Class signing.
He’s like a cultured Xhaka. Great to have someone who can play those chipped back spinning through balls.
Love the way he elegantly spins his way out of trouble too.
lush signing
Class signing.
He’s like a cultured Xhaka. Great to have someone who can play those chipped back spinning through balls.
Love the way he elegantly spins his way out of trouble too.
lush signing
So excited. Read ths article that overlays his numbers with Odegaard and Rice. What you see is that he is much more physical than the other two, and they are no slouches. He is an absolute duel monster. He wins tackles and headers in midfield, and gives us one more big body to put in the box on dead balls. You can see that he gets into the opposition box a lot as well. This is such an upgrade to the squad. We will be impenetrable. And can bring on Jorginho or Partey at the end of games to manage things
https://www.squawka.com/en/news/mikel-merino-arsenal-transfer-midfield/
Exciting signing indeed. Makes the game look easy
He's going to give what Arteta thought Havertz would offer from midfield.
Mirth and allow us to play like 22/23 with Xhaka on the left of midfield
Yoink.
This guy's going to be very entertaining in an Arsenal shirt.
Our two signings this summer are going to give our left flank a real Hollywood factor, it's gonna be fun to watch compared to the slightly anaemic combinations of traits we've had over there. If you take this summer's project as "fix the left" then they'll arguably do more than a top winger.
Here's a very, very thorough, by the numbers report on Merino:
https://billycarpenter.substack.com/p/scouting-mikel-merino
Don't think he'll be similar to Rice on the pitch, unless Arteta fully trains his Sociedad style out of him.
As for Xhaka, Merino's been signed to play Xhaka's version of the 8 with mobile running, but Merino is more of a loose unit in his football, and less of one in his personality. Merino quite often takes on passes that aren't on, but at Sociedad he's obsessed with moving the ball forward directly.
And he's a solid couple of levels above Xhaka in the air and in the tackle. He'll jack up our already shamefully swollen height and strength at set pieces. The tunnel shot of our team is going to vibe like Villeneuve's Sardaukar performing their weird blood ritual. We're almost unbullyable at this stage.
I suspect Rice—Merino—Ødegaard may be funky and clunky till we figure it out or do something different, but when we do see it it'll be an all action trio with bags of leadership and aggression.
Wonder how long it'll be before we see him in first team action? Finished late with Spain obviously and hasn't had much of a pre-season, so I reckon it could take a while before we see him starting games.
I do like the idea of him at 8 with Rice at 6. Let's see how it works out in reality. Exciting times. We've (almost) completely revamped the left side in one summer.
really happy with this signing. this guy looks like a synergiser/amplifier with a dash of cut and thrust. can see him making our LB and LW look like a million bucks
I completely didn't realise / think to remember that Odegaard played with Merino at Sociedad. That's an extra little benefit to getting the side to gel.
I have hesitancy about Rice as a lone 6 because he’s at his best on the front foot, and his best season was in a midfield pair.
Perhaps I’m thinking about this naively though as in our system the inverted fullbacks offer Rice a midfield companion (if not a partner). Further, when we’re really under pressure it seems like Merino will be plenty comfortable coming deep alongside Rice.
So do we see Califoria or Timber enabling Rice to actually press higher than we’d typically expect of a 6? No way Zinchenko can offer what I’m envisioning…
MistaT So do we see Califoria or Timber enabling Rice to actually press higher than we’d typically expect of a 6?
Yeah I'm curious about this. Reckon we'll see Øde continuing to track back quite a bit to help in the build-up. We might deputise an extra CB more for backstop duty.
Merino is also a little bit Busquety
TambourineMan Could be a week or two ... shouldn't be any longer based on the Euros, though, our England players are already back in action. I'm sure he'll get at least a week's training with the XI, however ... anything else would be daft, we don't need him to plug a hole in the Titanic or anything.
Might ride the pine this weekend to get a taste of it if everything comes together astoundingly quickly, or get a little run-out at home to Brighton.
Happy Merino Day!
Something to get the juices flowing. Have a watch whilst you sup on your morning latte
I'm glad we signed him but I'm not that excited. I think he's more of a depth signing to help us maintain the way we finished last campaign across an entire season, which is great, but I'm not sure it'll too noticeable in individual games.
️ Gabi Martinelli likes this
Pepe LeFrits I remember when Tifo/The Athletic made that video about how Havertz would fit in at CM and it totally tricked me into thinking it would work.
QuincyAbeyie Tifo and the Athletic spend a lot of time sucking Arteta off. If Arteta bring his wife into the team, they would make a video about how great she is gonna be.
Excited about this signing, he will fit in very well. Hope he breaks into the first 11 really fast