Hleb to Barca

Alex Hleb is currently doing his medical at Barcelona to complete his move to Cattalunyans from Arsenal for a reported fee of £ 11.9 million. The news of him leaving Arsenal to find a quite heaven abroad were circulating since the end of the last season but now it appears a deal has been brokered finally between the two clubs.The FC Barcelona site has already printed an article about the move being done and the contract to be signed as latest as by Thursday.The Barca site has interviewed Alex in Spannish and I am providing you the translated version of that piece of info.

The player Alexander Hleb, who has militated the last three seasons at Arsenal, has come to Barcelona this afternoon to undergo the medical examination before joining FC Barcelona.

In Barcelona, Alexander Hleb has affirmed meet "a dream" with his possible signing by FC Barcelona. "I love this team. I love. I will give the best," said in statements to Barca TV and fcbarcelona.cat.

"I want to win everything"

Belarusian player has been very ambitious: "I've spoken to Guardiola and it is very important for me that he wants and give me the best thing for this team and I want to win everything with the club."

Asked about his qualities, the midfielder has chosen not defined himself. "I can not speak for me. I give it my best on the pitch, but it is better that people and the coach talk about me," he concluded.

So another of the long transfer sagas concerning an Arsenal player has come to a sad end for the Arsenal fans. Could this be a blessing in disguise for Arsenal. I think so Hleb has been a weak link in Arsenal's armoury right from the time he joined Arsenal in 2005 after the club paid Stuttgart £11.2m for his services.I am not being Anti Hleb but the truth is for everyone to see. As rightly pointed out by Opta his statistics sets the record straight regarding Hleb's impact on the overall game played by Arsenal.Here is the statistics:

Season	Games	Goals	Assists
2005/06	25	3	0
2006/07	33	2	4
2007/08	31	2	6
Total	89	7	10

In 89 games that he played for Arsenal over 3 seasons he just netted in 7 times and gave 10 asissts. Quite a low contribution by any one playing for a club like Arsenal in Epl. Hopefully the signing of Nasri could improve this area and be a replacement that would make Arsenal fans memory of Hleb's time at Arsenal just a walk in park. One things for sure , with Hleb's departure the headache for Wenger has increased as his youthful team was coming into its own fold and were very close to achieving great things last year. Now he will have to rebuild the entire squad again which could mean another season without any silverware and which I think would only frustrate more players with the likes of Cesc Fabregas and Adebayour.

Still "In Wenger I believe" and I trust him to deliver a silverware for sure this season.He has this vision which he wishes to achieve with his team and that to by playing the football which is attractive.It needs some courage to that but if you are Wenger, nothing is impossible or is it?I don't know if there's going to be any further movement of players but I would like to bring to your notice about the Youth and Reserve players and I have this piece of info thanks to J Sanderson from Young Guns. The first pre-season warm-up sees us against Barnet on July 19 at Underhill will feature quite some players from our youth setup and reserve teams. Also Arsenal will land a new talent to Spanish outfit UD Salamanca for a season's loan apart from Pedro Botelho who already did a season last year there.

Finally we are linked with Xabi Alonso of Liverpool. Now Alex hleb leaving and Rafa Benitez wanting to cash in, there might be something in that news. Whatever be the case this season has seen us loose quite a midfield players and we desperately need a good quality backup if we are to realize our dream of winning the premiership this season. Keep putting your Comments till then Go Arsenal Go........