Gunners Players and Options by Brighton manyex
Greeting Gunners,
We have a new manager Unai Emery and a brand new wave of optimism, he is a winner too…because of that I thought I can use this opportunity to voice my concerns hoping they can improve our squad and make us contenders for every trophy before us!
GOALKEEPERS…we in order in this position and i welcome the competition and Unai’s silence in pronouncing his no.1…but I suppose its Bernd Leno, Petr Cech and Martinez….best 3! I don’t think we still need Ospina anymore! With Marey on loan we are OK!
RIGHT-BACK…waaw we got the best in the world and spoiled for choice. We just need to make some cash out of Carl Jenkinson!
LEFT-BACK…I am still concerned! Niles is not a leftback its a problem we had during Wenger’s time and I thought we were going to resolve this problem…both Nacho and Sead are too injury prone…we got the best in Nacho and strength in Sead but I feel we should look for a young player for the future (Van Aanholt) I suggest. Sead need more work, his marking, skill and passing is not good enough.
CENTRE BACKS….I am satisfied! And glad to see Mustafi improved and calm. The addition of Sokratis brought stability, Mavropanos looks promising, Chambers is great but going out on loan. Holding is a fine defender who just needs confidence! I don’t know about Koscielny if he will ever come back this season! Osei-Tutu needs to be loaned for experience, he can be a future asset.
DEFENSIVE MIDFIELDERS….Our problematic area! Thank Emery for the improvements and we all know he is not finished yet! At his former job he had Verratti and Rabiot and certainly he now has Torreira (a fantastic player). He needs Steven N’Zonzi and we as Arsenal have always wanted and still want this guy! And we also acquired a brilliant player in Matteo Guendouzi waaw! But we need to lose one between Mo Elneny and Granit Xhaka, of which I prefer we keep Xhaka and release Elneny to accommodate N’zonzi!
ATTACKING MIDFIELDERS…I feel this is a position we have over-concentrated players of lately with OZIL, RAMSEY, IWOBI, MKHITHARYAN, WILLOCK, MAITLAND-NILES, SMITH-ROWE and the 2 released players (Wilshere and Cazorla) and I feel we are OK even if Aaron Ramsey leaves …we can manage pretty well!
ATTACK/STRIKERS….We have one of the deadliest attacks in the league. The way I see it if we can have one or two more additions ….Aubameyang and Lacazette partnership should be capitalised well! But we need another attacking Winger (Ousmane Dembele) no matter the price! We also need another tall, strong and fast player like M’Baye Niang as backup to our attack, with young and dangerous Eddie Nketiah doing soo well…its goals galore and we can be unstoppable! I feel Danny Welbeck, Lucas Perez and Joe Campbell are surplus!
♥Hope my contributions can help for the betterment of our beloved Arsenal!
Thanx
Gooner for life!
Brighton
I dont rate any of Arsenal’s left backs and tbh Niles offers much more in attack than both Monreal and Kolasinac due to his crossing and dribbling ability.However,Kolasinac has time so I believe he can improve.
As for the CB’s anyone who will be shocked to see that position be our weakness this season bas either not really been watching us or doesn’t know much about our players.We need one more quality CB tbh.Sokratis is a good signing but I believed we rushed too much because we could’ve done better tbh.In hindsight,to me in defense our season is going to really hinge on Mustafi and Mavropanos or the incoming new CB.
The defense is a real concern all over and to me it’s a gamble along with our keepers.Cech still has a mistake in him.Our defense is a big big gamble this season and knowing Arsenal very well it won’t pay off.I believe our team van even challenge for the EPL only if the defense is sorted.
