So…
Do Technical Directors take the weekend off?
Or do the ITKs go to Church and hit up family time?
‘Honey, I know the rules, no tweeting transfer gossip on the lords day’
It’s been quiet… but, if you want RAW conspiracy, how about Manchester City posting a goodbye video for Gabi J?
The best bits of @gabrieljesus9‘s 2021/22 🇧🇷🤙#ManCity pic.twitter.com/oczJxSUvXl
— Manchester City (@ManCity) June 26, 2022
OH MY WORD HE’S COMING TO ARSENAL!
Listen, I wanted a tall boy, but you cannot argue that this is a blockbuster move for Arsenal.
The player is a winner, he’s powerful, he’s aggressive, he has a big fat CHIP on his shoulder, he’s coming to Arsenal to help us find the next level.
If we’d had him as our striker last season with Eddie, we’d have finished with 79 points. It’s that simple.
I love that Arteta is attacking the brief this summer, I love that Josh K is leaning into the progress with investment, and I am SHOOK that we seem to be spending so much money.
Remember, it’s the selling club that leaks the fee, so here’s my estimate on outlay if it all comes off.
- Jesus: £40m
- Vieira: £30m
- Lisandro: £35m
- Tielemans: £25m
- Raphinha: £50m
That’s £180m.
I suspect we’re going to try and recoup at least £80m. Here are the top candidates.
- Holding: £18m
- Xhaka: £15m
- Torreira: £15m
- Ballard: £5m
- Bernd: £12m
- Ains: £5m
- Nico: £15m
- Pablo: £5m
- Nelson: £2m
- Hector: £8m
That’s £100m
If we exit this window with a net spend of £100m, we’ll be in great shape.
In the space of 2.5 years, we’ll have exited majority of the dregs of Wenger and Emery. We’ll have no massive financial weights sitting in the squad doing nothing. The squad will have a beautiful balance. The project will be ready to hit the ground running, and say it quietly, prepare to attack the league to make a run for the title in 2 seasons’ time.
… and to REALLY drive home how exceptional this rebuild is looking. Our 30-player squad will have an average age of 22.5. Our first-team squad of 24, as it stands, will likely have an average age of 23.5!
What does that mean?
3.5 seasons of time to move the average age of the squad to where title winners Manchester City are.
The average age of Liverpool’s starting 11 was around 29 last season.
Let’s talk about the opportunities opening up on Merseyside.
Their two best players are/were:
Sadio Mane: 23g | 5a
Mo Salah: 31 g | 16a
Combined 54g | 21a
Those two players alone were involved in 14 more goals combined than Arsenal scored in the entire Premier League season. Sadio Mane has exited the building. Mo Salah isn’t going to get the £400k a week deal he seeks, they will probably sell him. It is going to be VERY difficult to replace that level of end product, regardless of how good Liverpool are at transfers. It’ll be tough for them not to dip. Also, their generational defender VVD is 31 in two weeks, last time he picked up an injury, Liverpool dropped 30 points. There is an opening coming, it might not land next season, but it’s coming there.
Chelsea sold as a distressed asset. Their new owner Todd B has annointed himself Technical Director with ZERO experience. Marina G has exited the building. David Ornstein thinks CFC are going to move for CR7. That is not good news.
Manchester United kicked out Ralf R. They have a manager that has never worked in the Premier League. Their summer rebuild has stalled and when it starts up, it’ll be panic stations.
Back to Arsenal. How good does it feel to have done the hard part of the rebuild? How good does it feel to have stability, vision, and strategy that is being well-executed?
We’re building a title-chasing team. It won’t be ready to do that next season but I expect it will be in 2 seasons’ time.
It’ll be difficult though.
Arsenal will spend. But so will Newcastle, United, Chelsea, City, Spurs, and Liverpool. There are no guarantees. Which is why I’d like to put all the folk saying ‘NO EXCUSES NEXT SEASON’ in the bin.
Like, mate, do you think Arsenal is run on excuses? Is your idea of football so immature that you can’t understand the difference between an excuse and a process?
If someone tells you a house will take 2 years to build, do you head to the site at the end of year one and say, ‘guys, the house isn’t here, NO MORE EXCUSES.’ You don’t, because you’d get a slap from a man with coarse hands.
