Youth team development: Page 57 - The Arsenal discussion forum and community: One More in the Tolly

Youth team development

Big Willie

Claudius wrote:
Not sure.
What made them even better was the clever off the ball running of Flores, the Mexican-Canadian Bellerin lookalike at leftback. He was constantly getting inside them to revive the ball and run into the box. The Liverpool players had no clue.

It’s a pit we lost. The style of play is good. You can understand why Saka and ESR play so well kid each other watching this. The kids play like Ajax men, with positional fluidity and skill on the ball. It’s not our senior team.

Funny you mention Flores. Seen him a couple times towards the beginning of the season and whilst some of the others like Azeez and Balogun were getting the plaudits, it was Flores that really caught my eye with his technique.

He was playing I think in midfield those times, or at least was pushed so far forward and tucking in he looked like another CM/AM. He might be one to surprise is at some point in the next season or two.

lorddulaarsenal

Avoided relegation. Stopping the rot!

Claudius

Another stellar afternoon for Amani Richards.
Next big thing. We have so many promising kids coming through

mentalvortex

Claudius wrote:
Another stellar afternoon for Amani Richards.
Next big thing. We have so many promising kids coming through

Is he the kid we poached from Chelsea's academy ?

lorddulaarsenal

Kido is a proper talent too

BWooley

Thought he was leaving this summer, having not signed a contract with the club. Any chance we manage to keep him?

lorddulaarsenal

No point keeping him really - we don’t play left winger/forwards in their correct position anyway

Claudius

mentalvortex wrote:
Claudius wrote:
Another stellar afternoon for Amani Richards.
Next big thing. We have so many promising kids coming through

Is he the kid we poached from Chelsea's academy ?

Yup. We brought him in a year ago.

Klaus

@lorddulaarsenal wrote:

Kido is a proper talent too

He even looks like Robert Pires nowadays.

lorddulaarsenal

And AJ Tracey

Meatwad

our only hope at senior level is a serious bumper crop of world class players from the academy, barca style.

Claudius

With no Europe, I really think there is an argument for trading away every veteran except Auba. They’re expensive to keep and add very little value. Replace with external additions for CM, RB and backup LB. but we can fill out the rest with academy grads.

I cannot justify keeping any of Cedric, Bellerin, Luiz, Torreira, Xhaka, Elneny, Ceballos, Lacazette, Willian.

That’s about £800k/week (£40m/year), excluding Torreira in wages that can be replaced with 3-4 new players and academy grads.

(And BTW that’s what I mean by we’ve been keeping a bloated squad that’s not worth the marginal value of Europa relative to its marginal cost. None of those players add the quality required to be consistently good across games. They just add depth. That’s part of why we are inconsistent over and above Arteta)

invisibleman18

The more likely scenario is the ones that do have value like Saka, Martinelli, Smith-Rowe, Tierney will be looking to move to serious clubs once they start to sniff around.

Klaus

Most of them are here because of him though.

Good luck trying to sell Willian, Cedric or Torreira this summer at any rate. They have no value whatsoever. Bellerin is the only one worth anything and after that we'll be lucky to get 10 million for Lacazette. I think we can maybe get something for Pepe still, who I don't really want to sell, but I'm sure Arteta's comments after the Villarreal game were aimed mostly toward him. He's going to be thrown under the bus now.

Claudius

We have to control the narrative. Sell those players. Trust in the youth and new players. Build back better.

lorddulaarsenal

Yeah the fan base won’t tolerate signing any more pensioners

Claudius

We have to change the retirement home narrative. Lacazette needs to make way for Balogun now. Just have faith. And Willian for Nelson. And bring in top top players to hold it together

flobaba

Which non pensioner top players would be eager to come here just to “hold it together” (whatever that means)?

Claudius

We will easily attract guys like Guimaraes, Tchouameni, and Bissouma. Buendia too. These are excellent players whose wages we can double or triple without fucking up our pay structure. All young, incredibly talented and hardworking. Good in both directions. That’s the approach we have to take

Klaus

Claudius wrote:
With no Europe, I really think there is an argument for trading away every veteran except Auba. They’re expensive to keep and add very little value. Replace with external additions for CM, RB and backup LB. but we can fill out the rest with academy grads.

I cannot justify keeping any of Cedric, Bellerin, Luiz, Torreira, Xhaka, Elneny, Ceballos, Lacazette, Willian.

Half of them are here because of Arteta though.

Good luck trying to sell Willian, Cedric or Torreira this summer at any rate. They have no value whatsoever and no incentive to go anywhere else because no one will pay them what they earn here. We tried to ship Torreira for half of what we paid last summer and there were no takers. We had to loan him out and still pay some of his wages in the end. He's worth even less now after spending a season on the bench in Spain, and on top of it he only wants to go home. We might as well dissolve his contract and save us the wage outlays, the bloke is a spoiled brat and a sunk cost.

Bellerin is the only one worth anything and after that we'll be lucky to get 10-12 million for Lacazette. I think we can maybe get something for Pepe still, who I don't really want to sell, but I'm sure Arteta's comments after the Villarreal game were aimed mostly toward him. He's going to be thrown under the bus now.

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