Sorry i disagree about the defence, the defence isn’t good enough and its why we should lower our expectations and give emery this season to find out for himself as a couple of games in preason can’t give him the full picture as to how good a player is. I am still not convinced of mustafi, chambers, bellerin, kolasinac and holding defensively. Also i would rather keep welbeck than spending money on niang, he is so bad that i rate welbeck higher than him. Also the lack of wingers is a problem when we face defensively solid teams and we can’t pass our way through, we need wingers in those situations so we can be more direct. I am happy we finally bought a dm, a gk and rb to compete with bellerin but i just wish the board supported emery more to rebuild the squad after the last season failures
Sorry i disagree about the defence, the defence isn’t good enough and its why we should lower our expectations and give emery this season to find out for himself as a couple of games in preason can’t give him the full picture as to how good a player is. I am still not convinced of mustafi, chambers, bellerin, kolasinac and holding defensively. Also i would rather keep welbeck than spending money on niang, he is so bad that i rate welbeck higher than him. Also the lack of wingers is a problem when we face defensively solid teams and we can’t pass our way through, we need wingers in those situations so we can be more direct. I am happy we finally bought a dm, a gk and rb to compete with bellerin but i just wish the board supported emery more to rebuild the squad after the last season failures.
Agree with you on the defense part.The only defenders I trust in our team 1v1 are Lichtsteiner and Koscielny who’s injured.
Disagree with you on Niang though.I wouldn’t want him but he poses a far far far bigger goal threat than Welbeck.Also Niang has most of Welbeck qualities and to me he’s the better player.
I would be keen to know who the “waaw” RIGHT BACK is whom you consider world class. I hate to suspect that you could possibly mean Bellerin and SURELY you indeed don’t? Lichtsteiner is now 34 and looks a good buy but world class? Not for me, though we have seen very little so far. The way you phrased it”waaw” was clearly meant to assume that we all agree with you on the mystery person, so please do enlighten us . Though I hope for your sake, you do not possibly mean Bellerin, as I rather suspect you may. I shiver to recall that some naive young folk dubbed him”world class” when he had player less than one full season at the time.
I take some issue with your other comments about positional areas too. You think we have worries at DM, whereas I feel that once Torreira is fully installed and with the clearly gifted Guendouzi as a deep playmaker we are well off in that area, albeit, thanks to Wenger, a full decade too late. In common with many other Gooners who have posted, i still have huge reservations about most of our CB ‘s and am very surprised that the one who is clearly improving fastest , Chambers, is being loaned out, it seems. I have no faith in either Mustafi or Holding, with distinct doubts over Sokratis and his lack of speed, which is vital all over the pitch in top Prem teams. Nor do we have a winger at all, which is a problem. However , as a realist I accept that Emery has been left a poor hand by Wenger, who should have been sacked many years ago but disgracefully was not. I have great faith that given fair time , which means at least three windows after this one, Emery and his regime will make huge and wonderful changes for the better. In the meantime , we can hope for but not EXPECT miracles. For me, being realistic about where we are right now and where we wiill be in the forseeable near future is an important component of being true supporters. Immature hyped optimism is the enemy of our club. Support , of course but be realistic and sensible about how long it will take. Especially with the loathsome Kroenke holding us back in comparison with our main rivals.
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Overall we will do better than last season. Let us all get behind our players including Ramsey in case he stays.
Ozil’s main competitor would be Iwobi, which I think is not enough to dethrone Ozil or force him to maximize his abilities
Arsenal do not have a quick and towering CB yet
They also do not have a player that can break the opponent’s defense consistently with through balls and runs/ dribbles. But I expect a new expensive player coming after they kick Chambers, Welbeck, Perez and Campbell out
– van Aanholt is not young (he turns 28)
– AMN is not a CAM, hes has played mainly CM, RM, RB and LB
– Osei Tutu is not a CB but a RB
– Niang is garbage
– we are not set on CBs. Sokratis is average (has always been), Mustafi inconsistent. I pray Holding and Mavro steps up
” Sokratis is average (has always been)”
That’s not true.
