Arsenal have on their books three "experienced defensive midfielders" in Rice, Partey and Jorginho. The latter two are in their 30s and in their final year of contracts.
Frankly I don't expect either to secure contract extensions and will leave the club at end of this season although Jorginho might retire and join our coaching staff.
Merino is technically a centre/left midfielder and could well come into our starting lineup sooner rather than later this season and replace Partey. So realistically our Midfield would be Odegaard,
Rice and Merino.
I anticipate that Nwaneri will be given more game time this season, but he is more likely to do so
coming off the bench rather than staring regularly. Over the the next two seasons his workload
will increase, but I doubt that he will be a first team starter in that time unless we have a lot of
injuries.
If we assume that Havertz will remain our first choice centre forward for foreseeable future then
Arsenal are likely to focus on midfield recruitment next summer. One player who is apparently of
potential interest is Wirtz a highly rated AMF. He is probably the only "world class" player currently
playing for an unfashionable club in a major league who could be possible available next summer.
If he becomes available he would be a player of interest to most major clubs including Arsenal. This
would be a player who would certainly excite me more than most of the CFs who are allegedly targeting.
It's said Jorginho is ‘considering his future’ at Arsenal, with his contract expiring in the summer, with an option for another year in that contract, and he has two options on the table.
He can choose to take that extension, or ‘join Mikel Arteta’s coaching staff’.
Jorginho definitely looks like a guy that will have a successful coaching career.
The season is young though. Let's see how Partey and Jorgi do, there's a chance we might keep one of the two. If our management sees enough in either of them to extend their contract by another year, on renegotiated terms, that might save us some funds and trouble looking at the market.
I think Porto and Bayern confirmed last season that we are not psychologically ready to achieve great results with top European teams yet. But it's not criticism, it's quite logical. The team have been battling Man City for couple of seasons, but neither players, nor Arteta have confidence that they can dominate Bayern/PSG/Barcelona.
So as In Premier League results season will improve, but will not be at the level, where we can confidently get win at home or draw away vs top team - just like Bayern didi with us last year. If result comes, it probably will come through pain. The game today as the game vs Inter is another stepping point in this direction.
Nobody has beef nor mutton with any player. Partey has been on the decline, Ramsdale wasnt good enough(just like Zinchenko and Jesus), Ben White will soon find himself on the bench.
Pedro, sorry you are on your own regarding your beef with Partey, most on here are of the opinion the re is no need to be critical of Partey, I don't even understand why there should be a critisism of anyone really , we are doing fine and long may it continue!! Is Pedro on purpose raising this Partey thing to get us to comment on here ?
“another ‘LOOK AT ME MUM’ performance from a referee eager to be the star of the show”
More like a piss-weak ref unable to get a good look at the play, over reacting to a player’s yelping, rolling around holding his knee after a minimal contact on his shin pad. That, and his teammates lobbying for the most severe punishment available.
Basically everything that’s wrong with modern football encapsulated in one play.
Big game today , a pretty much a must win having drawn with the all mighty Atalanta( 12th in Italy), if automatic qualification is the aim.
Correct if I’m wrong but only 8 clubs advance directly , no?
You must be one of those Arsenal fans who on one hand celebrate bookies having us the top 3 favorite to lift the trophy( no idea how they figured that btw) , while on the other lowering expectations at every turn.
The only thing that’s missing from you is a mini rant how the uefa conspired against us fixing the schedule so we play Europa league winners, Cl finalists from two years ago, and Cl title hopefuls in the three first games.
Someone will soon show up claiming just that no doubt.
On the sauce Tom? The time to be peaking is in Feb / March onwards.
Calafiori and Timber still effectively newbies and our first choice midfield, Odegaard, Merino and Rice hasn’t started yet.
Of course a win is the aim tonight. All I’m pointing out is that pretty much every game some poster or other will state that the next game is ‘ a must win’ and if we don’t win it’s unacceptable and proves that we’re not serious about winning things.
8 games, see how many points we accrue and where that gets us. Hoping we don't have two extra games but if it happens, we'll just have to deal with it.
