Forget transfers – Arsenal need to FIGHT in every game

PERSPECTIVE: LIFE AFTER THE TRANSFER WINDOW by Uche

The storm is finally over. The transfer window is shut and I could not be more relieved. We did not make the signings we expected and it was painful. But surprisingly, we are getting over it. For me, what I did was to avoid all things football for a couple of days and it turns out that there is actually more to life than football! Who knew?! Oh boy. Staying away really helped me because I have come back calmer, less upset and more introspective.

You see, when you are in the thick of it all and furiously digging for transfer news every five minutes like we all do, we tend to forget a few things. Transfer season really is indeed silly season and it doesn’t say much about anything. Anthony Martial for 38 million pounds? Kevin De Bryune for 53 million pounds? I am mad at Wenger alright for a variety of reasons but for those prices, I wouldn’t have bought any of those players either. I only have to think back to Manchester United loaning Radmel Falcao for 10 million pounds last season and paying him around 340,000 pounds a week for what? For him to score four goals the whole season and finish fourth in the league? What about Angel Di Maria for 65 million pounds? What did they get in return for that?

Wenger is tight, arrogant and annoying but there is more money than talent in football right now. Not his fault. It is also true that the players who can improve our team are few and that those few players are not available for sale. Maybe Wenger didn’t try hard enough and I personally feel that he didn’t try hard enough but here is the thing. Does it really matter? Man United bid a 100 million for Bale and failed. And then they bid the same figure for Thomas Muller and failed again. What does that tell us? If you were the Real Madrid manager, will you sell? Will you sell Karim Benzema for 75 mil when you have no replacement for him? This is not about money anymore. If you throw silly money at these clubs, they might sell you an Anthony Martial but not a Sergio Aguero. Would you sell Robert Lewandowski for any amount if you were Pep? The answer is no. Well, those are the only strikers that will improve our forward line except you are going to argue that having more Danny Welbecks in the team is progress.

Remember Danny Welbeck? He is an Arsenal striker and it turns out that he is not better than the much maligned Olivier Giroud. And talking about Welbeck, when he returns from injury, we will have a total of three strikers. But you will not hear pundits mention this fact. When Welbeck returns, we will actually have more depth up top than City and United. Did you know that? City have Aguero and Bony. United have Rooney and Martial. Bony is injured and Aguero is injury prone. An Aguero injury to a high flying City will leave them without strikers and this can happen at any time.

Do you guys see where I am going with this? Our summer did not go as planned but we are far from finished. Anything can happen. The world is not coming to an end. Far from it. We are in for big surprises this season. You only have to look at Chelsea languishing in 13th place after winning the league last season, Liverpool losing 3-0 at home to West Ham after spending over 50 million pounds on Benteke and Firmino and United losing to Swansea for you to realize that strikers won’t decide who wins the league. They will have a say but they will not decide it. Strikers are easy to nullify. That is why Costa, Rooney, Benteke, Giroud and Walcott are not shining yet. Strikers will not decide the title. A supreme collective effort is what will win the title. The biggest threat to winning the title isn’t Manchester City and the top teams. It is EVERY OTHER TEAM in the EPL because something is happening folks. We have moved into an era where every game against any opponent is a cup final. Three points has never been harder to gain. Any team can take points off any team, no matter the profile of your players.

So this is not the time to give up because we did not buy Benzema or whomever. This is the time to fight and be hard to beat. This is the time to pull ourselves together, play for each other, throw in everything we have got and see what happens. That is all anybody can do, no matter who they are or who they buy because the EPL is not the Bundesliga. Nothing is decided – and a team’s squad depth means squat if they don’t play to their best. I mean, how did Manchester City end up empty handed last season boasting a strike force of Aguero, Dzeko, Bony and Jovetic? The could not even win the Capital One cup!

This is football folks and in this game, one plus one is never two. You can have the best players and still lose to West Ham or Crystal Palace. This is the EPL and in this league every game is a brawl. Don’t ridicule the strikers we have. They may not be the best strikers but they are ours and they can do damage to teams if they play to their best. We beat Chelsea to win the Shield with this same squad.

Benzema did not play that game. We beat Liverpool and Man City to finish 3rd last season with this same squad. Cavani did not play. We beat Manchester United to win the FA cup with this same squad. Enough of this pity party. Our season is not over. Come match day, we will be rooting for the ‘brainless’ Walcott and ‘Lamp Post’ Giroud to score because they are all we have and when they start performing, we will realize that we are capable of winning and that we are equally capable of loving them again.

So this is where we roll up our sleeves. Anybody can beat anybody. This is where we fight. Peace.

Uche

Tags Aguero Man City Man utd welbeck

30 Comments

  1. I have said for years now that Wenger does not have 100% say in transfers, this opinion has come about due to looking at Arsenal for a LONG time.