GK – Fine, Ospina will leave. (Cech/Leto/Mace)
LB – Fine, we have Monreal/Kola and Maitland as 3rd place depth. We will have high hopes for Joel Lopez (16) as the future youngster/back up in 2 to 3 years. So unless we sell Kola it seems unlikely (unless we are concerned over injury issues with Monr/Kola.) Next year we’ll have an idea on 17 yr old Lopez and Kolas future so even if Monreal goes we can make a decision then. (Monr/Kola)
CB – Juries out. We could sign someone. We could sell Mustafi but even if we sign someone its not certain as 5 would be a nice number with the option to play 3 occasionally. Chambers is out on loan as we’re not entertaining 3 at the back as a regular formation this year though. (Must/Sokr/Mavr/Hold)
RB – Fine, reassess next year not much to say (Bell/Lich)
DM/CM – Fine well stocked now reassess next year (Torreira/Guendouzi/Elneny/Xhaka/Ramsey/Maitland.) With a 3 man midfield 6 is a nice number.
LW/RW/ST/CAM – Looks ok but a top talent wide player would be great. We will play with 3 on occasions so we well stocked here (Auba/Laca/Ozil/Mhki/Iwob/Nels/Nket)
Making an assumption that Ospina/Perez/Welbeck/Campbell/Jenkison will go. That Ramsey will stay (doubt we’d be shipping Welbeck and loaning Chambers if he wasn’t.) Also assuming Nketiah takes the final HG slot we need if Welbeck goes.
The () are the squad Mav won’t be declared because of his age so we have 2 free slots for any non-HG players if we like with no need to sell. Dembele would obviously be a dream. Vida or another CB wouldn’t be unwelcome either. Given the LB injuries there are rumours swirling and I certainly wouldn’t mind a Rodriguez but it’s highly unlikely and we’d have to move on one of Monreal/Kola/Mustafi assuming the other two positions are the priority and the wing should certainly be.
Obviously any under 21 player can still play that doesn’t go out on loan.
Martinez will be in the squad not Macey who is on loan now.
Attacking wise we are short of a winger there’s no question about it, we don’t have a natural out & out wide man!
Midfield we have youngsters in Niles & Guendouzi, infront of them Torreira, Xhaka, Elneny & Ramsey,though if the latter is sold then we need another midfielder. Rowe is good but again youth isn’t what we need, the youth need to learn from the experience players. If Ramsey goes then I’m.not sure who to bring in tbh
Defence I am very worried about. Unless Mustafi becomes good & Sokratis somehow gets up to speed quickly then we are again relying on youth with no Top Drawer CB to guide everyone! LB & RB are big problem as both LBs are injured & Bellerin looks like his hair is more important than football itself.
Keepers are dead on. Other than that we have a new regime & manager so never know what he gets out if all these players.
This is just my opinion but if we already had Mustafi and Chambers for RCB why did we push to get Socratis knowing he plays RCB as well? Why didn’t we get a LCB instead or even a left footed ball playing CB and hold off on Socratis until we sold Mustafi at least? Kimpembe comes to mind. Now Chambers is being sent on loan again right after just signing back to back deals. I fear we will get done by set pieces with Mustafi and Socratis together. Neither are commanding CB’s with good height. With Kolasinac now out for 2 months we actually now need 3 players, a LB as Monreal with know doubt return to Spain by next summer and Maitland-Niles is a short term solution, A commanding LCB and a wide player where we are really lacking for options.
Spot on John Fox
no settled defense going into the season is going to be a huge issue. This should’ve been one of the first things addressed, but I feel there are more question marks now more than ever. Every other part of the squad I’m pretty okay with, even wingers we can manage. But defensively I still think Arsenal are average at best. And loaning out Chambers makes us weaker
juve have alot of quality CBs and with the return of bonucci i guess we can get either of benatia or rugani….
i liked de ligt since last year, kimpede, upamecano are all young quality…but based on the rumour mill soyuncu would have sorted all def problems for the near future.
