So the Reus story I told you about in June has reared it’s sexy head again with a number of key people have started talking about it. It’s quite interesting hearing it from different places because I only had a loose understanding of the initial agreed deal.

But anyway, just to go back to it. The clubs agreed a fee way back when, thenthe player picked up an injury and it felt promising, then it went quiet. The assumption is that he rejected Arsenal.

Arsenal apparently going hard for Reus as a striker (which is why I think Sanchez will play there for us). He has it all, pace, spectacular vision as well as versatility across the front line. The club also opened talks with Sanchez at the same time. The reason that Dortmund were keen to do business is the very public buyout clause the German has in his deal for £35m. Not very high for a superstar. They’d already lost Gotze, World Cup goal winner, the season before.

Now, my assumption was that Bayern would take him next year. I’ve been told this is an impossibility by loads of people who know more about German football than me, however, I don’t believe this regardless of his affiliations as a fan. All his pals will be at Bayern, Pep is every young players dream manager and they’re the pride of Germany armed with mega cash. If Sol Campbell can move to Arsenal, Reus can move to Bayern.

Another premise for him rejecting us is that he thought he was going to be Barcelona’s hero signing of the summer. Then they moved for the disgraced Suarez, which left him up Dortmund creek without an option. And remember, Arsenal are a very good option as half the national the are with us. The German guys love London apparently. Who wouldn’t, a Chicken Cottage on every corner.

If the Barca story is the right line of fire, it’s clear Dortmund are selling because they can get £45-50m for him now opposed to £35m next year. Which means we were going very big. If the Bayern rumour is true, they’ll want to dump him this summer and very soon to stop him moving the way of so many others.

Now, I mentioned the other day that if we received bids for late twenties pairing Lukas or Cazorla, we’d probably accept. Both don’t have it physically anymore to beast the league. Now, just a total speculative guess here, but if we pick up a nice fee for either of them, say £17m, free up £100k a week in wages, it’s probably not beyond the pale to suggest we’d push for Reus again if he’s available.

Just a guess, so don’t take your clothes off and share the excitement on the tube. It’s just a guess. Such an attractive guess. So attractive, I’ve just dropped my trousers in an staff members review.

Anyway, it’s good to know, that when armed with cash, Wenger goes big on talent, not reputation. Reus is one of the best on the planet. He’d be an incredible snare for us.

I’ve been doing some more digging around on Shad Forsythe. He’s an interesting signing. I’m quite interested to understand how Arsenal picked him up in the role. I’m assuming he clearly wasn’t brought in by Arsene Wenger because he’s not qualified to make such a decision. Nor is he a fan of usurping his team of merry men. So was it Colin Lewin or Gary O’Driscoll who interviewed him / chose him? Was it the shady assistant Gazidis has from America you never see mention of anywhere? Was it one of the tech providers like Prozone? How do you go about recruiting for a role like this and what were the checklists? I mean, bar being American which must have checked a few ‘boys club’ boxes. Who is in charge at the club of making sure we’re at the forefront of tech and talent?

Still, what is apparent is that, as one of the Grovers pointed out yesterday, is he can work with fatigued players. He’s taken a group of men who’ve collectively all played about 50 games. They’re all going to be totally ruined after a season of heartache. They’re all playing in disgusting heat. They’re all firing on all cylinders. The German strategy was to blast teams hard and direct and fast… you need to fuel players correctly to achieve that. So regardless of club experience, he’s taken on the hardest 6 weeks in international football and he’s owned it with limited injuries.

Reading up about how entrenched in tech the German national team were, it’d interesting to see what Shad’s thoughts are on our current providers. Are there enough of them? Are they the right ones? Do we need more?

Igor Guryashkin sent me an article I can’t sure because it’s PDF (LIES, here is ARTICLE), but he wrote about the study into cortisol levels in sport and how it affects fatigue. Apparently when the body is stressed, in weaker players, more cortisol is produced which causes fatigue. They measure it in saliva. What they’re getting to is this..

The task for Hudy and the coaching staff would then be to manage the external stress factors, either through herself, the sports psychologist they have on staff or even Self, who Hudy stresses “is hard on players but the first to slap them on their ass after practice.” She explains: “We looked at biological stiffness and environmental stiffness. Biological stiffness would be from strength training and what you have genetically. That’s affected by what we can prescribe and increase or decrease for you. But then we looked at their environmental stiffness—psychological fatigue, stress, things we could control. It was the big thing I got out of the cortisol study: What psychological work can we do in that time frame so the players don’t get stressed?” So basically, physical workouts affect your recovery as well as psychological stresses. Really interesting. Which drives back to the point I made about Austria. Why take players to another country, with poorer facilities in a hotel room… well, there’s your answer. Kind of. Just goes to show you how far the game is moving. Imagine where we’ll be in 5 years? ROBOTS ON THE PITCH!

Anyway, that’s all you’re getting today you buggers. Have fun and keep your clothes on.

P.S. Mascharano: ‘Alexis Sanchez asked me should I move to Liverpool, I told him “they aren’t the team they used to be. Join Arsenal.”‘