If you think Arsenal are letting Arteta do his thing because he has good excuses, you don’t get the football space.
He’s lighting up our summer because financial backing is a reward for a job well done.
This isn’t the same as Unai Emery finishing 5th, if you think it is, you need to rewatch where we were under him.
Arsenal are spending £180m on players this summer because:
- Arteta took the youngest team in the league to 22 wins, more than the European Champions
- We banked 69 points, enough for top 4 the last two seasons
- The team generated the 4th most shots
- The team generated the 4th most shots on target
- The team basically did all of this without a goalscoring striker
- Arteta has the fans in the ground BOUNCING for the first time in Emirate history. The mood around the club hasn’t been this good since peak-Wenger years
- The mission last season was to get back into Europe.
Arteta didn’t exit the season needing excuses.
We exited the season wounded because the team confounded expectations and made an argument they were a top 4 team.
Arsenal don’t have excuses, they have areas of improvement to address:
Squad rotation: Arteta needs to listen to his fitness folk and bring more players into the mixer next season.
How we solve:
- Arteta will be more experienced next year and learn from the pain of what happened with Partey, Tierney, and Tomi
- The club might look to the dark arts of Liverpool and be more aggressive about protecting the club from international friendlies
- Arsenal are adding more weight to the squad. We’re not buying filler, we’re buying KILLER (you like that). Bukayo is easier to rest if you have Raphinha. Tierney can be benched for Lisandro. Odegaard can be rested for Vieira.
End Product: Arsenal struggled with end product. Be that the killer pass or the killer strike.
How we solve:
- We’re adding a Premier League-proven talent to our striker force
- We tied down one of the sharpest young strikers in the league, giving Eddie a new deal
- We’re adding goals and assists in attack, tying down Vieira and chasing Raphinha HARD
Weak links at fullback: Both Tomi and KT are injury prone, cover has been weak
- We’re signing a player to compete with Kieran Tierney who has showed poor fitness over the past 3 seasons
- We have more options at right-back with Ben White and William Saliba. There might also be an option for Ainsley to come back in an be cover
Bravery under pressure: Arsenal fell to pieces in some crucial games where wins would have taken us to the promised land
- I don’t want to hear ‘chokers’ when it comes to young players. These kids will learn from their experiences and have more tools to pick from when pressure time comes next season. There aren’t many players born to deal with pressure, it’s a learned experience, don’t buy into anyone that tells you otherwise.
- We’re adding monster characters to the dressing room that will set the tone for the dressing room mood. Raphinha, Jesus, and Vieira all have winning mentality and experience. Tielemans and Lisandro have games built on bravery.
None of the above counts for excuses unless you are of a childish disposition or you’ve never built something in the real world.
Too many people that write about football don’t understand that sport is a process, there are ups and downs, progress is not linnear. People don’t understand that spending money does not guarantee anything. Just look at Chelsea and how they stagnated under Thomas Tuchel last season. Look at United who spent money on pure winnertivity, only to drop right out of the mixer. Look at how well Leicester have done a season after Arsenal fans said they were a better place to ply your trade than Arsenal: they found mid-table mediocrity. All of those clubs had managers Arsenal fans banged the table for, all of them have struggled.
Arsenal has one of the best projects in Europe. We have owners that are now certified winners. We have investment that looks very, very promising. There is momentum and we can all feel it.
If you are sitting there, looking at this summer thinking… if Arteta doesn’t get to X position, we should sack him. Then you are not doing football right. I worry that there are kids that think shouting STANDARDS into the ether means they have them. That behaving like that is progressive. That not having a better idea but shitting on one that is working means you are a cut above. But… who really gives a shit, because the ground is rocking and the folk that feed off of rage are not making much money off the algorithm these days.
Fuck the bores. Let’s crack on and enjoy what is set to be a blockbuster week and potentially the best transfer window of the last 20 years. Arsenal are MASSIVE.
Podcast coming later my darlings.
9pm NEW YORK time
8pm MIDWEST TIME
6pm LA time
Andy
“Otherwise we aren’t going to get 90+ PL goals. We can’t do it by expecting so many individuals to contribute (that’s never happened in the PL).”
It just happened this season with Man City. Their top scorers got 15, 13 and 11. And they scored 99 goals! I also seem to recall Chelsea winning the CL without a prolific striker. The evidence suggests we need to be open minded about how we achieve our targets.