We need a top right back (sorry, Bellerin is just not good enough and Lichtsteiner is past his best) and a mobile centre back, possibly Soyuncu. Mavropanos and Holding could develop into quality defenders but I can’t see either as regular starters at the moment. Mind you it is still a great improvement on last year even if we don’t sign anyone else this window. The midfield looks at it’s strongest for a long time!!
tired of this bellerin is not good enoguh talk so will settle this…ok name 9 other right backs better than him andrew and i’ll let the issue with bellerin rest, if you can’t than you shouldn’t say a thing 🙂
i’ll even help with the first five: 1)carvajal, 2)pavard due to the wc but an excellent cb aswell, 3)kimmich but hes not a natural rb you would have complained if he was in our team, 4) odriozola will become great but that’s the same with our player, 5) azpilicueta if you played him there,but he plays lb so let’s say henrichs from leverkusen as our no 5…go on name the other four:
are you still thinking about it? that should tell you how valuable hector is ….ok when your done with that name another ten better than him and im saying even retired/or the verge of retiring ones like lahm and dani alves….so you still cant ? then what are you talking about replacing him? as fans the minimum requirement is to know the value of our best players, same goes with ozil critics don’t think you’ll be getting better!!
Lichtsteiner “past his best” is still one f the best around – captain of Switzerland, 9 Seria A winners medals.
LB is not a weakness; however I am still concerned about Arsenal’s CB’s.
Hopefully “Diamond Eye” has not lost his gleam. Why has the interest in Caglar Soyuncu from Freiburg – 22 yo 6’2″ Turkish international CB waned, as he wanted to play for the Arsenal?
Walker,trippier,danilo,sergi roberto,cancelo,dani alves,juanfran. Do you still want more?
yes sammy please!!! my comment is exactly that !! name them if you actually can, who do you beleive better than him, and who would you replace him with just to stay on the same page, cool beans 🙂
ill start with walker if you rate him you have to, or more like you are obliged to rate bellerin as you rate pace and power the only thing walker has in his game and lets remember his age? and when is it exactly did he start producing? yep thats was under the poch as he was shiite before.
ok dani alves juanfran are definetly the future RB of the world i would at least put lichsteiner on the list if you like your veterans since he’s our new signing !!
but hey you would rather have alves?…..trippier that slow ass? or danilo? have you been watching last year danilo who played what like ten games? mostly at the lb position and not even worthy of lacing up bellerin’s boots, cancelo pfft check his stats if you are one of those and you’ll se how overrated he really is, and sergio roberto is where you really lost me you would honestly want sergio roberto as your first choice rb over bellerin? the guy that is forced to play in a position he is just ok at, the Delph of the Right back’s!?!
at least say kimmich he’s actually good, or check for the german,portuguese and french league they have a couple of youngsters in those position who might come good but are nowhere close to bellerin.
so i’ll say it again that list is weak!! i’m sorry wouldn’t want any of them over bellerin and neither should you!! name another 10 was my challenge to anyone who thinks he’s not a gift, an academy gift that we should be extremly happy about not asking for it to be replaced.
also should i quote the prices of some of these average players? no? most importantly how many of these average players would come to arsenal and how much with that cost us? and you still don’t value him? then how can we can talk football Sammy? if a team like man city spends 100 mil just on fullbacks and we got fans that want to sell a guaranteed starter in any team then how can we talk football? yes i said it any team would accomodate him he was the first player pep looked at when he got to city before even signing walker or the bench warmer danilo.
not a single of these players mentioned have bellerin’s potential as he is still younger and in my eyes far better than any of those on the list, so get with the program bellerin is a superstar!! i respect yout opinion but it’s wrong so very wrong sammy, and most importantly your opinion is not a fact 🙂
YOUR OPINION OF BELLERIN IS A PRIVATE FANTASY, UNSHARED BY MANY FANS, HE HAS NO DEFENSIVE NOUS AND IS SO OFTEN FAR UPFIELD WHEN HE SHOULD BE IN HIS RB POSITION. HE CANNOT PREVENT CROSSES NOR HEAD A BALL AND HIS TACKLING IS WOEFUL. TRUE, HE HAS PACE, AND NOTHING ELSE OF VALUE. You are fooling yourself. I can only woinder why you do so? Perhaps you like his hairstyle or his manic use of social media?
