If that's the only reason why didn't he replace him last summer?

"oh the options behind him are trash". so you can't sign a replacement? uhmmm i need another center back.

Things are working so well with Tomiyasu right now that I'd be very hesitant to move him and mess it up. I really don't think it's a coincidence that we've found a bit of precious balance again with one attacking fullback and one who's a defender first and foremost. It seems like a recipe for disaster to my mind to replace him with Lamptey.

Totally agree. But I'd understand a Tavares style signing to back up Tomi.

Klaus wrote:

Things are working so well with Tomiyasu right now that I'd be very hesitant to move him and mess it up. I really don't think it's a coincidence that we've found a bit of precious balance again with one attacking fullback and one who's a defender first and foremost. It seems like a recipe for disaster to my mind to replace him with Lamptey.

Tomiyasu has been really good but so far he's made us more defensive with their being no adjustment in other positions to compensate. I can definitely see where Clrnc is coming from but it'd mean admitting Tomi is a better CB than White and benching our marquee £50m man.

Coombs wrote:

Totally agree. But I'd understand a Tavares style signing to back up Tomi.

or just use your resources better and make tavares (who is either two-footed or does a good job pretending like he can use his right foot to a premier league standard) the backup RB as well.

I don't think its a lack of back ups at RB thats our problem.

yeah but he said a tavares style signing for backup, i'm saying just use the tavares that we have now.

I'm not worried about resources so much, in a case like this. Signing a Tomiyasu backup doesn't stop us from doing anything else.

It's not so much about recourses for me as making sure players get enough game time. If you have a small squad with versatile players it probably means your backups can be of a higher standard as they won't be starved of gametime. At the same time, it also means you don't end up giving cup mins to trash who have no real future here other than being contingency plan c and can instead give it to the next best thing.

The way we're operating right now is not sustainable and destroys value. We've got 5 players who can play as strikers, 5 who can play as right backs, 4 as left backs and 7 who've played as a centre back at some point. That doesn't help anyone.

Arteta and Edu have failed miserably is the short of it.

goon wrote:

It's not so much about recourses for me as making sure players get enough game time. If you have a small squad with versatile players it probably means your backups can be of a higher standard as they won't be starved of gametime. At the same time, it also means you don't end up giving cup mins to trash who have no real future here other than being contingency plan c and can instead give it to the next best thing.

The way we're operating right now is not sustainable and destroys value. We've got 5 players who can play as strikers, 5 who can play as right backs, 4 as left backs and 7 who've played as a centre back at some point. That doesn't help anyone.

Totally agree. I'd love to see the squad trimmed both permanently and via more loans. We still have a Europa league size squad but with no European football.

But we can't risk getting into Europe and having no squad either.

Coombs wrote:

But we can't risk getting into Europe and having no squad either.

That's why you loan out young players and then bring them back. The likes of Elneny, Laca, Eddie won't be here next season anyway so that problems gonna happen anyway.

Qwiss! wrote:

Klaus wrote:

Things are working so well with Tomiyasu right now that I'd be very hesitant to move him and mess it up. I really don't think it's a coincidence that we've found a bit of precious balance again with one attacking fullback and one who's a defender first and foremost. It seems like a recipe for disaster to my mind to replace him with Lamptey.

Tomiyasu has been really good but so far he's made us more defensive with their being no adjustment in other positions to compensate. I can definitely see where Clrnc is coming from but it'd mean admitting Tomi is a better CB than White and benching our marquee £50m man.

That's true, but I just think that's because Arteta is clueless when it comes to attacking football. Consider how he pulled a forward and threw on a midfielder when he was 1-0 up against Palace yesterday for instance. If we actually get an attackminded rightback I bet that we'll switch back to playing with three defensive-minded central midfielders again and then we will be back to having issues in both ends of the pitch.

Klaus wrote:

Qwiss! wrote:

Tomiyasu has been really good but so far he's made us more defensive with their being no adjustment in other positions to compensate. I can definitely see where Clrnc is coming from but it'd mean admitting Tomi is a better CB than White and benching our marquee £50m man.

That's true, but I just think that's because Arteta is clueless when it comes to attacking football. Consider how he pulled a forward and threw on a midfielder when he was 1-0 up against Palace yesterday for instance. If we actually get an attackminded rightback I bet that we'll switch back to playing with three defensive-minded central midfielders again and then we will be back to having issues in both ends of the pitch.

Oh yeah Arteta got him to slide into a back 3 when we have the ball. Its really annoying when he's doing that and Partey and Xhaka are both sitting in midfield with Odegaard just hovering around a little ahead of them. A large part of why we are so easy to defend. You'd have to hope a different manager would get a lot more from Tomi, Ode, etc

https://dailycannon.com/2021/10/arsenal-want-denis-zakaria-on-free-transfer/

Qwiss! wrote:

Coombs wrote:

But we can't risk getting into Europe and having no squad either.

That's why you loan out young players and then bring them back. The likes of Elneny, Laca, Eddie won't be here next season anyway so that problems gonna happen anyway.

Feel like we should've tried to adopt the Chelsea midlist player-farming model years ago, but we haven't had the business nous or the hard edges for it as a club. Of course it hasn't worked out that well for them with players returning to make an impact, but they get value out of it.

Burnwinter wrote:

Qwiss! wrote:

That's why you loan out young players and then bring them back. The likes of Elneny, Laca, Eddie won't be here next season anyway so that problems gonna happen anyway.

Feel like we should've tried to adopt the Chelsea midlist player-farming model years ago, but we haven't had the business nous or the hard edges for it as a club. Of course it hasn't worked out that well for them with players returning to make an impact, but they get value out of it.

They don't do it to develop players for themselves, other than it being a revenue stream they've created for FFP so as to replace Abramovich's direct funding towards the transfers and wages.  This is why they were worried about UEFA/FIFA talk pre-COVID of restricting the number of players a club could have out on loan in any given season.  

The funding Abramovich now provides is to cover any pre-tax operating loss so as to keep them in the black re FFP, and because it's not directly spent on transfers or wages it's allowed under current FFP structures as it's seen as the owner/investor absorbing club debt and not passing it on to the club, even if it is done by means of a non-interest bearing loan/s to the parent umbrella company.  The Abramovich loan now exceeds 1bn and is probably closer to 2bn post COVID.