Apologies for the delay, but I am now with child, the heir to the Le Grove thrown has been born, and she shall inherit it all.

Before I crack into the post, wow, women are awesome. It’s been a rough year, but the circle of life truly is something special. Even more special that she decided to be born during the off-season. x

OK, let’s talk some soccerball.

We beat Everton.

It was a very preseason-ish friendly. Some sharp reminders of what you missed last season, some big ol’ kippers to the face when you realise how low we were, and how naive some of our hopes were (mine), and to cap it all off, a result that means next to nothing.

There were some areas of the game that I really liked.

Firstly, Gabriel Jesus really is a stark reminder that playing with forwards that can’t do it physically in this league is going to cost you 10 points. What I love about Jesus is he has all the build-up play and work-rate of Lacazette, he has finishing potential that will hopefully move closer to where Auba is, and he has the system understanding that no striker we’ve had over the past 2.5 years has been able to offer. He’s a very intelligent player schooled at the MIT of football.

Mikel Arteta called him ‘chaos’ and that is a leading comment. Chaos, until The OG Lord Of Chaos Nuno Tavares landed in the side, was not really something you would associate with Arsenal. What were we? Very structured, extremely organized, generally very difficult to beat… but there was nothing particularly unexpected about the way we played. No bang-bang, to joga bonito, very little of the stuff that made peak-Wengerball special. I think the manager recognized that and if you asked him he he thought being overstructured impacted us, he might say our inability to come back in games. I think we did it once, against Wolves, when THE AOP Podcast was at the ground.

To my mind, Arsenal are making a move on chaos this window. We are signing players that unlock doors with wild imagination, we are targeting players with power, pace, and explosiveness up front. We’re trying to bolster our weaknesses to give us more in the final third. Zinchenko means we don’t have to drop a midfielder into left-back to start play. Two inverted fullbacks means our #8 can roam into more advanced positions without exposing the team (Xhaka was doing that more at the end of last season and he did it against Everton). Having 5 players in the final third that can run, pass, control, and finish means we’re going to be a nightmare to play against.

Think about how balanced this squad will be.

You won’t be able to press us because we can move the ball around at speed with precision.

You won’t be able to play a high line because every single one of our defenders is a longball specialist and all of our attackers will be electric.

You won’t be able to sit back because we’ll pick locks and finish.

You will struggle to chase games because every player in our team can keep the ball.

If we add a Tielemans and a Leroy Sane to the mixer, what weakness do we have outside lacking experience?

I don’t see one.

Back to the game. Bill Saliba made his debut and he showed a lot of composure. What I liked about his afternoon was the maturity to not overplay. There’s a lot hype around the player. There’s a group of Arsenal fans that truly believe they discovered he was good and they are propping him up for every 6 yard pass. Saliba looks like he should be the best defender in the world and the strengths of his game mean he’s very friendly for a Youtube generation of scouts. He’s dominant, fast, he’s brave, and he looks like a superstar. What I do worry about is Oziltologist like hype that is surrounding him. It is going to be tough for him next year, let’s give him chance before we crown him the new VVD. I’m excited regardless, the fact he can drop in as a right back or a centre back and look comfortable in both positions gives me a lot of hope for the variety that we’ll have tactically next season.

Talking of a young kid and hype. Reuell Walters has dropped out of nowhere and seems to be drawing quite a bit of love from Mikel Arteta. He has all the elements we’re looking for, he has bundles of pace, height, sound technical ability, and he looks very comfortable on the pitch with the seniors. He should look for a loan this season like BNC did. But again, the quality of players coming from the academy is exceptional, even if we did pinch this one from Spurs.

There were some horrorshows. Hector just ain’t it these days. I love the man, I love what he was as a player, but he doesn’t have what we need at this level. Ainsley is in a similar boat. He has the technical level, he could be an elite back-up right back, but he doesn’t have the concentration for a centre mid and that is what he wants.

Eddie Nketiah had a solid game. He looked fit, he made great runs, he moved with the ball really well, and he gave a lot to the team. It was good to see Big Gabriel back in defence again, he’s said no to Juve apparently, so that’s that. I also thought Matt Turner looked a little more settled, it looked like he made a hash of a long looped ball, but I think that was a bit of a freak, and he saved it, so it doesn’t matter. He’s better with the ball at his feet than I think we give credit for.

Only other concern of the day was Ben White, Tomi, KT, and Vieira are doubts at the moment. Ben White is made of the same stuff Xhaka is, so I’m not worried about him… but the fullbacks are a big concern. They are too important to the team to be perma-crocks. Let’s hope we get the back-ups sorted or they get fit and stay fit.

Final piece: Zinchenko to Arsenal looks very likely at £30m. That’s a steal. There has been a bit of debate about where he should play. Arsenal fans are galaxy-braining this deal if they think he’s been signed as a midfielder.

Now, I was wrong about the Tall Boy Summer. It turned out to be Short Kings. So I accept that I might be wrong again. But this is an opinion blog, not a I HAVE TO BE RIGHT blog even though my hit rate is like, 99.9%.

Anyway, this deal is Occam’s Razor for me.

The simplest explanation is probably the right one. If the best manager in the world, who mentored our coach, thought he was a left back, and won titles with him there, then safe to say, he’s probably a left-back.

We are very specifically profiling a left-back that can build play. Zinchenko does that. That style of player is always going to be able to flex into a midfield role. Hence Martinez being a target. But just because you can play there doesn’t mean you will. Two things lead me to this conclusion:

1. Arsenal fans struggle to grasp that their opinion of Granit Xhaka isn’t the one they carry at the club. He’s not seen as a problem. No one will call it a failure if this window ends and he’s still here. The player, for the clumsy faults, looks very good in our midfield when he’s next to Partey. He’s brave, hardworking, and he’s a leader. He’s the least of our problems. When we do replace him, I expect it to be a specialist, not an experiment.
2. Zinchenko was immense in midfield against Scotland playing for Ukraine. The performance was outrageous. But you’ll find outrageous performances from Thomas Partey as a #10 for Ghana. The international game is different.
3. In the Arteta system, the fullback inverts into midfield anyway. No reason to think he’s moving here for any other reason than he wants more than 1200 Premier League minutes a season.

If all of the above is wrong, I’ll delete it, and deny I ever wrote it under questioning.

Oh, maybe I do have two more things?

Lisandro Martinez, to United, for near £60m. Our starting bid? £30m. Do you REALLY think a negotiating team that doubled the value of a 5ft9 centre back in the space of two weeks looked at Steven Bergwijn at Spurs and said, fuck it, shall we just pay the same fee they bought him for because why the f*ck not? Of course they didn’t. Football fans really do believe anything they’re fed.

But, back to Martinez. It’ll be interesting to see if his tremendous heading ability translates into the Premier League. To my mind, at a certain level of competition, you are going to come up against physical barriers. Thomas Vermaelen famously had a tremendous leap at Ajax, but he was poor from setplays in the Premier League. The counter is Ben White, 2 inches taller, has been very good in the air. I’ll be keeping my eye on this. Arteta has gone out of his way to make sure his defenders are tall, it’ll be interesting to see how Ten Hag makes Martinez work.

Anyway, banter aside, they’ve got a top player there… but I’m happier with Zinchenko because we know what he’s about and he’s a total winner.

Right, jump in on our Patreon Podcast. It’s one of the best we’ve done behind a paywall. Check it out. Sign up. The new season is nearly with us and we’ll be putting a lot of good stuff there.

That’s me done. xx

Become a Patron!

P.S. New shirt is a bit tasty, right?