Sicario wrote:
est wrote:
Yes please to Bissouma. Him and Partey could form a potent midfield base together.
We will be fucked in Jan 2022
That's a concern. I'll give you that. Willock, Azeez and Guendouzi will step in though, so we'll manage. :boris:
Pepe LeFrits wrote:
est wrote:
Yes please to Bissouma. Him and Partey could form a potent midfield base together.
mmm, I feel like that'd be putting a lot of pressure on what is an already struggling attacking midfield trio
I'm not sure about that, actually. For me, our CM was a big reason why our attackers struggled. When we started replacing slow ball-hogs like Willian with pass & move players like ESR, our results improved. I've no doubt that if we do the same in central midfield, we're also going to improve.
Both Bissouma and Partey can manipulate the ball, create angles for passing it forward or dribble and drive the ball forward themselves. Because they're both pretty mobile, I feel the opposition would have more difficulties in marking our midfield out of passing options. Xhaka sits back/drops deep and then looks for the ball forward, by that time our players are already marked and his only option is to pass it wide to the fullback. Partey with Xhaka or Ceballos didn't work because the latter two could or would not move. Sometimes with Elneny we saw how him just passing it on quickly and moving injected some pace in our build-up play.
Not to mention that both of them are strong and defensively solid, so maybe our entire team doesn't have to drop into our own penalty box every time we lose the ball? (Although this is probably largely Arteta's fault, but it seems we are stuck with him for now.)
With ESR/whoever we get in the no10 role and Saka/Pepe wide, we should have enough for decent attacking football, Arteta willing of course.
