Summer 24: Page 38 - The Arsenal discussion community: One More in the Tolly

Summer 24

Pepe LeFrits

If Rice gets injured, or Jorginho and Partey both get injured, who plays left 8 for us? Merino sounds like a sensible buy to me. What is the current pecking order at left 8? Rice, Havertz, Vieira? Zinchenko?

I'd love Zubimendi for 6 but I think the worry around that role is a bit exaggerated. We have 3 players who can play it plus maybe Lewis Skelly may come into the equation this year. There may be a couple of games a year where none of them are who you'd ideally want at 6, but they should leave us covered to knock down the vast majority of our opponents across a season.

Gazza M

Claudius I've never been on board with this. odegaard is most devastating when he's being fed between the lines, playing closer to the front 3, and free to make runs into the area. any system that results in him dropping deeper to assist with build up is a waste of time and should be binned as not fit for purpose. i saw enough of this when rice and havertz played in midfield and it was just dysfunctional

Burnwinter

Gazza M @Claudius That's it. We need Ødegaard playing the forwards in or scoring, not the first ball. He's too good at working the right pass behind the defence to divert him to other tasks. He'll track back all day regardless but how deep and with what responsibilities? If he's often playing a pass he should be receiving, or he's deemed a necessity to evade the press, that hurts us.

I don't expect we'll be carrying the ball to break the lines often. Players who come to us with that reputation don't attempt it much at Premier League level. Rice is among those, I expect Calafiori will be next. We train the option out of them because it's inefficient nine times in ten.

HomeSteak

So they are linking Sane to us by saying that he won't leave. Looool. They have no fucking clue what is going on.

Qwiss

Burnwinter Seems highly likely we bring in some medium to big fish later in the window, no matter what Arteta says.

That is my hope too. That they are just waiting to see what they can bring in first before they decide how much to splurge.

Pepe LeFrits

Agreed. We've a strong squad and it's clear we are sailing close to the wind with PSR, so finding players who will improve us that we can afford is going to be challenging. If I had to wager, I'd say we'll sign a fairly expensive wide player and more of a budget CM late in the window once Nketiah and Nelson have departed.

Cannon

I just know we are going to try for ISAK at the end of the window. If Eddie leaves there is definite room for a striker.

lorddulaarsenal

Mik Merino is top notch by the way. Great physique, big range and uses the ball well. Reminds me of Edu in many ways

lorddulaarsenal

HomeSteak

Low quality links, but there is just nothing out there for us lol. The league starts in 2 weeks and we are not ready.

Claudius

HomeSteak how are we not ready?

HomeSteak

Claudius Well any new signings that come in now will not be ready for the first few games? Add the guys from the Euro that will miss the first 1-2 games(like at this moment in time we have 0 keepers in the squad)? We are in a worse position then last year. Also, I think we all agreed we had 3-4 weakness in the squad that needed to be addressed, left back(maybe? some would have said we are ok), left wing, CM, striker and Saka sub. And we resolved 1.

Mirth

HomeSteak In terms of transfers, if you look at Man City and Liverpool, they're in exactly the same position as us. Euros and World Cups push the transfer activity out till the end of the window and that's normal.

It's only Chelsea and Man United that have been particularly active in the market but they're not a model to follow

As for Euros - they can't really be helped but most should be back by this weekend except for the English/Spanish players.

flobaba

We would likely not plan to resolve all our issues via the transfer window. Tactical reshuffles and internal promotions will also a part of our strategy. Nothing wrong with our left wing if Merino (or whoever our midfield signing will be) can bring the balance and help form a strong left side "pod". A striker of the sort of quality needed to elevate us significantly is a nice to have, not a must have based on the number of goals we scored last season. Sometimes it's more profitable to lean into your strengths than to put in much more effort (funds which we may not have) to improve your weaknesses. We were two points off the champions last year, and had the best defensive record in the league. Our main signing (Calafiori) and the player we are linked to (MM) look like they will tighten up the ship defensively even further and give us the ability to control games better. Martinelli is fit, Gabby J is fit.

I think we are ready, or very close.

GooneriC

Still need a striker. Can't see Jesus giving us the goals we need

flobaba

City scored 96 goals in the league last season with Haaland the best striker in the league/world. We scored 91 goals, with Jesus mostly injured and Martinelli out of form/injured as well.

If I owned Arsenal it would be hard to convince me to splurge on an attacking signing right now. I'd rather get more out of what we already have. The capacity is already there.

lorddulaarsenal

flobaba arguement is we struggled to lay a glove on opponents in bigger matches - City, Bayern…

JazzG

flobaba If I owned Arsenal it would be hard to convince me to splurge on an attacking signing right now. I'd rather get more out of what we already have. The capacity is already there.

We had a little purple patch after Dubai though where we were banging in 5+ goals a game and I think that made our goal scored column look a lot beefier than our attacking play probably deserved. Signing a good midfielder and having Havertz/Jesus on top form up top will help.

Last season Trossard stepped up but Martinelli had a poor season. We need another wide player, ideally someone who can cover both wings as Saka had to play too many games imo. Ideally someone really quick because that is one thing our team is missing, a super quick wide player.

daredevil

JazzG

We aren't going to sign a starting winger who can cover both flanks, when we already have 4 first team players who can play both flanks. At least, not without selling someone which we won't do, and rightly so. At best, we will sign a young prospect who hopefully is an upgrade on Nelson, and is more suited to the role than Vieira.

HomeSteak

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