@Wicked Willy – Yes but as I’ve said (and you just confirmed) only three City players got into double figures for PL goals. Rich was talking about SEVEN players getting into double figures for PL goals and as I’ve pointed out that has never happened, not at City, Liverpool, Chelsea or anyone else. I expect that we will score more but that 90 goal/50% uptick in goals scored that Rich mentioned is extremely optimistic. Where City did score far more goals than us was in midfield which we haven’t yet upgraded. To reach those sorts of numbers we need 10-20… Read more »
Wicked I see Chelsea struggling. Rudiger leaving in particular is a huge problem. Thiago Silva is the only experienced defender now. Azpilicueta might leave too. And Rudiger made Thiago Silva and the defense look better because he is very athletic. The only way out for them is to spend big on two CBs. And if they do that and sign sterling there is little room to go big in other positions. They still need a CF, a RWB and a DMF. Gallagher will probably add to their squad. But they have a lot to do just like us. 75 points… Read more »
Rich Arsenal have completed today the transfer for Turner and it is clear that Jesus is on his way as well. This leaves three potential holes to fill which are left back, central midfield and wing. The Central Midfield is for me the priority, because we need three players to rotate particularly in view of Partey’s injury record. The obvious choice is Tielemans, but Ruiz might be the alternative option. On the evidence of last season Elneny and Lokonga are not good enough. Left Back. Tierney is a decent player but injury prone and Tavares looked suspect defensively. Personally I… Read more »
Habesha
I’ve thought about Declan too. He’ll have one year left right?
Pierre
I don’t think it’s fair to judge the directionality of the season based on the first game result. Let’s see where we at after ten games and see how things are evolving
We can be sure Sid that you’ll highlight Partey’s unavailability whenever it happens!
We probably need to tone down the Jesus chose Arsenal over Spurs. There’s not much between either side as the league table showed.
Arsenal are clearly the correct choice for Jesus as he’ll be top attacking dog and pick up a nice fat wedge. At Spurs he’d be scrapping for game time again, with two players who have been his superior (but let’s hope are now on the slide).
Wicked I think he will have 2 years left by the end of next season. We can negotiate a 80 mil + offer for him. He is worth the price. It will be like replacing Partey while he is still here. And I see both Elneny, Xhaka and Cedric moving on next summer for sure. If sign all these players we are trying to pull off and they bang, then we can target 2 to 3 players every summer. And Decaln rice for a huge price might not be a problem if we don’t have to fix more than 2… Read more »
sid you cannot be sure that we cannot be sure
DigitalBob
Yes, I always think that the least we can expect as fans is that the player wants to be here. We had too many that didn’t give a damn in recent years and that causes all kinds of problems. We shouldn’t underestimate the value of the culture change we have been through. .
Early talk but we need to be beating teams like Palace on the first day. Setting a marker down from the first game and an impressive win will inspire our confidence.
Brentford beat us last season and drew with palace next game and won around 7 games on that good run also drawing with Liverpool. It’s imperative we get off to a good start.
Jaroda, no toning down necessary when gloating over Spuds. Are they happy Jesus is coming to us? Are we happy he’s coming? They have different priorities, it’s all about overall squad development.
Rich – conservative estimate should see us score 75 goals. My expectation is that we should get in the region of 75-80 points, goal difference of +25-30 (this means at least 80 goals and some improvement in our defense) and at least a cup win, Europa would be great though.
Loving the aggressive attitude we’re going into this transfer window with. Is it just me though or is anyone else a little concerned with this raphinha transfer. It sounds like everyone bar the player himself wants to come to us. Great player and he would add another level to our attack but all the rumblings from those in the know seem to suggest Arteta and edu want him as a priority, even his agent deco seems to want to complete sending him to us (probably for the fee he would get which would be larger with us than Barca) but… Read more »
Raphina flirting with everyone at the moment. I think he’s after the most money deal.
