Roeder Tells Arsenal To Back Off!

Newcastle manager Glenn Roeder says Arsenal can forget about a January swoop for Charles N'Zogbia.

The 20-year-old is supposedly a target for the Gunners, but whether that is newspaper rumour or genuine fact, Roeder will have none of it.

Roeder: 'Charles N'Zogbia is an exciting talent for us and his future is here at Newcastle United. Anyone who is mischievously saying otherwise is totally wasting their time.

'Charles is very important in my plans for the future of this club and you do not find players like him growing on trees.

'He came to us from Le Havre and the way he has virtually come from nowhere to make over 50 starts for us is nothing short of meteoric.

'But we must not forget that he is still only 20 and while he is extremely talented and quite rightly well liked by our supporters, especially for the flair in his game, we have got to be patient with him.

'Fortunately, what is helping me deal with Charles is the fact that I had the likes of Jermain Defoe, Michael Carrick and Joe Cole as players in my time as manager of West Ham United, and I found that you cannot expect 20-year-olds to be fantastic every game.

'But now with Damien Duff injured and likely to be out for some time, Charles knows that he is going to have a run in the team and that should be a great encouragement to him.

'Part of my job with young players - and that includes Charles N'Zogbia - is that they should not start and believe their own publicity and take their eye off the ball.

'I know Charles is the sort of player who does not respond to the iron fist but to the velvet glove, and when he is in my office, all he needs to have an arm put round him.

'I have told him that apart from regaining his best form for Newcastle United, he has to be trying to get into the French squads in the near future.

'What I have never told him is that when Tord Grip was England number two to Sven-Goran Eriksson and he talked to me about Kieron Dyer, he asked me where Charles was from.

'When I told him France, he said that was a shame because he and Sven would have loved him to be part of the England set-up.'

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