    To get Wenger, Dein had to make sure he got Vieira. That was part of the deal for Wenger to manage us.
    Wenger came in and he wasn’t shy of buying players, he broker our own trasfer record, he got the players he wanted.
    Dein wanted investment so got Usmanov… things happened and Dein was no longer on the board, it was then fully down to Wenger. Wenger broker our transfer record srtaight away with getting Arshavin, he also paid a decent sun for Nasri because Nasri had just resigned a contract to help his (old) club get more money from the transfer… sounds pretty decent of Nasri to be honest, I wish RvP had done that for us!

    Gazidis came in a couple months after that and it took us many years to break our own transfer record, Gazidis even messed around with the Suarez deal offering that stupid £40mil and £1 bid… When has Wenger EVER done something that stupid?

    Ozil said it was the convo with Wenger that helped convince him that Arsenal was the right club.
    It was Wenger at the WC and could convince Alexis to want Arsenal over Liverpool… even though Liverpool had offered Barca more!

    That is the buying side, think about the selling we have done in the debt years! Was all of those sales done because Wenger said to do so? Nasri has come out and said it was the board that sold him and that he still respects Wenger, Wenger didn’t want to sell Cesc and Nasri at the same time!

    Before people jump on here and complain that Wenger didn’t do enough, think about who you blame and include Gazidis! Include Silent Stan who is Wengers boss, lets not forget that Silent Stan is a greedy businessman who likes to take profit out the club for what-ever reason he will dream up next!

    We could of bought someone, I am fully convinced that if we had Dein then we would of gotten another player, maybe 2. They would of been who Wenger wanted as well, not fall back options which feels like a lot of transfers over the past decade! We was lucky to get Cazorla a year after we failed to get him because we bid a million or 2 below what he eventually went for… I don’t blame Wenger for not increasing the bid by a little, he has shown that he will do that in the past (Nasri resigning a contract and Wenger just upped the price)……….

    Why would Wenger suddenly change how he will work at the same time Gazidis comes to Arsenal?

    1. If thats the case then why doesn’t Wenger just come out and say the club didn’t make a sufficient bid to get a player, and that he wasn’t part of making the deal. Why does he have to take the pressure? This is what I don’t get, if its not because of him why doesn’t he say it? Why doesn’t he apologize to fans about not being able to get certain player due to this or that. Is it part of his £8m a year deal package to protect stingy people upstairs.

      Also we could’ve still got better strikers than Giroud this season I already named some in previous article, and they would’ve been cheap too like Lavezzi and Huntelaar, for first team football for Lavezzi and UCL football for Huntelaar. A good bid for Moussa Sissoko woulv’e got us a good strong CMF unlike the other players we have. Out of everyone in midfield only Coquelin is strong and powerful but he is a complete DMF.

      1. Because Arsenal isn’t like any other club. Our board has recently stated that whoever is manager will take FULL responsibility for the actions of the club’s decisions both on and off the pitch even though he plays no part in most of them. Wenger is payed 8 million because the board know how much his image and reputation is being damaged by their actions. And I believe everything Nasri stated, Wenger isn’t suffering from any mental breakdown, it’ not a coincidence that as soon as Dein left and Gazidis came in everything went to shit. I mean he took a gamble on Arshavin which proves he isn’t afraid to spend if the quality is proven even if they might flop. And I find it hypocritical that fans say they want someone slightly better than Giroud if they can’t get a WC striker smh. Really ? Why buy a Lavezzi when a WC striker might be available the next season ?? We’re not Chelsea where we buy players only to sell them the next season. Every player we buy is bought with the intention that they have a LONG TERM impact on the team.

    2. Uche for president. I keep saying this. Love your articles. It’s Arsenal 4 Eva. Godspeed, gunners!!!

      1. More articles from Uche please admin. at least this guy knows what hes talking about, is constructive and understand the entire picture, unlike most of the articles published which are often opinated or one sided.

  2. Yeah i agree ‘forget transfers Arsenal need to FIGHT in every game’ because seriously thats the only thing we can do at this point of time.

  3. Our title hope has ended for ages.

    Wenger is a fuxking LIAR!!

    Wenger OUT!!

    P.S. Uche: We don’t have good enough guys to fight for us. Thanks to the LIAR!!

  4. AW always said he would only buy if it improved on the squad. Also the players have to be available to buy. On the striker front, despite all the paper talk, it was clear Madrid, PSG etc were not really prepared to sell. The case of Schneiderlin is different as many of us would have liked to see him as a 2nd DM – so we’ll have to wait and see how he performs for ManUre. He has been prone to the odd expensive error in his play.
    We have a good, big squad, but the likes of Theo, Ox, Ozil, Ramsey and Campbell have to step up to plate, and put in 110% in every game. They cannot hide away when we’re playing the top (or even middle) teams. They MUST pay back Le Prof’s confidence in them.
    COYG

    1. Schneirderlin is NOT a DM. How many times do you have to be told ?? He played his whole life as a B2B, do you really think he will all of a sudden turn into a Busquets ?? You can’t teach old horses new tricks. And there’s no way he’ll be chosen ahead of Ramsey and Cazorla.

