So off I trotted down to London City and when I got to the stadium it was surprising just how many people had turned out – it was great to see future generations of Gooner’s all over the place, not forgetting the old timers (met one season ticket holder of a jaw-dropping sixty years !!).

I was up in club level as I had a shareholder’s pass and the first thing there was to notice was the amount of people trying to sneak a peak through the club level doors onto the pitch, we couldn’t see Cesc there and it was a few minutes after the SSN report about him not being at the stadium at all. After hanging around the doors I think I saw a number 4 shirt at the front between two of the goalkeepers – turns out I was right and he was definitely there. There was a bit of a free-for-all though as the blinds were down and we were being told to move back constantly.

From there we had a talk by the legendary Ken Friar – here are a few bits of what he said:

“financially were now in a position to improve and upgrade all the restaurants – in 2006 we were not”

His sidekick was talking about how people come to the stadium for the ‘Emirates Stadium experience’, I have to disagree there because they come to see the Arsenal but when he said “we want to make the Emirates the best stadium in the world for the next twenty years” you can understand why they are putting so much money into redeveloping the still fairly new club level – it makes big, big money.

“Bring back rich history of club of which we are so proud” was another brilliant quote, nobody can disagree with that.

Friar also talked about the emphasis on the word ‘forwards’ – one of the clubs first unofficial motto’s – always thinking, always looking forwards.

After the talk we made out way out into the stand and the players were introduced one by one onto the field – guess who came first?

As soon as you heard the word ‘World Cup winner’ everybody knew who it was going to be…. Cesc Fabregas

Cue massive applause and cheering along with a rendition of “we’ve got Cesc Fabregas” – that certainly woke everybody up.

nb. some of these quotes are courtesy of Darren on Twitter – I accompanied him

The players who got the biggest cheers are the walking Aaron Ramsey which is of course brilliant to see, Emmanuel Eboue, Theo Walcott and Robin van Persie – most other entrances were pretty lackluster. They could have at least of made something of it and waited to bring Cesc on last !! I joke… but it would have had a lot of people very nervous.

Then training started to kick off and it was clear that Robin van Persie and Cesc will be training alone together for a while -

They just mainly did some fitness work whilst the others were involved in some pretty abysmal shooting practice – Arshavin was woeful, but Carlos Vela scored a chip over the even more woeful Lucasz Fabianski – better in training then eh?!

There wasn’t much else to report really from the training – the boss had a few words but nothing too interesting.

Theo really loves the crowd – at the end he was the only player that went the whole way over the pitch to kick some of the 200 footballs that were to be booted into the crowd, he even made his way into the crowd to give a little kid a football, a nice touch I thought.

I then made my way round to the entrance for the shareholders Q&A and quickly realised there was a line full of hundreds of people queuing right up to the door I was supposed to be going into, not good !! It turned out that these people had been given the wrong directions and were supposed to go through a turnstile to the left of the Woolwich entrance, after another lengthy wait I finally got inside and a seat pretty much at the front. I spotted Bob Wilson and got him to sign my club level leaflet picked up earlier and exchanged a few words – top man. A real legend and seemed to be really enjoying the day, not many like him around now !!

We still didn’t have a clue who was going to be put up for the Q&A – I assumed it would be three players with Bob Wilson hosting but as it turned out there were four there – Theo Walcott, Kieran Gibbs, Johann Djourou and Nicklas Bendtner.

Theo: Seemed a really intelligent and intellectual guy, genuinely privileged to be at the club and got a bit of banter when he mentioned that he supported Liverpool as a kid. Talked about how he idolised Thierry Henry and Michael Owen. Interestingly, he admitted that he missed the call from Fabio Capello as he was on a golf course – not a good start, but he said that he will make the best out of a bad situation and was obviously disappointed about not being picked. I reckon it will improve him as a player though – he had a very determined air about him and wants 10-15 goals this season, along with 20 assists. Over to you, Theo!!

Gibbs: Looked a bit nervous at first but is clearly really good mates with Theo, one quote that really stuck out for me was when he was talking about commentators saying Arsenal need to show more fight and not be bullied away at the likes of Stoke, Blackburn and Hull – it is worth remembering that he is really close with Aaron Ramsey…. he said “do you want us to brake peoples legs or play football” – pure class.. Bob Wilson then said its a little different to his day because back then players went out there to intentionally hurt players… he asked them whether they think it was intentional and their faces told the story, Bendtner raised his eyebrows and Gibbs just looked at him wanting to say something – thankfully he didn’t say anything controversial which would have landed him in trouble

Bob Wilson was also saying he rates Gibbs so highly he thinks he will be challenging Ashley Cole for the England left-back spot – he has certainly looked in good shape and said he is fully healed so lets see what he has got.

Djourou: Seems a really intelligent guy again – made everyone crack up when he mis-said a sentence and came out with “its always good to play with yourself” which had Kieran Gibbs literally falling off his chair laughing. He assured the shareholders he was fully fit and ready to go for this season.

Nicklas Bendtner: Forget the arrogant image the press seem to have tarred him with, he seemed a really charismatic guy who is again genuinely proud to be at the club, on commentators he said “only one or two are really worth listening to” and said something about them chatting a lot of rubbish. He also said that he will be out until at least October and will start running again in training on Monday. Do you want to know his hero? I kid you not… he said its Batman.

Key here… don’t believe the media, or the way they spin what he says. His aim for goals this coming season – fitness permitting – is twenty goals.

All in all it was another really good experience, its great to be in such close contact with the players and of course meeting an Arsenal legend is not the sort of thing which happens every day. Now… lets get down to business and win some trophies.

One last note – during the Q&A Bob Wilson put some perspective on the way the club is now positioned to move forward “when I was playing for Arsenal we hadn’t won anything for 17 years – only then did we start winning things”

Brilliant stadium, great manager, class players – we have got it good Gooners – we’d have it even better if we had another defender !!

Til next time.