Habesha
Chelsea are in trouble
Kante has fallen off. Jorginho slows them down too much and their forward line have all been expensive flops bar Havertz who the jury is still out on
Ziyech, Lukaku and Werner are all floundering
The good thing for chelsea is their academy products are shit hot and the are the only club able to compete with us in that respect on this current crop. None of the other big sides are producing except for maybe Liverpool but their young lads aren’t in the same league as ours and Chelsea
SamesongJune 27, 2022 13:32:53
Raphina flirting with everyone at the moment. I think he’s after the most money deal.
Dirty little stop out
Sounds like my ex
Saw 75 points being mentioned as a good target for us this season. I’m not being funny but was the plan not to compete for the title next season? If that is the case then we would need to improve on our points by as many as 20 points from this coming season which is an absolutely massive jump and are we really going to have x3 massive summers of spending in a row? I would be hoping for more than a 6 point improvement on last season. 80-82 points for me is a good target if we do sign… Read more »
I honestly couldn’t care where we finish as long as we qualify for the CL and play very good football. 75 points is a good target for me. It guarantees CL. We aren’t competing for the title this coming season. So as long as we are getting anything above 4th I am happy. 80 to 82 points is a bit steep and a tough ask even with the additions in my opinion.
Un – Chelsea’s biggest problem isn’t likely to be players, for me it’s the new owner. Boehly coming in, clearing out staff and swinging his d!ck around like he knows all about ‘soccer’. I wouldn’t be surprised to see a fair amount of turmoil and poor performances over the next few seasons. And I’ll enjoy every minute too.
Eagle
I can’t see us competing at the 90 point level
That afford us only 24 points to drop all season
That’s 4 losses and 6 draws (unless my maths is incorrect which it usually is)
Andy
Chelsea have big problems whichever way you cut it
But Newcastle are going to be a problem for us soon
Maybe United too.
Once spurs have paid off their stadium then they will also be in a very healthy position, being another club with money who can offer London life and culture
What is the deal with this Martinez guy? I can’t really understand why we need him? Where does he exactly play? Surely we aren’t spending 50m on a squad/rotational player. From his YouTube clips, all I see are long balls and tackles and half turns. DM then?
Jonko
Have you seen his passing?
I wouldn’t be surprised to see palace start making waves either
They are really looking good lately and another who can attract a very decent calibre
Pedro
It’s all looking very exciting.
The club has finally realised that treading water in this league isn’t an option
And we’re acting fast for a change. .
Still no out an out CF but maybe Arteta feels that getting someone in that good, would blow the budget and wage bill, so he’s gone for an array of multi purpose forwards who can score enough between them.
Flexibility seems to be the philosophy at the moment.
Andy I didn’t mean 7 players getting into double figures in the league, I meant all comps. I’m hopeful/expecting, we’ll see roughly a 50% uptick on the goal scored column in the league, providing we get our business over the line. I don’t see that as overly optimistic or unrealistic Regarding players who can get 20+, I think Saka will kick on again this season, and if he stays fit, I’m confident he’ll break the 20 goal barrier I can see Martinelli getting 10-15 this season, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see him develop into a 20 goal forward… Read more »
I can see Eddie easily outscoring Jesus over the course of the season, if Arteta lives up to the promise to give him quality minutes,
Habesha
”80 to 82 points is a bit steep and a tough ask even with the additions in my opinion.”
Assuming we sign Martinez for the quoted £35m that will be £115m spent on Vieira, Jesus and Martinez. It’s safe to say that we would probably go on to spend another £50m on 1-2 more players. That will be £300m spent between the two windows.
If you are incapable of 80 points after that kind of spend, how much more would need to be spent to bridge a 15-20 point gap on competing for leagues?
Un
Not this season of course but is that not the ultimate goal for next season (23-24) ?
Otherwise where is all this leading to?
Now Ajax want at least 43m for Lisandro. maybe Edu should just get Aaron Hickey 20m and Tielemans
25m. instead of just getting Lisandro
Did someone mention earlier that we’d agreed a deal with Ajax for £34 million for Lisandro? & personal terms agreed to but the media were behind the curve? Or am I cracking up with all this transfer activity?🤣
€50m is too steep for Martinez imo. We cannot keep affording to overpay for players and then sell ours so cheap.
€35-40m is reasonable given he is unproven outside of Holland and is a fringe Argentina international.