  5. Despise the timing of these International games, the league finally kicks off after such a long break and they choose now. And then they have another break for friendlies and so on etc. They should lump it all into one month of football at the most convenient time. Maybe use it as a sort of pre-season for players before the join up with clubs or have the games during pre-season. I can’t wait, after the big transfer wait it gets tiresome. Sure, there are other things to do but when I wake up I get my coffee and then straight onto the net for any Arsenal news, without a match coming up it’s not the same though. Then after all that patience if your team loses any rhythm or momentum being built and reverts back to pre-season mode then it’s one big ant-climax.

    Really hoping the sto game goes to plan, then four days later we have our CL adventure to look forward to. Then Che then Tott Hotspur, exciting month ahead. COYG, very big month.

  6. Let’s see how good England plays in absence of Wilshere. Interesting to see Chambo in the team.

    1. Against San Marino? You should see how good England are when they play against a good team even with Wilshere.

  7. I get what ur saying…..we have to make do with what we have and fight till d end…….but wat I don’t get is y u sai “the players we wanted r not available” total bulls++t!!!!! this is not a situation of looking for a top class coach where only a few r available and the those ones wouldn’t be released by the President of the club cuz he’s doing a good job……nope, cuz this is where scouts com into play……go 2 south america specially and look for good strikers…..they don’t need to b world class(do we even have any) but at least have pace, can finish, is versatile with both legs and so on….(I’m not a scout so I can’t knw wat dey look at) man utd discovered Hernandez, Madrid discovered higuain, athletico Costa, Porto falcao, Martinez, etc…..wat r our scouts doin to earn their salaries??????? we could have got pato on a freaking season loan with option to buy if e plays like he did wen e started at milan…..all this options r less than £10m(thanks to d exchange rate) but will d coach take a risk???? NO….look, I don’t have a problem with him not offering 75m for benzema, 60m for cavani or som obscene amount for a so called world class striker cuz thats just outrageous or they will reject it (they don’t need it)……but e should use his bloody scouts and think outside d box….bsides it wasn’t only strikers we lacked…wat of defensive midfielders????? wat rili pisses me off is dat sim1 like kondongbia went for €35m (less than £25m and we refused to bid???? must he b playing for Madrid ir barca b4 we r in d running or r Madrid/barca players specially designed by God…..if so, y dint we bid for Pedro(he’s obviously better Dan wat we have at right wing and can play as a striker a whole lot beta dan Walcott)…..God knws if we bidded for kondongbia we would have got him(a whole lot beta Dan Schneiderlin)…..everybody is shouting about how man city overspent…..look dey got som good deals dere too…otamendi for dat amount??? as far as am concerned is wat it €35m=£23m or so for atop class defender…..all I’m saying is we should stop penny pinching for good players, waiting for d “crumbs” from Madrid and barca and put in sensible bids for very good players playing in other teams…………that stupid (there is no good quality out there” crap should b canned

    1. Chambers, Gabriel, Mert, Koscielny. That’s 4 first team defenders with Debuchy and Monreal able to play there, not to mention we have academy players coming up as wel. We have enough defenders we’re not getting another CB until Mert retires or is sold which will happen next season. And if you used your head you would realize our defensive record has been on par with Chelsea’s for the past 2 seasons even though Mertesacker is apparently “crap”.

  8. This is a well thought out and articulated piece of writing. Bravo to Uche. It is people like him that we need, thinkers not perennial pessimists. What has he said that is not true and what do we learn from it? Is it not interesting that last season’s Champions Chelsea are now struggling? What has changed in so short a time? My answer is nothing only that the rot began before the end of the season and Chelsea didn’t end on a high as some people would want to make us believe. There is something I have been observing for some few seasons now and it is that the Community shield is a very good indicator of a team’s health at the beginning of the season. When the Champion loses community shield it is a warning signal which should not be ignored by the fickle pundits who change like a chameleon! Just before the season began nearly all pundits had predicted that Chelsea winning EPL was a no brainteaser now the same people have already given the trophy to Man City. I wish they could get time to read Uche’s beautiful article and be wiser. Let us pray for Arsenal players to be even more compact, defend as a team, attack as a team and start shooting on target relentlessly and the results will be interesting. The business of buying this or that player is not what will win the League but team spirit and relentless efforts as well as the determination never to relent.

  9. Refreshing article..props mate!!All we can do is get behind this squad and hope for the best when they play bad & do wrong let them know like any other fan of any other club would but let’s cheer them up & give credit where credit is due…the squad is strong in some areas REALLY strong in others less.
    There’s still a lot of football to be played and some objectives are feasible!!

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