Will Samba style hit the right notes as Arteta tries to get a tune from his squad

A noteworthy set list as Arsenal boss Arteta plays Samba at Colney; also, Leandro Trossard, Renee Slegers, Steph Catley; and Chapeau Jen Beattie

Hello,

Happy Wednesday,

As a humble suggestion, while reading today’s Substack post, for a pitch perfect accompaniment, you might want to listen to Sergio Mendes Mas Que Nada.

Right.

As I always used to stress to my newspaper interns, journalism is not glamorous.

If you’re interested in becoming a journalist because you think it’s a glamorous profession, then you’re completely wrong.

If, like me, you’re a reporter who gets out and about on a near daily basis, journalism is bouts of terrific intensity, punctuated by plenty of hanging around, and waiting.

And, so it was at London Colney on Tuesday.

The scheduled open training, and two press conferences took around 30 minutes in total. Yet, most reporters were at Colney for nearly five hours, waiting for aforesaid events. It wasn’t anyone’s fault, it’s just the way it is.

Which certainly gave many assembled time to delve into samba beats.

Let me explain…

Tuesday saw another busy day at London Colney, with open training for Mikel Arteta’s team, prior to the gaffer’s pre-match press-conference, as well as Leandro Trossard speaking to the press later on in the afternoon - which meant nearly a whole working day spent at the Gunners training ground HQ, before battling the rushhour traffic on the M25 and M1. Which was nice.

It started around lunchtime, when we walked out onto the manicured turf of London Colney’s large number of pitches, evocatively framed by rolling hills in the background, that we could hear music.

Samba music.

Now, I like samba music as much as the next person.

It’s jaunty, and upbeat, and puts you in a good mood while sprinkling a spot of Latin sunshine on an otherwise cold and grey midwinters day.

But I have to confess I’ve never heard it played before, or during Arsenal training before.

Yes, after watching All or Nothing, we all know Mikel Arteta plays music. (In particular, as depicted in that series, “You’ll Never Walk Alone.”)

It’s just that I can’t recall ever hearing music being played at Colney before.

As an aside it was interesting to learn that Leandro Trossard - who came and spoke to the press about 430pm yesterday - admitted that when he trained he didn’t pay much attention to music being played…

Anyway, it turns out Mikel Arteta, in wanting to get a tune from his squad, ramped up the samba - in particular Sergio Mendes Mas Que Nada, featuring the Black Eyed Peas.

Aficionados of samba music beware - alas, I have to say, unlike Nick Hornby’s character Rob Fleming in High Fidelity, you know the bloke who runs a north London record store, and has an incredible memory for random music info - I don’t devour my music, samba or otherwise, the same way I take in sport.

In other words my brain doesn't have enough extra capacity/memory to catalogue, label and list music - the way it does, say every Arsenal match from the 1980s onwards, for example.

So, standing in the January cold, in the middle of the manicured turf of London Colney on Tuesday lunchtime, my samba knowledge was far from being a perfect pitch, as I tried to work out the name of the samba musicians Arteta had chosen to blast out.

It reminded me of the Billy Connolly sketch, when the Big Yin describes going into a Glasgow vinyl store to try and buy a record of music he had heard at a party, but had absolutely no idea what the music, or the band, or the singer was called.

“Well, er, how’s it go?” asked the man, Connolly says.

"I replied,” ‘it sort of goes like this: ‘Dum, de, dum. Dum, dum, dum…’”

I felt like that yesterday, while trying to work out who was behind London Colney’s mysterious samba music.

Anyway, to cut a long story short, it turned out the samba music was Sergio Mendes Mas Que Nada. You’ll definitely know it.

Even if, of course, it wasn’t to be confused with progenitor Jorge Ben’s 1963 Samba Esquema Novo (New Style Samba), or even the original 1966 Mas Que Nada by the aforementioned Mendes…

You might know it better from the Nike ad that showed Ronaldo and his teammates kicking a football around the airport on their way to France for the 1998 World Cup.

Anyway, as I’m sure you’re all aware by now it was nice to see Ethan Nwaneri and Riccardo Calafiori back in training…

One more victory in the Champions League and Arsenal are through to the knock-out stages without the need for a play-off.

Something that will make us all feeling like dancing, surely.

……….

Arsenal Women

It’s certainly been a busy few days for the club - after a mixed bag over the weekend, with Arteta’s side being held 2-2 by Aston Villa, while Renee Slegers’ first game as AWFC’s permanent head coach saw a lively 5-0 victory over a battling, but limited Crystal Palace side at a freezing cold Meadow Park on Sunday.

If you throw in the fact that on Tuesday, Arsenal Women’s new permanent boss Renee Slegers also gave a pre-match press conference, not to mention the very excellent Steph Catley also previewing AWFC’s Women’s Super League clash against Brighton at Crawley tonight, then Tuesday was a very busy day indeed.

Thankfully the Gooner Fanzine’s outstanding AWFC’s reporter Freddie Cardy’s came with me so as to focus on Slegers and Catley, while I covered the men for my newspaper the Morning Star.

FYI - see the Gooner Fanzine website, and our YouTube channel for Freddie’s comprehensive coverage of Slegers’ side.

Read what Steph told Freddie Cardy for the Gooner Fanzine here

…….

Chapeau Jen Beattie

Jen Beattie. PICTURE CREDIT: Suzy Lycett (See below for more on Gooner Fanzine photographer Suzy)

Chapeau Jen Beattie

There can’t be anyone who loves women’s football - or sport in general for that matter - who isn’t a little sad that the utterly brilliant Jen Beattie has finally hung her boots up. Sad, and proud, and full of admiration with huge respect for the legendary Beattie.

A true Arsenal great, as well as a colossus of the game, a four time title winner - including three with the Gunners, not to mention four FA Cups - two in red and white - and four league cups, again two with the north Londoners, the rest being won with Manchester City.

That’s without mentioning winning an incredible 143 caps for Scotland.

And of course, Beattie’s biggest challenge, her successful battle again breast cancer.

Jen, we salute you.

……….

Suzy Lycett

We’re absolutely delighted that we have the utterly brilliant sports photographer Suzy Lycett on board to shoot WSL action for the Gooner Fanzine.

If you haven’t come across some of Suzy’s superb, exclusive shots for our humble labour of love, then can I suggest you take a look.

We have big plans for our AWFC version of the fanzine so watch this space, suffice to say that Suzy’s outstanding work is integral to our coverage - along with Freddie Cardy’s every-excellent reporting, not to mention a raft of superb writers on Arsenal Women, including the brilliant Jamie Spangher, who now also sells the fanzine outside games before, doing, as I do, and heads to the press box before kick-off.

So please do watch this space over the coming weeks.

In the meantime, here’s my favourite from Suzy’s shots during Sunday’s 5-0 rout of Palace at Meadow Park.

Suzy and Freddie will be at Crawley tonight to cover AWFC’s WSL match vs Brighton so we’ll have much more to share tomorrow, cheers.

PS:

Apropos of nothing, it feels like I’ve been wearing long johns - or my bruised banana bright yellow pyjamas - under my jeans for the whole of this year. Not to mention about six layers.

The dog has even stopped throwing me a funny look as I shed my layers the second I get in the door, so as to not look too much like the Michelin Man - or is it the Stay Puft man from Ghostbusters, I can never remember…

I will be doing so again today when I flog the Gooner before Arsenal vs Zagreb, so please feel free to stop me and buy one.

A fanzine that is, not a pair of pyjamas..