Good morning everyone.
Now that this pesky World Cup thing is over, we can get down to the real business of summer: growing increasingly tetchy and agitated about our transfer business.
Whether it’s the lack of new arrivals, the deals we haven’t got done because the player went elsewhere or we chose not to proceed, the speed at which we operate, the names of players spuriously linked with us, the players we want who don’t appear to be of interest to those on high, the prices we pay or the prices we won’t pay, transfers completed by other clubs (even those in other leagues), not forgetting the players we need to sell but who will be still knocking around as the window comes to a close, it’s all grist for the mill.
Arsenal posted a short video yesterday of players returning for pre-season training, and at first I was flummoxed by one guy in particular until I remembered that Reiss Nelson is a real person and still under contract. Out of sight, out of mind, I guess. My main takeaway from that 30 second clip is Ben White saying he’s basically been training every day this summer and that his knee is ‘all good’. Jurrien Timber said he’s improving and hoping to step things up before the start of the season, so fingers crossed there, but with the William Saliba situation I’d be very much inclined to keep Ben White around despite the fact there were rumours about his potential departure this summer.
I know fitness is an issue for both our right backs, which goes some way to explain the reported interest in Ezri Konsa, but if they’re both available, they both play ahead of the Aston Villa man in any team I’m picking. We may well need the depth, and if he signs I hope he does well, but it’s an interesting angle to look at any potential arrival from. Does he improve the first XI? Not for me.
We’re waiting for the Christos Tzolis deal to be announced, which I think could happen this week, but the same question could be applied to him, and the answer is, at best, we don’t know yet. But probably no right now. Which isn’t to say that in six months time he’s made that left-wing position his own and is racking up goals and assists, but on paper he’s coming in to replace one of our most impactful attacking players, and he’s not an obvious level changer.
Let’s think about Morgan Rogers, who has now obviously gone to Chelsea, so it is a bit of moot point, but still. Last season he got 10 goals and 7 assists in the Premier League, with his position split almost evenly between the left and a more central attacking midfield role. More goals from midfield seems like an obvious area of improvement for this Arsenal team. Last season, if you include the left where Rogers played, we got 7 from Eberechi Eze (5 of those in 2 games), 6 from Leandro Trossard, 5 from Martin Zubimendi, Declan Rice and Mikel Merino both chipped in with 4, while Gabriel Martinelli and Martin Odegaard added just 1 each.
I don’t know what Arsenal’s exact plan for Rogers was. A piece in The Athletic (£) about his move to Chelsea suggested discussions between the club and the player had earmarked him for the left-hand side, without that being absolutely fixed, but I suspect he’d have been used more centrally as I think that’s where he’s best. Leave aside the fee, with Arsenal’s £80m valuation blown out of the water by absurd prices paid for Elliot Anderson and Sandro Tonali, would the player have given us something that would have improved us in a key area of the pitch? I’d tilt towards yes, but I understand the club’s reluctance to push the boat out to the £117m level which Chelsea eventually paid.
Bruno Guimaraes then. Whatever your feelings towards him because of his history with us, I think he’s someone who can come in and because of his Premier League experience, he’s a plug and play option which is probably going to be very important with Declan Rice currently in a cryo-chamber regenerating his muscles and lungs and stuff. I don’t think he changes the level, but he’s a very good player who would add something to this team. Assuming, of course, this is a deal we can get done because Newcastle seem to be digging in, and after a lot of reporting on our interest, it’s gone very quiet on this one over the last couple of weeks.
I realise it’s a tough job to significantly improve a side that won the Premier League, and reached the Champions League final, but so far – emphasis there – the players we’ve pursued and been linked with have been a bit underwhelming for me. I feel like we need to use the juice of being the title winners to really attract top talent, because there are areas of this side that need to improve. Defensively, I think we’ve built a great collection of players and it has given us the platform to achieve last season’s success. From an attacking perspective though, we can be better, and I think we have to be better.
We need more firepower and more creativity, which I recognise is the hardest part of the game, but to my mind that’s where we lack that bit of star quality, that individualism and dynamism to break tight games open or make ‘regular’ games more comfortable. Which, I guess, makes it interesting that apart from Julian Alvarez, a deal I think is way too complicated for all kinds of reasons, we haven’t really been linked with attacking players of that kind. I know they’re not ten a penny, but for me that’s where we need to see our ‘smart, fast, ambitious’ planning really come to the fore. If we can’t find that player (or those players), or we can’t convince them to join the Premier League champions, then I’d get worried.
I’m not quite there yet, time is on our side and pre-season only began yesterday, but with all the focus on us now, the man who sells online pitchforks is checking his stock diligently (the flaming ones cost extra!).
Right, I’m gonna leave it there for this morning. We couldn’t record the Arsecast Extra for you yesterday for technical reasons, but James is back in London today, so we’ll get that out for you later this evening. We’ll put out the call for questions on BlueSky @gunnerblog.bsky.social and @arseblog.com this afternoon, so when that happens fire away using the hashtag #arsecastextra – or if you’re an Arseblog Member on Patreon, leave your question in the #arsecast-extra-questions channel on our Discord server.
For now, have a good one.