WengerEagleJune 27, 2022 15:14:13 Habesha”80 to 82 points is a bit steep and a tough ask even with the additions in my opinion.”Assuming we sign Martinez for the quoted £35m that will be £115m spent on Vieira, Jesus and Martinez. It’s safe to say that we would probably go on to spend another £50m on 1-2 more players. That will be £300m spent between the two windows. If you are incapable of 80 points after that kind of spend, how much more would need to be spent to bridge a 15-20 point gap on competing for leagues? As usual…..bang on… Read more »
Jonny
Really though, I find it odd that such an incremental improvement would be deemed progress. Sure Liverpool went from a 75 point finish in 2017-18 to a 97 point finish in 18-19 but they went to a CL Final that 75 point season.
And they spent £250m on VVD, Allison, Fabinho, Keita and Shaqiri in 2018. If we spent £300m+ on these past X2 summers only to finish 4th with 75 points I am not expecting KSE to pump another £250m into the project, is anybody reasonable expecting this?
WengervEagle agree.€50 is a bit steep.Ajax chancing their arm cos the mancs are also after him.Though someone ITK state the deal with us had already been done but not disclosed yet?
€50 million of course!
PP
He’s a very good player but for €50m we’d be wise to call their bluff and walk away.
Plenty of very good CMs/LBs on the market that can be got for less.
How many times does a PL team lose a game because of a weak defensive midfield? 2/10.
Rest 8 times they lose because of a poor defence and an even poorer strike force.
The pathetic goals for achievements of this Arsenal team since Jan 21 underscores The necessity of Creative MFs (now we have got those) and at least 2 beastly-tall, bull-like strong striker (we haven’t even one; not even with Jesus).
We need a 6’3” big man who gets at least 3 SOTs per game to bang those in.
Look at Jarrod Bowen’s achievements. 15 goals in 45 PL+ EL games! Plus, 13 assists. Why didn’t Arsenal go for him instead of Jesus?
Eagle
Yeah id like to think so. Will just have to see how this all goes. Is this team capable of beating everyone in the league? Yes.
Is that squad (with new proposed additions) capable of managing a full season, with Europe? I don’t know.
I’m not sure why Arteta is so fascinated by Lisando, considering our needs. We’re pretty full at CB. He hasn’t played LB all that often in his career,, and he’d be behind Tierney anyway, barring injury.. Unless they see him challenging Tierney. Obviously Arteta has a vision for how he would use him…. but would it be enough game time for the player to move? Would it be a lot of midfield time? Those long balls you see in the videos are the same that Xhaka showed in Germany. Less effective in the prem. Is he really meant to play… Read more »
Dissenter “I can see Eddie easily outscoring Jesus over the course of the season, if Arteta lives up to the promise to give him quality minutes,” Well if Eddie is playing as back-up to Jesus he could play more games against teams that are not as strong or just plain fodder such as early stages of Europa League , League Cup matches, easy FA Cup matches against lesser opponents so calling that Eddie may end up with more goals than Jesus could be a possibility and not such a big call. Plus he can notch a few coming on as… Read more »
No need splashing cash for KTs cover. Anything above 35M (for a defender that’s not urgent) would be crazy IMO. If we can’t land Lisandro in this particular window, then let’s loan in someone to do the job.
Let’s be clear to those that continue to underplay Jesus and at this stage over-rate Eddie.
Jesus is the overall better player and that Eddie had his goalscoring run in the later part of the season doesn’t make him a better bet at this time.
We would need more evidence that Eddie is a top striker. Yes more evidence.
That Arteta has pushed the boat out in purchasing Jesus should tell everyone the reality regarding Eddie at this stage.
As it stands at this point Eddie is going to be five years at Arsenal from now on as second fiddle to Jesus.
Of course matters could change and we see a reversal but folks really should just be content that we seem to have a handy goalscorer in Eddie to be back-up to Jesus.
