afc Wenger holds fire on transfer plans

[TF S4DK]

Arsene Wenger will only turn his attention to possible summer recruits once he has ensured that his current squad will not be hit by departures.Following a slump in the club’s fortunes in the league, Wenger has been linked with players such as Lyon’s Hatem Ben Arfa and the Frenchman readily admits he rates his countryman as a bright talent.With doubts still surrounding the future of Mathieu Flamini who is yet to sign a new deal though, Wenger has other priorities than possible signings at present.“Slowly, yes, we will get there,” Wenger told Arsenal TV about his summer manoeuvres.“I have said many times and I will repeat that, even if you go through a difficult patch at the moment my first target is to keep the team together and when that job is done I can go somewhere else and look, but I have not completed that job at the moment.“It’s just he’s a player [ben Arfa] I have known for a long, long time and that I rate, but I have never heard from Lyon that he is for sale. I just wanted to say [in a recent interview with the French press] that for me, he is a good player with a great talent.”Flamini’s future in North London remains shrouded in mystery as his contract expires at the end of the season and he has been strongly linked with a move to Italy.Wenger remains hopeful that he will agree to remain at Arsenal though, stating: “We are progressing and as I said I want to solve this case one way or another in April, and it looks like we can respect this delay.”The Arsenal manager welcomed French president Nicolas Sarkozy and British prime minister Gordon Brown to Emirates Stadium on Thursday as the Premier League club hosted an Anglo-French summit – something Wenger admitted was a great honour both personally and for the club as a whole.The erudite Frenchman does not appear to be planning for a move into politics when his time in football comes to an end though.“No not really I would like to stay in sport, it is a different job and I feel more comfortable in real sport.“But I have a friend who is a minister of sport now, [bernard] Laporte, and I am interested in politics because it is the real influence on our lives and as well as a chess game, you can see it as well who manages his career very well and who makes mistakes or not, and it is very interesting as a neutral observer to watch what is going on.”

[MrJibbles]

Need to bring in a few players during the summer, wide man is a must.Also (off-topic) Nicolas Sarkozy has one sexy wife!