SUPER AGENT HAWKS €100M TALENT, IS IT REAL?
MENDES BACK ON THE SCENE, BUT CAN WE TRUST LIGA PORTUGAL?
Listen Le Grove gang, together we’ve been in the business of haaaaawt transfer summers for many years. This is the 16th summer window we’ve covered. We’re an experienced bunch. If there was a job that required transfer knowledge, we’d be pushing for CEO roles. Private jets, Saka Sauce lattes, Chigwell Grill flown into our New York working space, vacations on the OdeYacht… it’d be the best.
That’s why the hype around Gyökeres isn’t quite capturing me yet. Jorge Mendes was part of the crew of super agents that chummed up with Edu to deliver us some of the biggest Ls in sporting history. He’s now the rep of the Swedish player, and the hype appears to be generated mainly from the Portuguese side.
To recap: 3 weeks ago, Arsenal wanted a fresh-faced 21-year-old they were planning to spend £45m on - that move worked for Arsenal for a number of reasons.
The age profile clicked with where the club is going.
We have a striker operating at £100m levels.
The price point suited a position that isn’t a priority right now.
You can also add content of the highest veracity from David Ornstein, who has suggested focus would shift to getting an output master out wide.
Gyökeres is 26 years old, he’s bummed around Europe for years, he’s clocked a single good season in a Portuguese league that had Fábio Vieira dropping output per minute like a Lionel Messi regen. The Swede is a risk, however hard you’ve immersed yourself in his comp videos. His fee, which will be at least £70m, plus the monster costs associated with working on Mendes deals, seems a little pricey considering the priorities.
Does this seem like an Arsenal move? Or does it look a little bit like a post-Ivan Gazidis WOW move that we might later regret?
If he was 21 years old and free-scoring like this, I’d be more inclined to join the hype train because of the sell-on value. We’ve seen plenty of kids make it big moving to England, but we’ve also seen some huge flops for big numbers:
João Félix €127.00m
Enzo Fernández €121.00m
Darwin Núñez €85.00m
Gonçalo Ramos €65.00m
Even at low prices we’ve got Fábio Silva, Fábio Vieira, Hulk… there’s quite a list of expensive flops.
We don’t have a £100m need right now and if we did have that need - surely there are safer gambles to be taking?
Joshua Kimmich is rumored to be exiting Bayern this summer. He’s apparently entertaining interest from a lot of clubs, one of them being Arsenal. He’s world-class on his day, no doubt, but this is another player loaded with risk. He’s older, has won everything, has never experienced the physical pressures of the Premier League, and I’m not sure I’d want to be investing that heavily in an older player who has been getting rough critiques from the German press all season.
Arsenal should be aging down the midfield this summer - not adding older bodies. We have two incredibly experienced older 6s who can cover for Declan Rice. If we can exit Partey, that’s where I want to see movement. People keep pumping Onana, again, not for me after watching him again. People like the visual of someone that extreme in a deep-lying role for Arsenal. He’s tall, fast, incredibly aggressive, and a lot of folk, my brother included, think he should be judged on his Lille days. Maybe… Ramsdale was a hoof merchant at Sheff U after Wilder left, but if you looked at his play under Eddie Howe, that was a fairer reflection of his talents.
Here’s my rebuttal - if Sean Dyche thought Onana could be doing Thomas Partey things in midfield, he’d be engaging that skill set. David Moyes was a long way from a progressive coach when he landed at West Ham - but he recognized the beauty and talent of Declan-ball and he let him do his thing. Declan is a similar physical specimen to Onana - tall, strong, fast, aggressive, agile… but he could play ball, and he did play ball for West Ham. If Onana was a world-class one-touch release master with top-tier progressive passing mode - we’d be seeing more of that for Everton.
I haven’t been a fan of him for Everton and I haven’t been blown away by him at the Euros so far - we can do better. This is a guy that ends up in a Spurs midfield. The hype feels almost Bissouma-like. Remember people begging us to sign him? Now he’s the guy holding Angeball back. At least Bissouma was playing in a JdP system.
Still, I am open to being wrong. Arteta and his team are great developers of talent and let’s be clear - Thomas Partey was being held back by a very restrictive Diego Simeone and the stats nerds said they wouldn’t take him on a free… an L for the ages. I still saw more in Thomas than I have in Onana. I’d say go back and look at the archives but they’re squirreled away for later use for Le Grove Members.
A little MLS update. If you saw a video of a ref talking to the crowd, that was from where I work. The ref dropped his best WWE impression, telling the fans the goal was onside HOWEVER there was a foul. Pretty mean. But, to be fair, he nailed the decision. Minus the theatrics, you can’t know the refs chatting to the fans about what their thinking is. MLS is paving the way for lots of innovation on the rules that the Premier League should be looking into.
While we’re talking about great tech - I do love the offside radar tool they’re using at the Euros. No arguing radar or whatever the fuck it is. Get that into the Premier League.
Ok, that’s all I’ve got for now. We’ll be recording a podcast later on this evening. Let me know if there are any things you want to hear us talking about! I’ll have better luck recording and publishing this week as I’m back stateside.
BIG LOVE xx
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This from the athletic on martinelli
Been saying he same for 3 years now
He hasn’t got the variety yet to offer a constant threat vs a low bloc
When Brazil begin their Copa America campaign against Costa Rica, Gabriel Martinelli is expected to be named on the bench.