WE The point Edu has consistently made is to build a young squad so they can grow together. Even if we only got 75 points next season, and we will all hope for more of course, it’s what the team would do as they evolve into maturity is what’s exciting. As brilliant as Saka, Martinelli, ESR and Vieira are, they are miles from their peak. Same with Eddie. At the back, Ramsdale. Saliba and Tomi are still pretty young, and our CBS are only just about to enter their peak years. As long as there is clear improvement on playing… Read more »
WW It’s not always exponential improvement with younger players, you know that. Has Iwobi exponentially improved since his time with us? Or Oxlade-Chamberlain? Or the countless others I could name. To be clear, you are hoping that they all exponentially improve into a team of Champions. It’s a nice hope to have but it is still just that, hope. We have seen young projects fail time and time again in our own case and further afield. It doesn’t have to be NOW, I said that I would be very happy with just qualifying for the CL next season and a… Read more »
I have followed the goals/points next season discussion if this season we had scored six [6] more goals in the right games we would have had nine [9] more points Home to Crystal Palace, Southampton and Burley 2-2, 1-0 and 0-0 Away to Everton, Man U, and Brighton 2-1, 3-2 and 0-0 Three draws would have been wins and three narrow losses would have been draws Our 69 points this season could easily have been 78 If our defence is at least as good as last season and our attack is improved, it would not take a massive improvement for… Read more »
Tearknee is actually not bad Sid, one of your better efforts.
Why all the obsession about point tally?
Its about position we finish in. I am good with
65 points as long as we finish 4th or above.
If we ger 75 points and finish 5th than its
Not good enough.
As for being the envy of other clubs at this time that I read earlier on in the comments well folks like change and sweeping change. It is seen as a positive on a lot of occasions.
But I think first we actually need to get into the top four before we talk about other clubs being envious of us.
Nigel Tufnell
“Those long balls you see in the videos are the same that Xhaka showed in Germany”
If you can’t see the difference between Lisandro Martinez long balls and Granite Xhaka’s long balls then there is no hope for you …..football just isn’t your game .
Ishola
Doesn’t matter how many thesis you write, you are clearly under-estimating Eddie
Jesus is everything but a striker that gets you over 20 goals in a season. He’s a very good player who gives Arteta more options to set up his attack in all sorts of ways but he’s not an all out goal scoring center forward.
Eddie is a natural goal getter who needs to add more to his game. He will out-score Jesus, even if it means Jesus is doing the harder work of goal contributions
”Doesn’t matter how many thesis you write, you are clearly under-estimating Eddie
Jesus is everything but a striker that gets you over 20 goals in a season.”
Are we talking PL or overall? Because he has broken the 20+ barrier twice for City in all comps.
Dissenter
No I am not underestimating Eddie.
Arteta has just splurged on Jesus and there is a clear reason for that.
I am content that we can look to call on Eddie if we are chasing a goal in a match.
That is all.
WE My patience is contextual. klopp did not inherit a complete clusterfuck of a club that needed root and branch overhaul. He didn’t start out with a corrupt technical director who just wanted to deal with favoured agents. He didn’t have to navigate a pandemic. So yes, Liverpool is a great model for us to follow, but the starting points were different. And of course, not every youngster grows exponentially, but I for one never thought Iwobi was anything but a good squad player. And Oxlade’s injuries meant he never developed momentum. So who knows out of BNC, Patino, Omari,… Read more »
…and when Eddie bangs them goals in the “lesser games”, he will put Arteta under great pressure to play him in bigger games.
I expect Arteta wont make the same mistakes with Eddie twice.
Jesus better prepare to be pushed because Eddie will push him all the way for that starting place.
Not sure you are making much sense there Diss considering Jesus has a superior goals to minutes ratio than Eddie over a far larger sample size.
“Tearknee is actually not bad Sid, one of your better efforts.“
Almost as good as Jack Wheelchair
oh, and we haven’t got Raphinha, Martinez or tielemans yet, so we need to atch we don’t get ahead of ourselves.
Dissenter
At this stage you rate Eddie higher than Arteta does.
That’s fair enough but regarding Eddie some want a longer period to really judge him which is also fair enough.
Lots of players have had a purple patch at some time but then can’t match that gain as consistently.
Jesus is just a more proven player.
I hope there is healthy competition between the two as that is always good but if we are comparing right now of course Jesus wins out.
Jesus , of course, is a massive improvement on Laca, but I’m not overly excited by his signing. He’s a good player but I’m sure we could of found better for less. Hope I’m proved wrong , but I can’t see it somehow
WW
Couple of fair points in there although every manager had to navigate the pandemic including Klopp. I get what you are saying in that the likes of Saka, ESR and Gabi are clearly much better than the Iwobi’s of this world were.
