Qwiss there's another stadium not far from ours that serves basically no purpose...
Saka
Any one that understands football wouldn't find it difficult to see that Saka is levels and levels above Rashford.
Saka is already elite, and there is only direction he's going from here. Barring bad injuries, he's destined for the very top. Rashford is a decent to good player on a hot streak.
5 days later
He could have easily had another assist yesterday as well. The ball he played to Martinelli in the back post was sublime, defender did brilliantly to make Gabby mistime his header.
There isn't a single facet of the game that he's not excellent at. Absolutely ridiculous player. We're blessed to have him.
"Adds to happiness"
Where's the lie though?
I see you're brushing up on your Yoruba.
6 days later
Love this.
He has definitely made more steps forward this season.. Scary thing is he hasn't even reached his peak, you can now potentially see him being able to reach those Henry levels of just being unplayable.
Generational talent.
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Absolute jewel.
To reach those levels, three things stand out for me: More protection from Arteta and get a decent RW in the squad to ease load where appropriate (I'll ride with Nelson/Pépé); more protection and a better understanding from refs of his physique and playing style; a system where his average position is a more advanced, more in-field (i.e. closer to box).
We're delusional if we expect THESE refs to start protecting him more. It's not going to happen.
Saka's incredible though. That video almost brought a tear to my eye.
5 days later
Not sure what award this is, but since they all attended I assume it's something somewhat known. Good for them. Saka would be my winner, but then maybe we wouldn't have gotten all three awards. 
I’m happy with the winners. This is Saka’s second young player award. Congrats to all three men. A preview to the season awards.
QuincyAbeyie Saka would be my winner, but then maybe we wouldn't have gotten all three awards.
Saka best players, Martinelli best young.
Ode deserves recognition as well though so what they chose is fine.
Øde is one of those guys who won't win too many of these, because there will usually be some showboat with higher GA or a fancier hairstyle, so I'm glad he picked this up. As a pure footballer he's class, must be one of the best technicians Arsenal's ever had.
Øde and Saka—two guys who've spent the whole season making each other better. It's a good year to support the best football club with the greatest history in the biggest city in the country with the strongest league.
QuincyAbeyie Not sure what award this is
It was started up by Bob Wilson to fundraise for his charity, Willow.
I have to say if we go onto win the league I don't think you could argue much with all of these guys winning the national awards.
Well, a few wins will be required in April too.
We only lost 3 games in 2007/08, but the spate of draws we accumulated in the immediate aftermath of Eduardo's injury at Birmingham properly killed us.
RocktheCasbah that's the bonus in not relying on a single goal scorer like we were with Adebayor though. Our 3 top scorers are all evenly distributed, and we've got 3 more now coming into the side in Jesus, Trossard and ESR who all have decent goal scoring pedigree too.
Bring Back Kerrea Gilbert Mental, I know, but also true. Can't remember who the third game was, but we lost at United and Chelsea - a win against United would have given us the title by two points...
goon Oh, absolutely - no arguments there. I was just making the (obvious) point that it's not enough to not lose our games in April. With 18 points for grabs, if we could somehow manage to take all 18, we would be almost home and hosed. 6 draws and the world will look very different indeed.
RocktheCasbah I didn't remember either, so had to check. Our first loss of the season came to Middlesbrough. Aliadiere got the penalty they scored from.
QuincyAbeyie bloody Aliadiere! Thanks for the reminder, he scored the opening goal for Boro in a 1-1 draw at our place too...
5 days later
“Honestly, I love him. I’d just love it if he was my child,” Luke Shaw said during Euro 2020 — and somehow it didn’t sound weird.
It is weird, but I think I said "If I had a daughter, I'd like him to marry her" the other day so I've got your back this once, Luke.
9 days later
Nice round-up from The Athletic about how Saka is world class, at what stage of his career a gaggle of sports writers figured that out with some good little memories, and about how he's England's favourite son.
Burnwinter wow. What a tribute. Some lovely stories.
some other people on twitter are saying 15 mil per year.
That'd make him the highest earner at the club.
- Edited
no issue with the salary being bandied about. it will probably seem like a bargain in a couple of years.
im finally seeing rival supporters accept that the hype is real (apart from the mancs, who are salty that hes better than their wingers and getting picked for england ahead of them). his talent was always more subtle than the typical English wide player. he the feel for space and time between the lines of an attackind mid, but also can morph into one of the most dangerous one-on-one dribbling wingers around. add his physical robustness and workrate, and his skillset puts him well ahead of guys like grealish, rashford and sancho
the salary mentioned includes bonuses. Typical journos trying to inflate stuff.
Anything like £250,000 per week plus performance clauses would be ideal for Saka at this stage, it'd constrain our wage bill if anything.
Quite hard for an incoming star to say he should earn more than Saka, and his influence is clearly beyond that of some in the squad as it stands who would want similar money. Be good too if he could sign this right as he is anointed "world class" by the press.
We've certainly paid worse players more to do less than Saka likely will on these sorts of terms.
Gazza M his talent was always more subtle than the typical English wide player. he the feel for space and time between the lines of an attackind mid, but also can morph into one of the most dangerous one-on-one dribbling wingers around. add his physical robustness and workrate, and his skillset puts him well ahead of guys like grealish, rashford and sancho
This is all true. Plus Saka's highly tactically sophisticated, and along with Ødegaard has been the main player responsible for patiently picking apart packed defences for us all season.
Could become our best since Henry if he were to find one more level over the course of his next contract. And he could be holding up the league trophy in a few weeks at 21. What a player.
Need to offer a competitive salary and when you see what the top wide players in the world are on.
His salary is probably like £200k + bonuses. Hopefully we structure our contracts like that, keep the base as low as can and then heavily incentivise it.
Gazza M great analysis.
Gazza M always ahead of all of them, Sancho at Dortmund the only one who could chat to him
Rashford has the physical tools but his technique isn't up there, also his typical Manc glory hogging attitude prevents him from going anywhere. I like Grealish but he's always been a hype beast, nowhere near the top level
Saka is the most in form RW in the world right now and his game intelligence is high enough that I wouldn't worry if we played him in CM. Levels
- Edited
I don't think we've seen anything yet. Once he picks up a bit of that arrogance and calm that you see from the likes of Thierry and Salah in the final third he'll be something else. You can see it coming each passing week.
Don't like the England related hype though.
Gazza M his talent was always more subtle than the typical English wide player.
Exactly. His dribbling isn't particularly flashy most of the time but its still devastating. His close control is unreal as is his balance. You compare him to someone like Grealish who's a good dribbler but he throws his body around more and it leaves him off balance so his final ball isn't as good as Saka. Our starboy never loses control of the situation, never looks like its a lot of effort. He's sublime.