If we're sitting on two points before playing Inter, that'll be mean two draws and a loss in our first three games- definite cause for concern!
i'm struggling to understand the partey bashing given we have come through a really tough first six games and are one point off top of the table with him playing almost every minute.
i think he's the best option we have in that pivot position. he doesn't have rice's athleticism to get up and down the pitch but he's better on the ball and can break the lines more effectively with his superb first touch and ability to take the ball on the turn. afaict, he is crucial to how we play.
I ‘bashed’ Partey based on Saturday’s performance where I was frustrated by his lack of incisiveness. Admittedly other players could have been criticised for an inability to finish decisively.
He’s been available for every game which has been important. The fact that he is not the class player he once was, shouldn’t be a reason for piling on.
Merino will hopefully reduce the need to start him game in, game out. In my eyes he’s now a very capable squad player, not an automatic starter.
yeah. i was referring more to pedro now consistently bashing him. i have seen quite a lot of pushback against this in comments to be fair. partey is a pretty unique kinda player. closest i see to him rn is gravenberch but i would still choose partey ahead of him. i think his decline is being a little overblown. if he can stay fit then he will start more games than not i think. still only just turned 31. that is not old these days. he's been super unlucky with injuries since he came to us.
My main concern is that his speed in recovery is now an issue, not as slow as Jorginho but that's not saying much!
Rice at 6 and Merino at left 8 will undoubtedly be our strongest CM combination but I'd hope that Partey's available to share the minutes when necessary.
Against weaker opposition like Leicester, he is slightly redundant and we might as well get another creative/attacking player further forward. Next Saturday, I'd prefer to see Nwaneri start in AM with say Havertz to the left and Rice at 6.
maybe it's gone. or maybe he just needs game time. he has missed a lot in recent years and in some games this season i have seen him blowing pretty hard. which is partly why arteta keeps playing him afaict.
rice is definitely a better option if what you want is security and defending the spaces. he is brilliant at that. so we have two great and very different options there. and they can play together as a double pivot if needed to. i am hoping partey has a good season and we can keep him in the squad a while longer.
It's weird cause Rice is given leeway cause we're used to consider him consistently excellent. But so far this season he hasn't really had a top performance, not even one.
It's just so much easier to attack Partey given his age, his contract coming to an end, his injuries etc.
I'm waiting for Habesha to tell me how he's not mentioned Rice once but is so quick and happy to dish trash at Partey. Where has Rice been this season? Largely invisible and don't tell me it's cause of his position, Partey in his way and whatever. That's not it and you know it. It's just bad form that's it but acknowledge it and move on.
They are judged by past experiences. But if we only count this season and this season alone:
Partey's been here every single game, Partey scored vs Villa, Partey wasn't sent off and cost us points vs Brighton, Partey played vs Spuds and was one of the best players on the pitch.
The Ghanaian isn't showing the level we were used to a couple of seasons ago when he was up there in the conversation for best DM in the world, but he's here, he's trying, he's doing what he can and it's been largely enough.
When you consider he's started 6 PL games in a row for the first time in exactly 18 months, we have to give him some credit, not because he's done something incredible but because if he wasn't available either, in addition to Merino, Odegaard and Rice for a game, now then we would have been in the gutter.
He had a shitty last season, no doubt about it, but he's not even first choice anymore and his contract ends at the end of the season. Every game he starts and we win, we should be thankful as his journey here is in it's final chapter.
