Klaus wrote:
Ricky1985 wrote:
I'm sure your assessment of Brighton player Ben White is based on extensive viewing, but he looks a quality player to me. The sort I always want us to make: super talented and knows the League. Yes please!
He's a massive talent Ricky, I've been sure he was going to end up at a big club ever since I saw him for Leeds. You'll love him, and I reckon so will most people a year or two down the road. He's the best of this current English generation talent-wise as near as I can tell, and I don't think it's even close.
Like others have said though, you can't keep signing centrebacks every window, especially when they all fit similar profiles (none of them have realised their potential) and even less so when they command most of your transfer budget. Statistically we had one of the best defences in the league last season too while we had the worst attack of any team in the upper half of the table. If we had moved forcefully for someone like Buendia in addition to White I wouldn't have said a bad word about this transfer, but it speaks volumes to me that we didn't. We only see value in the defence - it's why we were insulted with a half-dead Willian last summer, why we started 20/21 without a single attacking midfielder before Smith-Rowe emerged halfway through - and that's a huge issue that is also reflected in the way we have played for the last 20 months.
It's good to read yet another glowing review of the kid.
Arteta has signed Gabriel and Pablo Mari. The former will start for us all being well in the first game of the new season, and the latter was a very cheap stop-gap in January. He's shipped out Luiz and Mustafi, and it's clear he doesn't rate Holding or Chambers as being at the required level to start for us, and I agree with him. He's seen an opportunity to go and sign a player that is by all accounts tailor-made for his style, has superstar potential, will likely be an England regular for the next decade, that plays for a club that we can actually buy from, and will be a starter straight away. I don't see the induglence?
Also, you say our defence was good last season, but I think that's twisting the statistics to suit your point. We had dodgy defenders, as we always do. The only reason we had good numbers for goals conceded was because Arteta was smart enough to set up the team to mitigate the shenanigans of Mustafi, Holding, Luiz, Bellerin et al.
It makes sense to me that if you have better defenders then you can set up more expansively, play more on the front foot, and worry less about protection and more about creation. I hope that's what Arteta has in mind and that's what we'll see.
You say the club only see value in defence, but that's not true because over the same time period you're talking about us signing centrebacks that haven't lived up to their potential, we've also signed Partey and Pépé for a combined £120m. And we also tried very hard to sign Aouar and failed only because he didn't want to join and not because we wouldn't stump up what Lyon were asking. We're also being strongly linked with Maddison right now, and it wouldn't be a huge surprise if that transfer materialsed. Add to that, Arteta has integrated Smith Rowe and Saka into the starting XI in the past season and would no doubt have had big plans for them last summer, and it makes your point about us not wanting to spend on AMs and not having anyone but Willian look less correct. Given his versatility and the fact that he was a free agent, Willian is exactly who you sign for a season if you think you have kids coming through that are a season or two away from exploding.
It seems to me that Arteta just doesn't rate Buendia as highly as you do, and you're projecting the rest. For what it's worth, I'm not sold on Buendia either, and think the fact that Villa signed him and not one of the big boys when he has been on everyone's radar for two or three years might be telling. But we'll see.
