HOUSEBOAT - Warning: tenuous links ahead!: Page 384 - The Arsenal discussion forum and community: One More in the Tolly

HOUSEBOAT - Warning: tenuous links ahead!

Coombs

Careers have probably been extended somewhat you're right, but only with a bit of luck. Like I said, COVID is likely part of this as well, it's like a gap year where clubs are relying on the older legends to bring them through. Most players are still gonna be pretty old and busted at those ages, I think.

Klaus

Yeah, I think you're right about that. I think the ones who have already proven to be good beyond 30 will continue to be good for a good while though.

I'd happily take Ramos if someone offered him to me this summer, for instance. Actually it's not quite that simple, you would have to be convinced that he's still motivated, but it seems fairly likely to me that he'll have another 2-3 seasons that will be as good as anything you get out of most football players.

Clrnc

Klaus wrote:
Regarding signing old players, it's a bit of both maybe. Look at all the top leagues. Who are the top scorers? Old arse players, mostly. Zlatan is the best player in Italy at age 39, rivalled by Ronaldo who's 36. Lewanwowski is 33 in Bundesliga. Messi is 33 in La Liga; Ramos and Modric are 35. Vardy is 34 in Premier League and won the golden boot last season.

Football still isn't half as athletically demanding as most individual sports so there's bound to be more and more examples like this. I don't think the issue is going for older players who are actually good if there's an opportunity to do so. I think the issue is just Willian. Signing a shit footballer is a bad idea regardless of his age; signing one who's starting to slow down doubly so.

Good point. Signing an old backup player that used to be world class, I have no problems about it. Just see Cavani and Thiago. These are positions where experience and winning mentality is good to have.

David Luiz costs us a lot of times but he also saved us a lot of times, especially he was brilliant in the entire run to the FA Cup win last season. Pretty much added that winning mentality although he is also a double edge sword in terms of squad morale. But the idea is there.

Qwiss

Players like Luiz and Willian have never been that good and should come as no surprise that they look like shit in their 30's. Of course guys like Ronaldo, Messi, Ibra, etc look good as the get into the latter stages of their careers, they are some of the best players ever. Even at his peak Luiz regularly entertained us with his stupidity.

Clrnc

Hope we take advantage of it with Reyna or Guerreiro.

QuincyAbeyie

Do you reckon Guerrero could play in a midfield two with Partey?

KurtEisner

I for one sincerely doubt it, he's not a central midfielder. Also, he recently came out and said he wants to stay at Dortmund for a long time.

Reyna would be a great buy though.

Clrnc

Quincy Abeyie wrote:
Do you reckon Guerrero could play in a midfield two with Partey?

Doubt it. More for a LB role I reckon, although Ornstein confirmed we want someone younger than Tierney to be his understudy.

Claudius

Just get Sancho. Make him our 9. Retire Auba and Laca. Would be a boatload but we can do it if we aggressively cut costs

QuincyAbeyie

Wouldn't make sense to have both Guerreiro and Tierney as LBs so then it's a no from me.

mdgoonah41

i dont really understand the plan for LB. tierney is 23. so if you want an understudy to him that wont expect to start right away, you are targeting an 18/19 year old who is raw and wont be counted on to start a ton of games. guerreiro is 27 and wouldnt be coming here just to cash a paycheck and play a few odd games in europa or the tinpot cup.

either we sign another lichsteiner who is old and just here to provide cover, or we need to be signing a player under 20 who is a long term project. its clear the club considers tierney the undisputed first choice, as they should.

what is andre santos up to?

Clrnc

mdgoonah41 wrote:
i dont really understand the plan for LB. tierney is 23. so if you want an understudy to him that wont expect to start right away, you are targeting an 18/19 year old who is raw and wont be counted on to start a ton of games. guerreiro is 27 and wouldnt be coming here just to cash a paycheck and play a few odd games in europa or the tinpot cup.

either we sign another lichsteiner who is old and just here to provide cover, or we need to be signing a player under 20 who is a long term project. its clear the club considers tierney the undisputed first choice, as they should.

what is andre santos up to?

Sounds like you are contradicting yourself? We are doing the 2nd part of your suggestions according to Orny, signing a u20 who is raw and not ready to be a regular starter, but can be counted on every now and then. Maybe like Clichy understudying Cole?

Or even someone like Antonee Robinson especially if Fulham gets relegated. Only costed them 2m.