Re your final sentence, I think Arteta has realized he'll have to find ways to compensate for Partey's midfield-splitting passing ability. Dropping Rice at #6 will not be as pretty as most people think build up wise, but Arteta has futureproofed us with Timber and Calafiori. That full back duo is how we move the ball up fast and precise when Partey's no longer here and we saw glimpses of it in the game vs Leicester.
yes. agree with your final point re. partey and making the play. he is much better at that than rice is currently. i really think arteta sees rice as more of a number 8 than anything, and i'm not so sure he will ever be world class there. rice is a DM who tends to play pretty safe. partey has always had much more in his locker going forward afaict.
i'm excited about calafiori stepping into that LB/CM role. he is such a huge upgrade on anything we have had at LB since arteta came in.
yeah. i don't like the fact we always seem to have one player we like to bash, even when everything is going really well, so i don't think it's fair to pick on rice either or make it into a "rice v partey" debate.
i like rice a lot despite us overpaying for him, but he has been pretty average so far this season. if merino does come in, which i'm not so sure about - i think he's more of a squad player than anything - it will probably be at the expense of rice and not partey, at least based on current form.
maybe. but given he is 28 and we only wanted to pay 20-25m for him i find that hard to believe. and even if he does start it will be as left number eight, not in partey's current position. the guy we really wanted for that position was zubimendi, who is a playmaker, like partey, not rice.
But we'll either play Rice and Merino as two 'up and down' CMs or Rice will sit deeper.
The price we paid was mainly due to him having one year on his contract and his decision that he only wanted Arsenal. 28 years old is peak years for a CM!
I can't wait for tonight going with my son is an added bonus.although he has been to a lot of matches with me this is his first" proper team in the champions league."took my daughter's to their first match against Leicester on Saturday as well and they both loved it.
That's one thing about your kids getting older you can enjoy the football through their eyes.
Agree Pedro that core value should be ‘barely noticed’ (paraphrased) but allied to that should be principle that refs should do everything humanly possible to ensure 11 players stay on the field. Sending off for minor infringements shouldn’t happen ever.
Arsenal have on their books three "experienced defensive midfielders" in Rice, Partey and Jorginho. The latter two are in their 30s and in their final year of contracts.
Frankly I don't expect either to secure contract extensions and will leave the club at end of this season although Jorginho might retire and join our coaching staff.
Merino is technically a centre/left midfielder and could well come into our starting lineup sooner rather than later this season and replace Partey. So realistically our Midfield would be Odegaard,
Rice and Merino.
I anticipate that Nwaneri will be given more game time this season, but he is more likely to do so
coming off the bench rather than staring regularly. Over the the next two seasons his workload
will increase, but I doubt that he will be a first team starter in that time unless we have a lot of
injuries.
If we assume that Havertz will remain our first choice centre forward for foreseeable future then
Arsenal are likely to focus on midfield recruitment next summer. One player who is apparently of
potential interest is Wirtz a highly rated AMF. He is probably the only "world class" player currently
playing for an unfashionable club in a major league who could be possible available next summer.
If he becomes available he would be a player of interest to most major clubs including Arsenal. This
would be a player who would certainly excite me more than most of the CFs who are allegedly targeting.
It's said Jorginho is ‘considering his future’ at Arsenal, with his contract expiring in the summer, with an option for another year in that contract, and he has two options on the table.
He can choose to take that extension, or ‘join Mikel Arteta’s coaching staff’.
Jorginho definitely looks like a guy that will have a successful coaching career.
The season is young though. Let's see how Partey and Jorgi do, there's a chance we might keep one of the two. If our management sees enough in either of them to extend their contract by another year, on renegotiated terms, that might save us some funds and trouble looking at the market.
I think Porto and Bayern confirmed last season that we are not psychologically ready to achieve great results with top European teams yet. But it's not criticism, it's quite logical. The team have been battling Man City for couple of seasons, but neither players, nor Arteta have confidence that they can dominate Bayern/PSG/Barcelona.
So as In Premier League results season will improve, but will not be at the level, where we can confidently get win at home or draw away vs top team - just like Bayern didi with us last year. If result comes, it probably will come through pain. The game today as the game vs Inter is another stepping point in this direction.
Nobody has beef nor mutton with any player. Partey has been on the decline, Ramsdale wasnt good enough(just like Zinchenko and Jesus), Ben White will soon find himself on the bench.
You didn't rate Partey even in his prime so there's that.
Its amusing when the characters that call others " negative" or similar names point out weaknesses about our players
The interesting thing about Partey is that Arteta keeps starting him meaning he's doing at least most of what he's expected to do.
