Andrei Arshavin: Gooner, Goner

Reports today out of the London Evening Standard would seem to indicate that Andrei Arshavin, who has fallen out of favor at Arsenal, will retire from the game altogether at the end of the season. Arshavin, 32, wants to stay in London, but no London team has expressed interest - and no team anywhere seems to want to meet his weekly wages, despite multiple alerts as to his availability. So, it would appear that the Meerkat era at Arsenal, and in soccer, is sadly coming to a close.

I for one will really miss him - not just for, y'know, this sort of thing, but also for this sort of thing (another view of it here). Arshavin is a damn good player who couldn't force his way into the Arsenal first team with any regularity, and It'll be a shame to see him go. On his day, he was a creative force, but his days were fewer and further between in the last few years. He was also a very fun guy to watch and to listen to, who seemed to have fun wherever he went, and that's a nice thing to see in this day and age of sporting automatons or manufactured "personalities".

He's 32 years old and set to retire. Must be nice. Anyway, Andrei, I hope you do find another team, and that you have a few more years of awesomeness left in you. You'll be missed, at least by me.