GooneriC

Tierney's injury problems worry me. We need to sign a proper LB to challenge that position , not another old player or a prospect. Needed the same for RB , but here we are with no real competition for Bellerin and suffered for it.

KurtEisner

Tierney has been really injury prone so far, so I think we should go for a reliable, steady player to split time with him rather than a raw youngster, who might have a really high ceiling, but would likely also cost us points if Tierney ends up being out for a prolonged amount of time. Can't think of any names though to be honest.

Speaking of fullbacks though, I've seen quite a few Wolfsburg games this year, they're looking to challenge for a CL spot in the Bundesliga and one of their best players has been Ridle Baku, who started the season as a RB, but is now playing at right wing and performing very well there as well. Would love him as Bellerin's replacement.

goon

I think that's unfair on Tierney, he's only started 2 games fewer than Saka in the league who in turn has started more than any other outfield player this year. From what Ornstein is saying it sounds like he's being left out as a precaution too, they reckon the discomfort is linked to fatigue.

Anyway, reliable and steady is overrated imo, it doesn't get you anywhere.

Klaus

I'd go for Robin Gosens if Tierney's injury problems persist, but he's too good to sit on the bench really. I don't imagine he'd want to move unless he knew he was brought in to play regularly. Worth a punt though. He's at least as good as Tierney.

mentalvortex

Clrnc wrote:
mdgoonah41 wrote:
i dont really understand the plan for LB. tierney is 23. so if you want an understudy to him that wont expect to start right away, you are targeting an 18/19 year old who is raw and wont be counted on to start a ton of games. guerreiro is 27 and wouldnt be coming here just to cash a paycheck and play a few odd games in europa or the tinpot cup.

either we sign another lichsteiner who is old and just here to provide cover, or we need to be signing a player under 20 who is a long term project. its clear the club considers tierney the undisputed first choice, as they should.

what is andre santos up to?

Sounds like you are contradicting yourself? We are doing the 2nd part of your suggestions according to Orny, signing a u20 who is raw and not ready to be a regular starter, but can be counted on every now and then. Maybe like Clichy understudying Cole?

Or even someone like Antonee Robinson especially if Fulham gets relegated. Only costed them 2m.

There has been a lot of noise about Hibernian left back Josh doig.

He fits the right age bracket and the profile (18 year old), and apparently very similar to Tierney in playing style.

KurtEisner

goon wrote:
I think that's unfair on Tierney, he's only started 2 games fewer than Saka in the league who in turn has started more than any other outfield player this year. From what Ornstein is saying it sounds like he's being left out as a precaution too, they reckon the discomfort is linked to fatigue.

Anyway, reliable and steady is overrated imo, it doesn't get you anywhere.

True, feels like he's been out a lot more for some reason.

I don't think it's overrated when it comes to defenders, especially back-ups, Cedric has done some excellent things in attack for us recently, but I'd rather have had a reliable defender playing who wouldn't have cost us the Villa game. Think Holding's been the definiton of reliable and steady this season too, and he's arguably been our best CB.

speedy

Clrnc wrote:

Hope we take advantage of it with Reyna or Guerreiro.

We're in the same boat. Didn't we take a 160m bank loan out to get through this. A big splurg in the window like you're suggesting and we can get back to new stadium levels of debt. It wasn't that much fun paying it off last time. You don't really want to have to pay back 25m per season for the next 10seasons.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/football/2021/jan/07/mikel-arteta-expects-mesut-ozil-future-to-be-decided-in-next-few-days-arsenal

Anzac

speedy wrote:
Clrnc wrote:

Hope we take advantage of it with Reyna or Guerreiro.

We're in the same boat. Didn't we take a 160m bank loan out to get through this. A big splurg in the window like you're suggesting and we can get back to new stadium levels of debt. It wasn't that much fun paying it off last time. You don't really want to have to pay back 25m per season for the next 10seasons.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/football/2021/jan/07/mikel-arteta-expects-mesut-ozil-future-to-be-decided-in-next-few-days-arsenal

Just to clarify the stadium debt still isn't paid off, and the loan provided by KSE last summer was only to pay out a portion that required us to retain 36m in cash reserves annually to cover that portion of the debt. As it stands the stadium won't be paid off until 2031 IIRC = 25 years from 2006 when we re structured the debt to include bonds.

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