William Saliba: Page 92 - The Arsenal discussion forum and community: One More in the Tolly

William Saliba

Claudius

Phil both important. They play different roles and give the team balance.

I am Arsenal Till I Die

I'm inclined to say Gabriel because 1) He plays next to Zinchenko and his matchday workload is something no one else in the PL would be able to handle; 2) For Saliba we have a competent back-up in White, with Tomi playing at RB or even Tomi himself playing at CB. Just sucks that they both are injured at the same time. We don't have a left footed CB to cover for Gabriel as Kiwior isn't reliable; and 3) He adds more on set pieces both defensively and offensively.

Burnwinter

I am Arsenal Till I Die Good summary. Put briefly, it's Gabriel but it's more about squad context than quality. I'd add durability to the list of Gabriel's excellent qualities (touch wood).

I am Arsenal Till I Die

Having said that, we need to get Saliba up and running for City and Newcastle away. His availability could be the key to winning the league.

HomeSteak

That fucking sporting game, I just hate the EL so much man. I hope we won't play there ever again

Clrnc

HomeSteak I hate it too but we really should have won at least one of it. Absolutely zero European pedigree this club.

Bring Back Kerrea Gilbert

Clrnc we're an embarrassment in Europe and that's got to change from next season. Expecting major teething pains though.

Claudius

We will be fine. The Europa is a very difficult tournament especially given our trajectory. At some point we weren’t good enough to win it. And now we were definitely the best club in it, but we did not have the depth to compete for both Premier League and Europa.

Daz

Claudius though I'm not too bothered about dropping out of Europa this season, I'm not sure I fully agree we lacked sufficient depth to continue while maintaining the title challenge as a priority. As is being discussed in another thread, Arteta could have managed squad rotation more effectively and doing so may well have aided us on both fronts.

Burnwinter

My guess is we'll get out of the group but little further and it'll set us back a few points in the league. I'd be fine with that.

Next season will be a bit odd, we'll probably perform like a post-2008 Wenger side, but one that's still getting a bit better, and we'll all be grateful for it.

Claudius

Daz the squad rotation story is the biggest misinformation on this forum. People love bringing it up. There is no way this team is top of the table if we keep spotting in Jolding, Nketiah, Bieira at the same time. The team has had some injuries that force you into making 1 or 2 changes anyway, which just about retains the individual quality, relationships and automatisms. You start constantly taking people in and out, and the quick flowing, press-breaking football falls apart.

You need to do things in stages. You build the base. And then you keep layering new, high quality players in. Otherwise you end up losing individual battles all over the pitch each week, and that weakens the entire team.

Go look at how many minutes fringe players like Nketiah and Vieira have played, and then go back and read the discussions here each time these guys were on. They depleted quality.

Our best bet for rotating us to go add players like Rice and Caicedo this summer. Not to rely on Elneny.

Burnwinter

Claudius Our best bet for rotating us to go add players like Rice and Caicedo this summer.

Agreed, I'm hoping for two or more signings at or above the level of current players. We can definitely improve on Xhaka. I want to see Partey moved on. I'd also like a highly mobile fullback who's brilliant on the ball. Don't care what side so much, we'll need to move Tierney on and reinforce both.

Daz

Claudius I disagree that bringing up squad rotation is "misinformation " but it also depends on what you mean by rotation and the extent of it on a game by game basis. Swapping out 3 or more players each game is certainly problematic, particularly if the rotated players lack sufficient quality. But I believe it would be entirely possible for Arteta to have given several of the better squad players more regular minutes through the season without significantly compromising performance and results. And accordingly I think the argument that we lacked the necessary depth to manage a deeper run in Europa is pretty spurious.

Qwiss

Claudius There is no way this team is top of the table if we keep spotting in Jolding, Nketiah, Bieira at the same time.

You been playing Pro-Evo again?

Claudius

Daz
Again I point folks to Liverpool’s title season. That team was still quite new as a collective. And they all played 35+ games basically. To have a new team in flow, you need high quality players at the core playing frequently together. If you guys want I’ll try to look for Nketiah data - but that guy effectively broke the team when we had him up front. And that then also resulted in criticism of Martinelli for most of the time Jesus was out until Trossard slotted in. But our deep progressions, ribs i to the box etc - all the precursors to a shot flatlined with Nketiah at the top, and took the whole attack down.

The Nketiah example is an easy one to pick because it is very easy to connect final 3rd ball movement to chance creation and goals. But an eye test will show you that we have been weaker with a lot of our swap-ins, whether it’s Tomi, Tierney, Holding, Jorginho, Vieira etc., in most situations.

I’m fine with these guys playing one at a time or once the game is in the bag, but I’m pretty confident that is playing our core constantly is a large contributor to our league position.

HomeSteak

Out for West Ham as well

Bring Back Kerrea Gilbert

Qwiss I thought it's "Nikita" anyway.

tazmania

Please be back before City. Please

tazmania

To be clear, holding isn't our biggest problem but Saliba makes a significant impact with his play from the back

Clrnc

tazmania yep. Like I said he was the biggest denominator to our success this season. Without him everything falls apart

Sicario2

tazmania

Disagree. Holding is our biggest problem. He’s a fucking liability. He makes our whole team from front to end nervous and also changes how we play as we are effectively protecting him. He knows he’s shit too based on his nerves today.

The biggest question mark on Arteta is why the fuck did he spend £20m on a CB in Jan when he doesn’t use him and still plays Holding as back up?

Meatwad

Clrnc
it's not a coincidence that he comes in to start this season and we're title challengers.

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