, I will welcome them (unless they're one of these signings in which case I'll hedge my bets and make a 'this tastes yukky' face whilst suggesting we should wait and see how they do), and players we don't sign don't interest me in the slightest.

Good morning to you. It's another scorcher in Edinburgh.

Thanks to all for the kind messages re: Mrs Blogs and the marathon running. I can think of a million things to do on a hot day like that, running 26 miles is really not one of them. Sitting in the park supportively drinking cold beer before going to finish line to see a sunburnt Mrs Blogs arrive was one of them.

Good sleepy morning from a very warm Edinburgh.

Last night was one of those where I lay down, immediately couldn't sleep, so moved to the sofa in the sitting room so as not to disturb the soon to be marathon running Mrs Blogs. I couldn't sleep there either so I was treated to the sound of late night Scotland.

Hello, how's the head? Pounding, eh? I know the feeling. A quick Saturday round-up for you. Not that you don't deserve more. There just isn't more.

Anyway, we'll start with Bacary Sagna who in the spare time he has since that bloke tromped on his leg and broke it, has obviously been soaking up the mood from the old Twitter box.

In the Darwinian jungle of football, every summer ought to be a surgery. It's a chance for the coaching staff to doctor the cosmetics of the side. To assess what went well and what didn't and where and how to improve. Improvements aren't solely transplanted through the transfer market, but a good nip and tuck on the training field can often make just as much, if not more difference.

Everyone loves a new signing, right? That's what this summer, and every summer, is all about. Waiting, watching, speculating and hoping, until that magic moment arrives when the announcement is made on the official site:

Arsenal are delighted to announce the signing of Rupert P Winkletosser on a long term contract for an undisclosed fee .

Morning all.

We'll start today with the news that Arsenal have announced the release of 7 players, the most high profile of which is Manuel Almunia whose contract expires this summer.

The others are Gavin Hoyte, who follows his brother Justin out of the club, and youngsters George Brislen-Hall, Sean McDermott, Rhys Murphy, James Campbell and Jeffrey Monakana.

Good day to you. The sun is shining, the birds are singing, and all remains quiet in the world of Arsenal.

Many of our players are now away with their countries ahead of Euro 2012. There's a list on the official site here so you can see who you're supposed to be fretting about for the duration of the tournament.

Morning all.

Moving swiftly on from this weekend and we're now faced with that thing that football fans hate more than anything else in the world – having to have a bit of patience. With Euro 2012 on the horizon we may find that the business we need to do isn't done as quickly as we would like.

So, do anything last night then?

Me and Mrs Blogs just had a quiet pint or two in the local, discussed the upcoming referendum in this country and the implications of same, then came home and had a toasted cheese sandwich. And apart from that nothing else happened. Nothing at all. Nothing at all.

I do not know. We do not know.

Words which you rarely hear during a summer transfer saga because somebody always claims to know. Even if they don't know, they know. The not knowing provides them with knowledge based simply on the fact that they don't know. Ignorance is information.

So this morning you'll have people who know one thing about our captain and his plans.

So the season is over and another summer is upon us. It's been here for four days and already I'm bored of it. As Mick Jagger once drawled, "the sunshine bores the daylights out of me." (Not that that presents a problem in London, but stick with the metaphor). Already I find myself looking ahead to those glove handed, dribbly nosed November afternoons.

So, yesterday I looked at the keepers and defence and sent them home to get their report cards signed by their parents otherwise they'd get 100 lines (I must not do that thing I do which makes us concede goals").

Today it's time to look at the middle and top end of the pitch and see how they got on.

So the season has ended and we can take stock of where we are and the way we've performed. I've decided to a player by player analysis of each player and assign them a mark, just like in school. I just need to find a red pen with which to scribble on their report cards.

It's broken up into two parts (today and tomorrow), and we start at the back with goalkeepers and defenders.

So, it has begun already. The season is barely finished and the summer transfer madness has kicked in. I say madness because there's a lot of talk, a lot of hype, a lot of speculation and frankly, it should barely register on our Give-a-fuck-ometers because it's nothing anyone who has even a passing interest in football couldn't have predicted.

Match report Video By the numbers

It was the 92nd minute of the game when Arsene Wenger, as fraught with nerves as I've ever seen him, clung to Pat Rice as a Robin van Persie chance went begging.

I think we all knew how he felt. I'd have tried to cuddle Pat too if I were there.

Right then, it all boils down to this.

Participation in next season's Champions League hinges on our league finish which hinges on today's game against West Brom at the Hawthorns. Win and it's ours. Anything else and we're looking for others to do us favours and, frankly, we can't rely on that at all.

*boilk*

It was poker night last night down at Mugsmasher's place. I lost everything in one hand some time around 2.30am to a bearded cardshark. Which probably wasn't a bad thing considering I'm now of an age where I take a Vampiric approach to nighttime I'm ok once it's dark but I'm fucked if I'm going to let daylight hit me.

