Chairman of the board at Arsenal Peter Hill-Wood has told the club website that he has entered in to talks with Arsene Wenger about extending his contract beyond the twelve months he has left on his existing deal.

The Frenchman was linked with the Real Madrid position following the dismissal of Fabio Capello. The uncertainty surrounding his future has created instability in the dressing room at the Emirates Stadium. Players are considering their own futures as they watch their leader planning a future that may lie elsewhere. They have already watched the club captain Thierry Henry leave for Barcelona in a cut price deal, Henry being the latest in a procession of big names that have left the club in the last few seasons.

Arsenal have experienced difficulty in attracting new talent to the club, they have already been snubbed by Ryan Babel and William Gallas has voiced his concerns about the clubs inability to attract stars. Big players with reputations to protect would be best advised to steer clear of a club that will be changing the management in twelve months for fear that the new manager may not want to keep them around as he attempts to make his mark on his new squad and bring in his own playing staff.

Hill-Wood told Arsenal.com “I’m confident he’ll stay” he also said “Hopefully, in the not too distant future we’ll have something positive to say about it”. Cynics will say that this announcement will give the impression that all is well at Ashburton Grove, Arsenal will hope that it sends the right signals out to potential signings. So far they have only signed relative unknowns Fabianski, da Silva and Sagna, although die hard Gunners will jump to the clubs defence to remind us that nobody had really heard of Henry or Vieira before they were unveiled by Arsene Wenger.

With more departures on the card with speculation in the press over Ljungberg and Fabregas and Wenger hinting that Reyes will be playing elsewhere next season. It would seem that Arsenal would have it all still to do if they are to compete next season with more than just kids, especially when you consider the rest of the big four have brought in a galaxy of stars and the pretenders to the coveted fourth Champions League spot are also bolstering their squads in a bid to exploit the Gunners weakness. North London rivals Spurs have brought in Bent, Bale, Kaboul and Taarabt, while Pompey have recruited Nugent, Muntari, Distin and Hreidarsson and Newcastle have brought in Geremi, Rozehnal, Barton and Viduka.

The City of London asked local forces around the country to execute raids on Portsmouth, Newcastle and Glasgow Rangers as part of their investigation in to corruption in the game. The Police have indicated that this investigation is separate from the on-going Steven’s report that had unearthed dodgy dealings in transfers.

Newcastle were quick to release a statement indicating that they were assisting the investigation, but that the club was not the subject of the investigation and that they may have been a victim of criminal activity. However both Pompey and the Gers only released statements indicating their co-operation with the investigation with no further comment.

There will no doubt be immense speculation in the coming days about a variety of transactions involving the clubs and the different staff at those times, or perhaps the culprit is an agent that has sold players to the clubs being investigated, but until the police decide to let the fans know what is happening we will remain in the dark.

Harry Redknapp has added another veteran to his Dad’s Army style squad on the south coast. Sylvain Distin will move to Portsmouth when his contract expires with managerless Manchester City.

Portsmouth almost lost their man when Liverpool placed an offer to tempt the Frenchman to stay in the North-West. The signing of Distin will add further resolve to Pompey’s defence as they push for Europe next season.

English football will mourn the passing of one of its less glamorous sons, as while the media glorifies the World Cup final goals of Peters and Hurst, there is little mention of the tireless running of Alan Ball that helped England to win the Jules Rimet trophy on home soil.

Hampshire police have reported that Alan Ball died of a heart attack as he tried to dampen the blaze of a bonfire in his garden.

Ball’s playing career began with Blackpool, and during the twenty-one years of playing he had nine different clubs, playing for the tangerines twice. He is best remembered for his spells at Everton, Arsenal and Southampton who he eventually went on to manage. Ball like many of the big names of his era found himself playing in the original Major League Soccer or as it was known then the North American Soccer League in the United States.

After trying to pit his wits in the managerial arena for a number of years, Ball found his niche working as a pundit for SkySports and was involved in the coverage of the first fixture that took place in the new Wembley.

Journey man Carl Robinson has made the move across the pond to join Major League Soccer. He has left Norwich City to play for the Canadian outfit Toronto FC, the 30 year old Welsh international was captured by manager Mo Johnston who played for both Celtic and Rangers in the SPL.

Robinson will bring some premiership experience to the side as well as some steel to the midfield as he has a reputation for being a tough tackler, with a good sense of judgement as he has only earned one red card in his ten years in English leagues. Robinson can also provide cover at centre half if necessary. His former clubs include Wolves, Portsmouth and Sunderland.

George Gillett has decided to take advantage of the collapse of the negotiations between Dubai International Capital and the Liverpool board, to launch his bid to become the third American to buy an English premier league club. With Randy Lerner at Aston Villa and the Glazers at Manchester United.

The DIC bid was worth £450M in total with only about 150M of that being used for buying out the share holders. The remainder would be spent on new players as Rafa Benitez requires and a new stadium as the capacity of Anfield is limiting the club’s income as they could easily sell 70000 seats for home games.

The Gillett bid is believed to be worth more to the share holders with reports in the media of it being an extra £500 a share; which the board are duty bound to consider as they have to answer to their share holders not the fans. However the source of the revenue for the Americans bid is not as transparent as that of DIC who have the worlds eighth richest man at the helm and a queue of investment banks willing to lend him anything he requires as he has the assets to back it. The sixty-nine year old American on the other hand has already been bankrupt fifteen years ago, but has since risen like a phoenix from the flames and has built his empire with the Montreal Canadiens the jewel in the crown.

