Arsene Wenger has resisted all calls to buy a new striker or DM in this transfer window just gone, just as he did in the previous two summers, but one thing that Arsenal fans forget is that IF Wenger had bought a DM last summer then we would not have recalled Francis Coquelin from his loan at Charlton, and we all know how that panned out….
Maybe Wenger is thinking that if we have another injury crisis this year, then he could do the same again. At the moment we have all these players out on loan: Carl Jenkinson – West Ham, Wojciech Szczesny – Roma, Yaya Sanogo – Ajax, Serge Gnabry – West Brom, Chuba Akpom – Hull City, Emiliano Martinez – Wolves, Isaac Hayden – Hull City, Jon-Miquel Toral – Birmingham, Wellington – Bolton, Geidon Zelalem – Rangers, Ainsley Maitland-Niles – Ipswich and Dan Crowley – Barnsley.
Rather than be sitting on the bench or playing with the reserves these players are getting valuable experience and playing time with other clubs, and we are already getting good reports on Gnabry, Toral, Wellington, Zelalem, Maitland-Niles, Hayden and of course Akpom, who has already scored twice for Hull.
Going back to Coquelin, who knows all about the benefits and downfalls of going on loan, having spent one season at Lorient in France and a not-so-successful season at Frieberg in Germany before last seasons trip down the road to Charlton. He is convinced that spending time away from Arsenal is good for you! “If you keep working hard, at some point it will pay off,” he said on Arsenal.com.
“Sometimes it’s mentally hard and you don’t get the chances. You have to stay mentally strong and it’s important to have good people around you.
“You have to make good decisions as well and when you get a chance you need to grab it. The most important thing is not to give up.”
“It’s good experience,” he said. “You get to know what it’s all about in the different leagues. There’s a lot of comfort here. Arsenal is a great club with loads of facilities, but when you go to other clubs you realise that not everywhere is Arsenal.
“You need to prove yourself every week, especially when you go on loan with the Arsenal label. You need to give even more. It’s good experience for them. I’ve been watching the results recently of Hull City, and I’ve seen that Chuba’s scored a few goals and Isaac’s playing as well.
“It’s going to be a good experience and if they can stay injury-free, keep performing, then it will be good for them.”
It was certainly good for Francis in the end at the ripe old age of 23, as he is now an integral part of the Arsenal team, but which of our twelve players currently out on loan do you think is most likely to come back as a first team player?
Off topic
I liked these comments made to ” Mr. Hold up play”
1. ““Giroud’s Tongue” gotta be the most popular thing ever seen in all Arsenal matches (SoOpa AeoN, 2015)
2. Putting his tongue out after one of his many misses is the only skill he has ever shown in an Arsenal shirt (Dee@ease, 2015)
Clearly the signs of a hopeless baby waiting for Ozil or Carzola to spoon feed him..
Can Giroud go out on loan, lol
And before budd and the other experts start I’m joking
I am aware due to Wengers inabilty we have no other CF , not joking this time
hahaha..
So now Koscielny might be a doubt for Stoke because he aggravated his back injury according to reports.
Yes the problem is where they go on loan, they get send out to la liga and other foriegn leagues how does that help them settle i England or acclimatize to the atmoshphere or enviroment which we innevatibly assume theyll be playing in .. I say we concentrate on sending them down a division or 2 so they can get used to the propect of playing against sides they’ll actually face on a regular basis… especially if they play in the FA cup and Carling Cup we begin to understand how they’ll stack up against Premier league opponents….. If they haven’t got the capabilities of performing at all in the Championship or league 1.. the player is probably a dead duck who needs to be cut loose
Great comment! The biggest difference no matter how talented you are is going from playing against boys to men. You raise the great point in regards to acclimatisation to England in general which often gets overlooked IMO.
Loan moves can be deceiving though.. It may be a one off example, but Coquelin was struggling to get a game for a much, much, much lesser side then slotted into ours effortlessly.
If Wenger had bought a DM last summer then we would not have seen the Francis Coquelin of today.
IF Wenger had bought a DM last summer then we might have won the league.
Or maybe if he hadn’t loaned Coquelin out in the first place??
Or maybe Chelsea wouldn’t have won the league if Hazard tore his ACL in the first game of the season…
Or maybe Chelsea wouldn’t have won the league if Fabregas, Costa and Matic tore their ACL in the 2nd game of the season.
nahhh.. they probably still would have
but if we played podolski at striker he probably would’ve scored a gazillion goals and we would’ve won.
hahaha what a los*r!.
Wenger shud go on a season long loan too! I wud personal prefer he go to Nagoya Grampus or is it Campus?
Arsenal should sell Wenger to increase the bank balance.
I don’t know. I would not mind having Akpom in the squad right now. He would be useful in League cup matches at least.
Also, if I knew Wenger wasn’t going to get another striker this summer, I would have been against getting rid of Podolski. He isn’t a bad player. He has scored 1 goal in 3 appearances so far For Galatasaray. He is still a good finisher and was even called up by Germany this weekend.
I hope Walcott and Giroud find their form though and Welbeck returns asap
I’ve actually been really impressed with all the loan moves so far!
Hayden, Akpom, Zelalem, Maitland-Niles and Crowley are the loanees I personally have the highest hopes for based on the limited times I’ve seen them. Reading what their respective temporary fan bases and managers have been saying about them it really seems they’re already valued members of their teams.
Gnabry could be interesting. Hope he can nail down a regular place. Same with Silva.
Hayden could be our next CDM, I hope he plays really well. Next year both Arteta and Flamini will go so it is spot for the taking.
Jenkinson could be the replacement for Debuchy.
Gnabry could come in if we sell Joel Campbell.
If Akpom scores lots of goals he stands a good chance of getting first team action.
As for the other loanies Crawley is the most talented however there is a lot of competition for midflield places.
I wish Arsenal had more promising players in defense, left back as that is where replacements are needed in future.
I think Toral, Silva, Szcesny, Martinez will struggle.
To be honest, as long as Afobe has a buy-back clause then I am fine with how this transfer window went as far as strikers are concerned. We’ve got Giroud who is capable, we’ve got Walcott and Sanchez who can both score 15+ goals and we can always recall Akpom if need be. It’s the DM position that worries me now, Coquelin will need a replacement at some point this season. I just hope it’s due to suspension or fatigue, and not due to an injury.