edgecroft
Well-Known Member
What a miserable time they're having. Arsene Wenger is about to offer a contract to Jens Lehmann, a player who hates and is hated by his number one, Manuel Almunia. Read more:
From the Telegraph
<a class="postlink" href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/arsenal/8380911/Arsene-Wenger-opens-old-Arsenal-wounds-with-offer-to-Jens-Lehmann.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/footba ... hmann.html</a>
Arsene Wenger opens old Arsenal wounds with offer to Jens Lehmann
Arsène Wenger took a gamble with the harmony of his Arsenal dressing room yesterday by offering Jens Lehmann a chance to return to the club.
By Jeremy Wilson 3:29PM GMT 14 Mar 2011
Lehmann, 41, has not played competitively for 10 months, but has been identified by Wenger as the best available option to ease the injury crisis among his goalkeepers.
Wojciech Szczesny (finger), Lukasz Fabianski (shoulder) and Vito Mannone (thigh) are sidelined, leaving Manuel Almunia and James Shea, 19, as Arsenal’s only senior goalkeepers.
Lehmann is without a club so he can be signed outside the transfer windows. He was preparing to spend six weeks with Arsenal’s academy as part of a coaching course. Wenger, though, is hopeful that the German — an integral part of his ‘Invincible’ team who went through the
2003-4 season unbeaten — is still fit enough to play in the Premier League.
Final confirmation of a short-term contract is expected within 48 hours and, subject to his performance in training this week, Lehmann is now likely to be on the bench for Saturday’s Premier League match against West Bromwich Albion.
“Arsenal have a goalkeeping crisis and I jumped at the chance to help them,” said Lehmann.
Incredibly, it would mean that Almunia and Lehmann would again be competing for a place inWenger’s team as Arsenal try to win their first Premier League title for seven years.
Aside from the sporting gamble of signing someone who is 42 this year and who had retired at the end of last season, there is also the issue of Lehmann’s past relationship with Almunia.
In his final season at Arsenal in 2007-8, Lehmann complained vigorously about being superseded by Almunia as Arsenal’s first-choice goalkeeper.
“I have read that Almunia said he deserves to be the No 1 but until now he has not won a single important game,” he said at the time. “To be sitting on the bench behind somebody who only started to play when he was 30 is not funny.”
Lehmann also described it as a “humiliation” and said that he felt “very angry” to be watching among the substitutes.
In an interview in April 2008, shortly before Lehmann left for Stuttgart on a free contract, Almunia responded with some force. “I treat people the way I would like to be treated myself,” he said. “To have someone here who hates me is just amazing. I know he hates me.
“Every morning I wake up, I know it is going to be the same. I’ve had to put up with it every day since he was out of the team and even before then. But I don’t care about him any more. I come into training and I work with Lukasz Fabianski and Vito Mannone. They are better goalkeepers than him anyway.
“If he was someone important to me, I would try to talk to him and see what the problem is. But he’s not. So we don’t talk. Why he doesn’t respect me, I don’t know. But I don’t want any relationship with him.”
Lehmann has a history of controversy and also had a long-standing rivalry with Oliver Kahn as they competed for the same place in the German national team.
Since leaving Stuttgart last summer, Lehmann has established himself as a popular and outspoken pundit on German television. He also made his acting debut last year in a film called Themba.
Lehmann made almost 200 appearances for Arsenal after signing from Borussia Dortmund in 2003 and was part of the team who won the 2005 FA Cup.
From the Telegraph
<a class="postlink" href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/arsenal/8380911/Arsene-Wenger-opens-old-Arsenal-wounds-with-offer-to-Jens-Lehmann.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/footba ... hmann.html</a>
Arsene Wenger opens old Arsenal wounds with offer to Jens Lehmann
Arsène Wenger took a gamble with the harmony of his Arsenal dressing room yesterday by offering Jens Lehmann a chance to return to the club.
By Jeremy Wilson 3:29PM GMT 14 Mar 2011
Lehmann, 41, has not played competitively for 10 months, but has been identified by Wenger as the best available option to ease the injury crisis among his goalkeepers.
Wojciech Szczesny (finger), Lukasz Fabianski (shoulder) and Vito Mannone (thigh) are sidelined, leaving Manuel Almunia and James Shea, 19, as Arsenal’s only senior goalkeepers.
Lehmann is without a club so he can be signed outside the transfer windows. He was preparing to spend six weeks with Arsenal’s academy as part of a coaching course. Wenger, though, is hopeful that the German — an integral part of his ‘Invincible’ team who went through the
2003-4 season unbeaten — is still fit enough to play in the Premier League.
Final confirmation of a short-term contract is expected within 48 hours and, subject to his performance in training this week, Lehmann is now likely to be on the bench for Saturday’s Premier League match against West Bromwich Albion.
“Arsenal have a goalkeeping crisis and I jumped at the chance to help them,” said Lehmann.
Incredibly, it would mean that Almunia and Lehmann would again be competing for a place inWenger’s team as Arsenal try to win their first Premier League title for seven years.
Aside from the sporting gamble of signing someone who is 42 this year and who had retired at the end of last season, there is also the issue of Lehmann’s past relationship with Almunia.
In his final season at Arsenal in 2007-8, Lehmann complained vigorously about being superseded by Almunia as Arsenal’s first-choice goalkeeper.
“I have read that Almunia said he deserves to be the No 1 but until now he has not won a single important game,” he said at the time. “To be sitting on the bench behind somebody who only started to play when he was 30 is not funny.”
Lehmann also described it as a “humiliation” and said that he felt “very angry” to be watching among the substitutes.
In an interview in April 2008, shortly before Lehmann left for Stuttgart on a free contract, Almunia responded with some force. “I treat people the way I would like to be treated myself,” he said. “To have someone here who hates me is just amazing. I know he hates me.
“Every morning I wake up, I know it is going to be the same. I’ve had to put up with it every day since he was out of the team and even before then. But I don’t care about him any more. I come into training and I work with Lukasz Fabianski and Vito Mannone. They are better goalkeepers than him anyway.
“If he was someone important to me, I would try to talk to him and see what the problem is. But he’s not. So we don’t talk. Why he doesn’t respect me, I don’t know. But I don’t want any relationship with him.”
Lehmann has a history of controversy and also had a long-standing rivalry with Oliver Kahn as they competed for the same place in the German national team.
Since leaving Stuttgart last summer, Lehmann has established himself as a popular and outspoken pundit on German television. He also made his acting debut last year in a film called Themba.
Lehmann made almost 200 appearances for Arsenal after signing from Borussia Dortmund in 2003 and was part of the team who won the 2005 FA Cup.