Remember someone saying Jorghino is ahead of Partey in the pecking order,funny
The team has been getting the job done irrespective of the circumstances they found themselves and we all should be proud of that
Partey is here till next summer so let's move on
Pedro, sorry you are on your own regarding your beef with Partey, most on here are of the opinion the re is no need to be critical of Partey, I don't even understand why there should be a critisism of anyone really , we are doing fine and long may it continue!! Is Pedro on purpose raising this Partey thing to get us to comment on here ?
“another ‘LOOK AT ME MUM’ performance from a referee eager to be the star of the show”
More like a piss-weak ref unable to get a good look at the play, over reacting to a player’s yelping, rolling around holding his knee after a minimal contact on his shin pad. That, and his teammates lobbying for the most severe punishment available.
Basically everything that’s wrong with modern football encapsulated in one play.
Big game today , a pretty much a must win having drawn with the all mighty Atalanta( 12th in Italy), if automatic qualification is the aim.
Hyperbolic final sentence! At least you didn’t say ‘anything but a win is unacceptable’.
Is it though?
Correct if I’m wrong but only 8 clubs advance directly , no?
You must be one of those Arsenal fans who on one hand celebrate bookies having us the top 3 favorite to lift the trophy( no idea how they figured that btw) , while on the other lowering expectations at every turn.
The only thing that’s missing from you is a mini rant how the uefa conspired against us fixing the schedule so we play Europa league winners, Cl finalists from two years ago, and Cl title hopefuls in the three first games.
Someone will soon show up claiming just that no doubt.
Me.
On the sauce Tom? The time to be peaking is in Feb / March onwards.
Calafiori and Timber still effectively newbies and our first choice midfield, Odegaard, Merino and Rice hasn’t started yet.
Of course a win is the aim tonight. All I’m pointing out is that pretty much every game some poster or other will state that the next game is ‘ a must win’ and if we don’t win it’s unacceptable and proves that we’re not serious about winning things.
Peaking?!?!
I’m thinking more along the lines of fewer games on the schedule in a season that’s bound to have more injuries than the last.
Drop points to psg and we’ll be going to inter sitting on two points , at which point you’ll be saying a point away is acceptable lol.
we play Shakhtar Donetsk before Inter
8 games, see how many points we accrue and where that gets us. Hoping we don't have two extra games but if it happens, we'll just have to deal with it.
If we're sitting on two points before playing Inter, that'll be mean two draws and a loss in our first three games- definite cause for concern!
Peeping?!?!
i'm struggling to understand the partey bashing given we have come through a really tough first six games and are one point off top of the table with him playing almost every minute.
i think he's the best option we have in that pivot position. he doesn't have rice's athleticism to get up and down the pitch but he's better on the ball and can break the lines more effectively with his superb first touch and ability to take the ball on the turn. afaict, he is crucial to how we play.
I ‘bashed’ Partey based on Saturday’s performance where I was frustrated by his lack of incisiveness. Admittedly other players could have been criticised for an inability to finish decisively.
He’s been available for every game which has been important. The fact that he is not the class player he once was, shouldn’t be a reason for piling on.
Merino will hopefully reduce the need to start him game in, game out. In my eyes he’s now a very capable squad player, not an automatic starter.
yeah. i was referring more to pedro now consistently bashing him. i have seen quite a lot of pushback against this in comments to be fair. partey is a pretty unique kinda player. closest i see to him rn is gravenberch but i would still choose partey ahead of him. i think his decline is being a little overblown. if he can stay fit then he will start more games than not i think. still only just turned 31. that is not old these days. he's been super unlucky with injuries since he came to us.
My main concern is that his speed in recovery is now an issue, not as slow as Jorginho but that's not saying much!
Rice at 6 and Merino at left 8 will undoubtedly be our strongest CM combination but I'd hope that Partey's available to share the minutes when necessary.