It is a role he has been forced to become accustomed to. Martinelli, previously an automatic pick for manager Mikel Arteta, was a substitute for nine of Arsenal’s final 10 league games last season.
It was a disappointing end to a decidedly mixed year. The hard numbers do not read well: after 15 goals and five Premier League assists in 2022-23, he dropped to six league goals and four assists last season.
But Arsenal’s faith in the 23-year-old is not shaken. Under contract until at least 2027, he remains an important part of Arteta’s plans. Arsenal’s decision-makers believe last season was an anomaly in Martinelli’s development, and that he will kick on again next season.
How to follow Euro 2024 and Copa America on The Athletic…
Euro 2024 news | Euro 2024 fixtures
Copa America news | Copa America fixtures
His participation in the run-in was severely impacted by the injury suffered during March’s 6-0 win over Sheffield United.
Before that, he had looked to be finding his best form. In the first game after Arsenal’s winter break, Martinelli came off the bench to score twice against Crystal Palace. He then started the next six matches as Arsenal steamrollered through opposition such as Liverpool, Newcastle United and West Ham United. In the Sheffield United game, Martinelli had already recorded a goal and an assist. He appeared well on the way to finding his best form — and then injury struck.
The incident was innocuous enough. Martinelli’s attempted shot was blocked by the outstretched boot of Anel Ahmedhodzic. The collision caused a laceration to Martinelli’s heel that made running uncomfortable, and with Arsenal cruising, the Brazilian was substituted.
After the game, Arteta initially described the injury as a “light cut”. Concerns deepened, however, when Martinelli limped away from Bramall Lane on crutches.
It transpired Martinelli had suffered a nasty, deep cut to the bottom of his heel that required stitches. The healing process was also more complicated than initially hoped.
With hugely important games in the Premier League and Champions League to come, every effort was made to get Martinelli back playing as soon as possible. Adidas staff even visited him soon after the injury to assess the situation and supply him with a boot that provided more comfort and support. Despite the best efforts of everyone involved — Martinelli, Arsenal’s medical staff and Adidas — he did not return to playing without pain until near the end of the season.
Martinelli was pressed into action for the two Champions League games against Bayern Munich, but those were his only starts between the Sheffield United game on March 4 and the final day of the season on May 19. Beyond the injury, Martinelli’s case for the starting XI was not helped by two other key factors: the excellent form of Leandro Trossard and Arteta’s propensity to stick with a winning team during the run-in.
Even when fit, Martinelli is no longer a certain starter for Arsenal (David Price/Arsenal FC via Getty Images)
There are other mitigating circumstances to consider when evaluating Martinelli last season. He operates on the extremities of Arsenal’s left side, which significantly evolved across the season.
Arsenal lost their left-sided central midfielder, Granit Xhaka, in the summer of 2023. Kai Havertz initially took on the role, before Declan Rice was shifted into a more advanced position. Arsenal chopped and changed their left-back, with Jurrien Timber, Oleksandr Zinchenko, Jakub Kiwior and Takehiro Tomiyasu all appearing in that position. None of those players are particularly inclined to make the overlapping runs that Ben White uses to draw markers away from Bukayo Saka on the other side of the pitch.
Comparisons are frequently drawn between Martinelli and Saka — but the Brazilian has failed to build the type of relationships Saka has developed with White and Martin Odegaard. When Arteta and Edu are considering the future development of the team, the left flank requires considerably more focus than the right.
Then there’s the change in how opponents approach playing against Arsenal. Arteta’s team are coming up against a low block with increasing regularity. By the time the ball reaches Martinelli, he is often double-marked.
Arsenal know Martinelli is at his best when one-on-one with a defender, or running in behind. They need to engineer a way to make that happen more often. Earlier, more direct passes from defence and midfield could be the key to unlocking Martinelli’s full potential. Few things are more frightening for a full-back than the sight of Martinelli haring after a long diagonal into the channel.
There are things he can do better, too. In the 2022-23 season, his dribble success rate was 50.4 per cent. Last season, that figure dropped to 36.6 per cent. Coming up against congested defences may force the Brazil international to innovate and change approach.
He was remarkably clinical with his finishing in 2022-23, scoring 15 goals from 8.93 expected goals (xG). That level of over-performance is rarely sustained. Last year, his xG was similar (6.85), but he finished with just six goals. Some of this can be explained as a natural regression.
Then there are those things that the data doesn’t show — the momentary hesitation, the extra touch before the shot. When players are confident, finishing becomes automatic. Martinelli never quite found his flow last season.
The Copa America, however, provides an excellent opportunity to relaunch himself. Despite an indifferent end to the season with Arsenal, he remains an important figure in the Brazil squad. Martinelli is competing in an area of the pitch where manager Dorival Junior has a wealth of options, including Real Madrid’s Vinicius Junior and 17-year-old Endrick, at his disposal. Nevertheless, he continues to make a good impression as a rotation option and impact substitute and is fit despite suffering a dead leg in training last week.
Beyond that, his focus is on returning to his best form with Arsenal.
“I’m going to work hard to make it happen,” he told the media last week. “I’m going to do my best to get to Arsenal in the best condition possible. I hope it will be a year of many joys for Arsenal and for me. I hope to help my team with goals, assists, with good performances. I’m going to prepare a lot because it’s going to be a long season again.”
This has been the most boring group by far... that said England's bracket after this is on the easier side of the quarter final bracket .. they should get to the semi - finals assuming they score a goal at some point.