Think we are more or less on the same page if you look between the lines and don’t fixate on points tally. 85+ points for 23-24 would imply a title challenge or being up there anyway.
https://mobile.twitter.com/talksport/status/1539276971112386561
Maybe there will be room for both Eddie and Jesus
”but I’m sure we could of found better for less. Hope I’m proved wrong , but I can’t see it somehow”
It’s a fairly dry market right now on top notch STs really. Osimhen for my money looks really good but he cost Napoli a fortune and is young still.
Besides that, cannot think of a player I would have preferred to Jesus.
Wicked Willy
“klopp did not inherit a complete clusterfuck of a club that needed root and branch overhaul. ”
Again we have this over-exaggeration of the situation Arteta walked into.
Raphinha feels like the Lemar of yesteryear.
Concrete interest but doubt he ends up here.
WW If we spend £200 million, off the back of spending £140-£150 million, in Arteta’s third full season, we have to see progress this season, we have to see progress “Now” I’ve repeatedly made the argument that inconsistencies are what we get with building a young team, I’ve shown plenty of patience with Arteta up until now. But if the club spend another £200 million, we have to see results, we have to see significant improvements across the season We have to be competitive in every competition, the currency in football for me will always be trophies, we should be… Read more »
* but we need to lay a platform for 2023/24
^ Great post Rich, my feelings exactly.
At this stage it needs to be remembered that Arteta has not achieved anything more than Emery did unless you think the FA Cup is the pinnacle of football still.
Of course we all want to hit the higher heights but the “clusterfuck” that Arteta took over from is on a par with what Arteta has actually achieived so far.
My Eddie better than your Jesus.. Lads calm down competition is good. Let’s see how they get on.
You simply cannot spend £350m+ in football and retain your job failing to compete for trophies never mind winning them.
It’s actually beyond generous giving next season as yet another feeling out season for Tets with CL qualification the only actual minor pressure.
I think your mad. But up to you. You’re setting yourself up for disappointment, and you’re robbing yourself of the joy when good times roll. You’re defying history expecting a young team to do so well. You’re also neglecting the fact that he will have built THE ENTIRE squad for that budget. These are not supplemental expenditures. How much did City’s entire squad cost? Chelsea? Man Utd? We will get there. But demanding 50% more goals? I hope you’re right, but I really think only a fool makes such statements. And I say that not to be a cunt, because… Read more »
Weagle “You simply cannot spend £350m+ in football and retain your job failing to compete for trophies never mind winning them.” You can if you are over-indulged and have the backing of the fanbase. I am going to be actually really disappointed if the fanbase turns on Arteta next season if he doesn’t meet these expectations. It would show massive turn coat. For those that have just been sitting on the fence regarding Arteta or even having doubts about him than of course they are excused. We all want to see those fence sitters getting off it into Arteta worship… Read more »
Partey, Gabriel, Mari, Tomiyasu, White, Ramsdale, Odegaard, Lokonga, Tavares, Vieira, Jesus puts us at £285m already spent under Artedu.
If you add Martinez and even one more player you are hitting £350m. Add Raphinha to that and over £400m.
If we pay any more than 40m for raphinha we’re being robbed.
Just looks like another presser with little end product.
Osimhen replaced Pepe at Lille . Perhaps we should have signed Osimhen instead back then. He wouldn’t have cost 72 million either.
”Perhaps we should have signed Osimhen instead back then. He wouldn’t have cost 72 million either.”
Leao was the real miss for £20m. Got to be worth at least 3-4 times that now.
Why did I read Wicked Willy post like it was Champagne Charlie for a minute lol.
Our scouts coming away from Lille paying £72m for Pepe while Leao was there was basically the modern Hazard/Gervinho but at least Gervinho cost peanuts.
Wicked Willy
“klopp did not inherit a complete clusterfuck of a club that needed root and branch overhaul. ”
And he didn’t inherit a squad of players( like Arteta) that had reached 6 cup finals in 6 seasons and won an fa cup within 6 months of arriving ..
Un – By the time Sp*rs pay their stadium off, Kane, Son and Lloris to name just three, will be gone. Take Kane and Son out of that team and they are a 6th to 8th place team at best, even if they sign Richarlison in the meantime!
If we buy most of the players we are linked with, we will make top 4 next season. We were good enough to.make it this season.