Against weaker opposition like Leicester, he is slightly redundant and we might as well get another creative/attacking player further forward. Next Saturday, I'd prefer to see Nwaneri start in AM with say Havertz to the left and Rice at 6.
maybe it's gone. or maybe he just needs game time. he has missed a lot in recent years and in some games this season i have seen him blowing pretty hard. which is partly why arteta keeps playing him afaict.
rice is definitely a better option if what you want is security and defending the spaces. he is brilliant at that. so we have two great and very different options there. and they can play together as a double pivot if needed to. i am hoping partey has a good season and we can keep him in the squad a while longer.
It's weird cause Rice is given leeway cause we're used to consider him consistently excellent. But so far this season he hasn't really had a top performance, not even one.
It's just so much easier to attack Partey given his age, his contract coming to an end, his injuries etc.
I'm waiting for Habesha to tell me how he's not mentioned Rice once but is so quick and happy to dish trash at Partey. Where has Rice been this season? Largely invisible and don't tell me it's cause of his position, Partey in his way and whatever. That's not it and you know it. It's just bad form that's it but acknowledge it and move on.
They are judged by past experiences. But if we only count this season and this season alone:
Partey's been here every single game, Partey scored vs Villa, Partey wasn't sent off and cost us points vs Brighton, Partey played vs Spuds and was one of the best players on the pitch.
The Ghanaian isn't showing the level we were used to a couple of seasons ago when he was up there in the conversation for best DM in the world, but he's here, he's trying, he's doing what he can and it's been largely enough.
When you consider he's started 6 PL games in a row for the first time in exactly 18 months, we have to give him some credit, not because he's done something incredible but because if he wasn't available either, in addition to Merino, Odegaard and Rice for a game, now then we would have been in the gutter.
He had a shitty last season, no doubt about it, but he's not even first choice anymore and his contract ends at the end of the season. Every game he starts and we win, we should be thankful as his journey here is in it's final chapter.
Re your final sentence, I think Arteta has realized he'll have to find ways to compensate for Partey's midfield-splitting passing ability. Dropping Rice at #6 will not be as pretty as most people think build up wise, but Arteta has futureproofed us with Timber and Calafiori. That full back duo is how we move the ball up fast and precise when Partey's no longer here and we saw glimpses of it in the game vs Leicester.
yes. agree with your final point re. partey and making the play. he is much better at that than rice is currently. i really think arteta sees rice as more of a number 8 than anything, and i'm not so sure he will ever be world class there. rice is a DM who tends to play pretty safe. partey has always had much more in his locker going forward afaict.
i'm excited about calafiori stepping into that LB/CM role. he is such a huge upgrade on anything we have had at LB since arteta came in.
yeah. i don't like the fact we always seem to have one player we like to bash, even when everything is going really well, so i don't think it's fair to pick on rice either or make it into a "rice v partey" debate.
i like rice a lot despite us overpaying for him, but he has been pretty average so far this season. if merino does come in, which i'm not so sure about - i think he's more of a squad player than anything - it will probably be at the expense of rice and not partey, at least based on current form.
Can't agree with your view on Merino. I'm sure he's been brought in to be a starter.
maybe. but given he is 28 and we only wanted to pay 20-25m for him i find that hard to believe. and even if he does start it will be as left number eight, not in partey's current position. the guy we really wanted for that position was zubimendi, who is a playmaker, like partey, not rice.
But we'll either play Rice and Merino as two 'up and down' CMs or Rice will sit deeper.
The price we paid was mainly due to him having one year on his contract and his decision that he only wanted Arsenal. 28 years old is peak years for a CM!
I can't wait for tonight going with my son is an added bonus.although he has been to a lot of matches with me this is his first" proper team in the champions league."took my daughter's to their first match against Leicester on Saturday as well and they both loved it.
That's one thing about your kids getting older you can enjoy the football through their eyes.
COYG
Agree Pedro that core value should be ‘barely noticed’ (paraphrased) but allied to that should be principle that refs should do everything humanly possible to ensure 11 players stay on the field. Sending off for minor infringements shouldn’t happen ever.
2nd
1st