There have also been rumours of Tom Hicks supporting the deal, the Texan owns the Texas Rangers, and could provide much needed financial support in the potential $850 000 000 deal.

Should the deal be finalised Liverpool would be the seventh premiership club to be foreign owned including three of the top four. As Chelsea, AstonVilla, Manchester United, West Ham, Fulham and Portsmouth all have foreign ownership. Can it be good for the English game?

Tony Mowbray has signed former Republic of Ireland goalkeeper Dean Kiely from Pompey. The stopper had moved from Charlton to Portsmouth to further his career but Harry Redknapp brought in David James from Manchester City and Keily was relegated to the bench.

Having been on loan at Luton Town for the last two months, Kiely moves to another Championship side. West Brom need cover in the goal keeping department following the suspension of Russell Hoult.

The draw for the Football Association Challenge Cup sponored by EON Third round proper has not disappointed on any front. The romance of the cup is alive and well, with many of the smaller, lower league clubs facing opposition from the Premiership. Chelsea play hosts to bottom of League 2 Macclesfield Town in a tie that is very much in the vain of the princes versus the paupers.

Cup holders Liverpool will entertain Arsenal in a repeat of their upcoming Carling Cup quarter final, while last years finalists West Ham United have a home tie against Brighton & Hove Albion.

Tottenham who have not managed an away victory on home soil in the league will be hoping that they can overcome a Cardiff City side who have made Ninian Park a fortress as they fight for automatic promotion to the Premiership.

FA Cup third round draw:
Blackpool v Aldershot Town or Basingstoke Town?Barnet v Colchester United?Sheffield United v Swansea City
Reading v Burnley
Portsmouth v Wigan Athletic
Mansfield Town or Doncaster Rovers v Bolton Wanderers
West Ham United v Brighton & Hove Albion
Leicester City v Fulham
Derby County v Wrexham
Wolverhampton Wanderers v Oldham Athletic
Bury or Chester City v Ipswich Town
Manchester United v Aston Villa
Sheffield Wednesday v Manchester City
Tamworth v Norwich City
Salisbury City or Nottingham Forest v Charlton Athletic
Cardiff City v Tottenham Hotspur
Preston North End v Sunderland
Liverpool v Arsenal
Bristol Rovers or Bournemouth v Hereford United
Watford v Stockport County
Crystal Palace v Swindon Town
Bristol City v Coventry City
Peterborough United v Plymouth Argyle
Queens Park Rangers v Luton Town
Southend United v Barnsley
West Bromwich Albion v Leeds United
Hull City v Middlesbrough
Birmingham City v Newcastle United
Torquay United or Leyton Orient v Southampton
Everton v Blackburn Rovers
Chelsea v Macclesfield Town
Stoke City v Bradford City or Millwall

Just when we thought that the premiership was safe from the diving exploits of Robert Pires it appears that the nasty disease has made the short trip across north London and infected Didier Zokora.

Zokora fell in Portsmouth penalty area when the premierships most unlucky player Pedro Mendes flailed a leg to stop the attack. Job done the attack stopped as the African tumbled even though the former Spurs man failed to make contact.

Jermain Defoe slotted home the resulting penalty adding to the first goal scored by Danny Murphy in just 42 seconds. Former Arsenal striker Kanu scored for the visitors to make the final score 2-1; ending a string of nightmare league results for Tottenham who went in to the fixture in the relegation zone.

Where does the FA recruit the people it uses to decide on the punishments that they will hand out to those who offend and break the rules that hold English football together? Are these people trained? Have they seen a game of football? Do they understand business in the modern environment or do they live in an alternative universe?

The FA handed repeat offender Ben Thatcher an eight game ban (with another 15 match ban suspended for two years) for violent conduct when he hospitalised Portsmouth midfielder Pedro Mendes during a game earlier this season at Eastlands Stadium; giving Thatcher a number of weeks to reflect on his actions while he relaxes on a beach or works out at the clubs top class training facilities.

However the same football authority has just handed agent Jonathan Barnett an EIGHTEEN month ban with nine suspended, revoked his agents license and fined him £100,000 and ordered him to pay the costs of the hearing. What was his crime? Cold blooded murder of a player on the pitch? No he spoke to one club about a player owned by another club. In this case he spoke to Chelsea about Arsenal’s Ashley Cole. It appears there is no logic to punishments handed out. Although the FA have said that there is a “case for an element of deterrence in the sanction we are to impose” but I think I would much rather deter players from smashing in other players faces on the pitch; bearing in mind that they have over recent years taken much of the contact out of the sport.

However he was just doing for his client what many of us do every day. Many people have recruitment agencies call employers and tell them about their skills, they can even have them arrange a meeting, which could result in an offer of employment.

Why should footballers be restricted in their movement between employers, the clubs appear to have all of the power, they can decide to sell a play at the drop of a hat, however the player is unable to move when they want to. Imagine if in the ‘real’ world everyone that wanted to change jobs could only change during two periods in the year. The country would shut down and come to a complete standstill while all of the deals were done.

The powers that be in the FA need to perform a sense check on themselves. They need to ask questions that they may not want to hear the answers to, like which of these punishments was best for the game? Which violation of the rules needed the greater deterrent? The most important question is, was Arsenal FC ‘hurt’ more than Pedro Mendes?