Weagle
“Our scouts coming away from Lille paying £72m for Pepe while Leao was there was basically the modern Hazard/Gervinho but at least Gervinho cost peanuts.”
The scouting consisted of taking a peek at transfermarkt or whoscored.
Data analysis.
Overseen by the Spanish vacuum salesman.
TeeCee
They are a 6th-8th team now, their saving grace is Conte.
Ishola, if you want evidence comparing xG’s says that Eddie is a more clinical finisher than Jesus even if Jesus is a better all round player. At some point you need a player who will put the ball in the back of the net, it’s that simple.
Pierre, “If you can’t see the difference between Lisandro Martinez long balls and Granite Xhaka’s long balls then there is no hope for you …..football just isn’t your game”. This is the least substantive, most generalized response I’ve seen on legrove…. And on top of it, posing as a smackdown, lol. I know it’s cool to be down on Xhaka currently, but those long balls were the main reason we paid 30+ mil for him years ago. Now you’re saying there is some magic in Lisandros long balls from deep that sets them apart? I guess there is some special… Read more »
WengerEagle
You get the feeling that the people who sanctioned the Pepe deal had other things on their mind than getting value for money.
Note- I actually like Pepe.
We could have had Hazard and Osihmen but got Gervinho and Pepe instead. That is so Arsenal.
Really glad those are over now.
Andy
Would you have been comfortable with Eddie as No.1 striker going into this coming season?
Simple question for you.
No real offence to Eddie but if we were playing top trumps with Spurs and they laid down their Kane and Son cards and we said I will see you with Eddie N we would be laughed out of the room.
Over-rate Eddie at this stage all you like Andy.
We need a longer period to be really convinced about Eddie as seems to be the case with Arteta himself.
Firstly, here we have a player with CL pedigree choosing to join a team not in the Champions League. Other teams were interested who have CL football but he made his mind up he wanted to join Arsenal. I love that. He’s coming here because he wants to, he’s not choosing us because we provide Champions League football. As an Arsenal fan, it’s important to me our players show they want to be here and care. This is so positive. AFC Forever Do you think Bruno joined Newcastle because he cared about the club and wants to see them in… Read more »
Do we really want to try to compete or are we just content with getting in off the radar cheaper players with progression attributes?
Signing Jesus is a sign we are trying even if it doesn’t work out.
Ishola
“Would you have been comfortable with Eddie as No.1 striker going into this coming season?Simple question for you.”
You’re asking the question wrongly
Arteta is not going to play Jesus as a traditional #9 and Jesus effectiveness is not going to be measured in goals scored.
I just don’t see Jesus as “No 1” striker in that regard.
He makes us better in many ways but is not going to be that striker that scores 20 goal and above in a season.
Again, watch out for Eddie
This is his season.
Where’s Pierre when you need him
If we are interested in Raphina and already have Saka at the club plus Martinelli who has been playing not as a central forward as yet too many times this would suggest that Jesus would take the central berth in the attack.
Of course he is versatile so we could see him play away from central but I think the overall idea is to have him central.
That is Eddie territory.
I see Jesus sas a a very intelligent pluripotential player, that gives you more than a variety of options, which an egg head manager like Arteta will embrace. He’s not an all out central player that the traditional #9 is When Guardiola made that statement about Jesus ;”“I spoke with Gabriel and he likes to play sometimes more in wider positions than the central one,” Guardiola said after using him down the right for a 5-0 win over Norwich City last August. Take notice of it- the centrally minded striker we have is Eddie and I expect him to get… Read more »
lol I think we all realise that Jesus is not a traditional number nine.
But I think the idea is to have him for the centra berth in the attack.
I’d love to see big interchange of positions in the frontline during a match but I don’t think Arteta is quite up to that yet on a notable scale.
WW In fairness I’ve had a good record of predicting how our seasons will go over the last 4 seasons, i predicted 5th- 6th in 2018/19, and didn’t think 5th and a Europa League final was the disaster some made it out to be. I predicted the downturn of our squad in 2019/20, and was on the opposite side of the fence to Pedro and many others, I predicted that sacked Emery would solve little in the immediate to medium term, as our problems ran much deeper. I predicted we’d struggle for goals + creativity in 2020/21, and would likely… Read more »