Stupid rain.

Everywhere you look, rain. I am all for a bit of moisture, the world would be a much worse place without it, but this is ridiculous now. It's cold, it's wet and it's supposed to be summer. How is a man supposed to scorch large chunks of meat over charcoal in this kind of weather?

Distraction.

That is the word that springs to mind this morning as I look over the Arsenal news feeds and take on board all the stuff that went on yesterday regarding Yann M'Vila. Such was the ferocity with which the news was embraced that it makes you wonder if people really can't bear to think about what lies ahead at the end of this week.

Good morning,

bank holiday is over and we now get on with the task of waiting out this week until Sunday's final league game of the season. There'll be plenty of time to preview that in the days ahead, and a few decisions will have to be made by the boss in terms of the team, but let's get closer to kick off before we do that.

Well, well, well. Somebody up there clearly likes us because yesterday's results mean that we've gone one more chance to secure third place.

Our trip to West Brom on the final day of the season will provide us with one more opportunity to finish in third and thus qualify for the Champions League next season.

Match report Video By the numbers

Even in the cold light of a rather hungover day it's hard to put into words what we saw yesterday.

As others have suggested it rather summed up our season, we fought hard to get back into a good position, then let it slip through carelessness and over-complication.

An early start this morning and an early kick off for Arsenal as we face Norwich in our final home game of this challenging league season.

The situation we're in in simple and requires little explanation win both games we have left and we finish third and qualify automatically for next season's Champions League.

So, last night's results will certainly focus the minds ahead of Saturday's game against Norwich.

Bolton's game in hand down the bottom left them on the wrong end of a 4-1 pasting by Sp*rs while Newcastle pretty much ended Chelsea's hopes of a top 4 finish with a 2-0 win and a couple of fantastic goals by Pappis Cissé.

It is remarkably quiet considering we're heading into the final two games of this league season. Maybe it's not that remarkable though, maybe there's just a sense that this campaign is one most people would pretty much like to see the back of ... once we secure third place.

We'll watch tonight's games with some interest.

Yesterday Arsene Wenger made it quite clear we were a team that was far too reliant on the goals of Robin van Persie.

Yesterday Arsene Wenger said there was nothing we could do about it until the end of the season and he urged the captain to drag us over the line into third place.

Yesterday, he did something about it, for next season at least, by finalising the signing of Lukas Podolski from Cologne.

Morning all, and welcome to a brand new week.

I will, this morning, be avoiding the hot topics of hatred and abuse and Match of the Day. In the first instance there's very little you can do about it (especially as no club/fans are whiter than white) and in the second any programme that would have The Goblin Prince as its guest, to peddle his footballing philosophy, hardly needs me to further its agenda by complaining about them and giving oxygen to the nonsense they broadcast most of the time,

Anyway, plenty to be going on with this morning, starting with the manager looking for the skipper to drag us over the line and into third place this season.

Match report Video By the numbers

And so did venture a pack of brave knights into a land where did live monsters. The monsters did try and slay the knights through tactics of brute strength. They did lob high missiles into the air and a crumply giant did strike the first blow of the battle.

Match report Video By the numbers

And so did venture a pack of brave knights into a land where did live monsters. The monsters did try and slay the knights through tactics of brute strength. They did lob high missiles into the air and a crumply giant did strike the first blow of the battle.

Ok then, after a relatively quiet week it all kicks off again today against Stoke.

Their season is more or less complete, they're in no danger of relegation but you can be quite sure they'll be up for this one today. Their fans don't like us very much after we hurt their feelings by being upset that one of their players smashed Aaron Ramsey's leg in two.

I'm not much of a betting man really. From time to time I'll get a tip and throw a couple of quid on it, win a few quid back, then fritter that few quid away betting on stuff I really have no clue about. But I'm sorry now I didn't have a pop on both Spanish clubs going out of the Champions League this week.

Morning all,

the great thing about football is that you can choose to ignore the bits you don't like. So, John Terry, hahahaha. The rest?

*puts fingers in ears*

"Lalalalalala, can't hear you can't hear you can't hear you, lalalalalalala, stop talking, can't hear you, lalalalala"

I mean, just when you thought you couldn't dislike Barcelona any more for always trying to nick our players and suckle the DNA directly from their teats, they let something like this happen.

Morning all from a Dublin where summer has arrived. I assume that the absence of torrential rain is a sign of summer. Maybe I'm getting it wrong.

We'll start today with the news that Robin van Persie's agent has apparently had a nice cup of tea and a chat with Juventus who would very much like to sign him this summer.

Morning all, welcome to a new a new week.

We'll start this morning with the not-so-news that Robin van Persie was named PFA Player of the Year last night. It was, after everything he's done this season, fairly obvious he was going to win it and the captain was quick to praise those around him for helping him scoop the award won in the past by Liam Brady, Thierry Henry and Dennis Bergkamp.