Arsenal nightmare: Real swoop for Song, Vermaelen

Arsene Wenger seems pretty busy ahead of this summer’s transfer season already.

But he will be wise to watch his own back.

While Wenger seems confident that his treasure – Robin Van Persie – will not be stolen, other players could be quickly gone.

According to The Daily Mail, Real Madrid are plotting a double raid on Arsenal with summer bids for Alex Song and Thomas Vermaelen.

Jose Mourinho seems unlikely to join Chelsea and reports are that he wants to make sure Barcelona never return to the top of the Spanish League while he is there.

Hence, he sees Song as what he needs in midfield.

Vermaelen has also emerged as a target for the Spanish giants.

What’s worse for Wenger is that speculation is rife that Mourinho is also tracking Rennes' Yann M'Vila.

The Frenchman has also been heavily linked with Arsenal.

Song and Vermaelen, along with Laurent Koscielny have been key to Arsenal’s revival this season.

Arsenal plan pre-season game in troubled Nigeria

Arsenal are planning to visit Africa for the first time in 19 years by travelling to troubled Nigeria for a pre-season friendly.

The opposition for the Aug. 5 match is not yet known but is likely to be a leading African national team, the London club said on their website (www.arsenalfc.com) on Friday.

The friendly will be played at the 60,000-capacity Abuja National Stadium.

Arsenal, who are also planning pre-season games in China, Malaysia and Hong Kong, last visited Africa for a tour of South Africa in 1993.

The Islamist group Boko Haram has been fighting a low-level insurgency in Nigeria for more than two years.

Although its attacks are mostly in the north of Africa's most populous nation it has bombed several targets in the capital Abuja, located in the centre of the country.

The office of local newspaper This Day was hit on April 26 by a car bomb and last year United Nations headquarters and the office of the chief of police were struck by suicide bombers.

The sect, which wants to impose an Islamic state on Nigeria's evenly mixed population of Muslims and Christians, has been blamed for hundreds of killings since its uprising against the government in 2009.

Van Persie vows to remain at Arsenal

Arsenal striker Robin van Persie insisted he had no concerns about his Gunners' future as he collected the Football Writers' Player of the Year award on Thursday.

The Dutch striker insisted he would "always be a Gunner" after topping a journalists' poll, having already received the corresponding award from his peers in the Professional Footballers' Association.

Van Persie has scored an impressive 35 goals in all competitions so far this season and has helped propel Arsenal into third place in the Premier League - a position which, if they retain it over the final two games of the season will ensure qualification for next season's Champions League proper.

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There has been speculation as to whether Arsenal, set for a seventh successive year without a trophy, can hang onto the talented 28-year-old who has been attracting envious glances from Europe's leading clubs.

But van Persie was adamant he would be entering contract negotiations with Arsenal as planned once this season was finished.

"That is still the plan," he said. "We haven't set a date but I will have a meeting with the boss like we did before now. We will be having a meeting about my future, and lots of other things.

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"Arsenal is an unbelievable club. The player I am today is because of Arsenal. When I actually signed the deal (to join Arsenal) it was a dream come true.

"If you ask the likes of Robert Pires how he feels, what he feels like he will say 'I feel like a Gunner' - and whatever happens with me I will always be a Gunner."

The Football Writers' Association (FWA) award has been running since 1948 and van Persie said he felt honoured to see his name alongside those of the greats of English football.

"It makes me very proud to be here. I have seen the list (of previous winners), and for me, I never really thought I would be sitting here winning this trophy," van Persie said.

"But even this season I was not really thinking about winning a trophy for myself. I was just playing because I love it and for Arsenal to finish as high as possible in the league.

"When I found out I had actually won it, I was a bit surprised, and was like, 'What, me? Really?'

"It makes me really proud to be part of that history."

He added: "The writers know everything about the season because they have seen every single game, analysed every goal, every move. They know everything about you.

"They are doing interviews with me and other players, they get a clear picture of who is the best player, which is why it means so much that these guys have voted for me."

FWA chairman Steve Bates, chief football writer at The Sunday People, paid tribute to van Persie by saying: "Robin van Persie has had a quite magnificent season, excelling with consistent flashes of individual brilliance which have lit up the Barclays Premier League as well as bolstering Arsenal's season." 

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