unshared by you maybe jon fox and and a couple of others who beleive being older means you are always correct, that is a fantasy!! wiser for sure! deserving my respect for sure ! but does that means you know best jon!? far from it and you haven’t convinced me with those two lines to support how awful he really is.
first i’ll banter back ,i was born in the 80’s so supported and watched a bergkamp arsenal sorry mate about the 1-0 routine wins i never witnessed that!! or the Old Boring Arsenal!! the generation after mine is the one you want when you are talking about hairstyles and social media so a miss there , but nice one! 🙂
i’ll stay relevant you are an old faithful fan so here are my reasons: most full backs nowadays are converted wingers or CB its when you get them to defend properly taught by a proper coach is when you see the true value, not alot of kids wake up and say i want to be the next walker or Lahm!!
a full back who can attack is more valuable than the one who can defend ( im not saying this, the market prices are so note that!) especially when you play attacking football or total football , the way football is played in the modern era not the old way of defence is for the defenders and attack for the attackers. pace is a huge asset in attack and defence did you forget those last ditch tackles by bellerin who you say can’t tackle!! his forward runs provide the width we need when we attack, his ability to create will show as well and that’s the most valuable thing a full back can do is defend and the ability to join the attack. If he creates few chances or half chances a game and scores one or two a season you got yourself an extremely valuable player!!
he can’t head the ball so what neither did lahm. i’m not saying he’s anywhere close to lahm but height isn’t needed for the modern full back that’s where the comparison ends.
so as long as he doesn’t play as CB and isn’t defending a wide target man like Mandzukic but a winger he should be just fine!…as he won’t be outdone by a kick and run, his passing is very decent as well, being out of position and stopping crosses are defensive skills that are taught with game time and training not by giving up on a clearly talented player, also having a winger who helps defensively releives alot of stress on a young full back that is full of potential, who was on our right wing for the past couple of seasons?
but no nothing is taken into account and great players like ozil, young talented players like bellerin and might make it players like iwobi get constantly slated by fans for one bad game or season, it seems every year a scapegoat is needed!
i remeber when koscienlny cost us the cup and how some fans said he was shiite on this site or another i can’t recall but i still knew he was class and voiced my opinion like i’m doing now. also that day made me realize how fickle some of our fans are, and how clueless they are about football. so i’ll say it again so it sinks in and you can hold me to it, bellerin will be world class fingers crossed if he doesn’t get a Ronaldo injury, he’s got the coach to improve him and i beleive in emery’s man mangement. can you be as predictive and say the same about any of our players? i’m telling you now this 23 yrs old is and will be dynamite is that bold enough for you?
and jon i would love to know the name of the player you want us to replace him with as i don’t see you doing that either? thus making it seem like you want us to sell him with no replacements
also did you forget that this team had santos and jenkinson, debuchy was our rb after sagna remember that before you go on bellerin!!
The back field is still suspect and we won’t know until the key games against top ten opposition. For now, given injuries, the team below is what we have…
There is a need for a CB and LB still, with injuries.
Subs: good.
Notice, that I am not willing to remove Welbeck, who I think is under appreciated by Emery.
——————-Cech———————
—Lichtsteiner—Sokratis—Mustafi—–
Bellerin–Torreira—Gueduozi—Welbeck
———————Ozil———————-
———-Laca—————Auba———–
3-4-1-2 (or or 5-3-2 or 4-3-2-1 or 4-4-2, as this line up can change shape)
Emery will play with aback four regardless of permutations in midfield and attack.He is right to do so as it limits the number of centre backs,an area where we are very weak.As of now we do not have one top quality defender in our squad.As a consequence we should not expect Emery to produce miracles with the current squad.If he gets us back in the top four this season he will have done very well.Realistic expectations are appropriate at this stage.