Arsenal The Squad: Identifying problem areas and transfer expectations by ArsenalAfroArmy
A continuation of my conspiracy.
A typical matchday line-up would have most conclude that Arsenal squad has a strong attack, mediocre midfield and weak defence. Another commonly repeated statement is our left side is superior to our right. A closer look at the squad tells a slightly different story.
| LEFT | SPINE | RIGHT | |
| Laca (0) | Auba (2) | ||
| Saka (1) | Ozil (4) | Pepe (2) | |
| Tierney (1) | Xhaka (0) | ||
| Luiz (1) | Mustafi (3) | ||
| Mari (0) | |||
| Martinez (3) | |||
Players sourced from Arsenal.com*
Numbers next to players names indicate the number of players available to cover excluding starting 11*
Top right Heavy
Our right is superior to our left from almost every aspect including making more money and rocking amazing hair. Our left is young/unproven, short of depth, but highly talented and balanced in terms of personnel. The current fix is to shift players (Auba and AMN regularly feature on that side) but rumours of players being unhappy playing out of position tells us this may not viable long term.
We need a Doctor!
2 out of 5 have no backup, the CF/CAM operational area is being unnaturally occupied by Laca, the spine itself is defensively frail but none of that is more confusing than our RCM area and it is not from the lack of trying. Ozil, Torreira, AMN, Guendouzi, Willock and until recently Dani. A passing specialist, a defensive specialist, our most versatile player, a foreign talent, an academy player and a former Spain youth captain. If rumours are to be believed, we might be throwing another €50M at the problem. I will concede some issues are unrelated to football but even when all are available, the midfield duo just doesn’t seem to be effective enough, despite various combinations. And a final note on Laca, for fans quick to sell him, Barcelona has spent upwards of hundreds of millions and has yet to solve it.
Nothing to see here
An interesting time for the squad, as I cannot remember the last time we had this level of quality in the GK unit. We had talents or close to retiring players before, but 2 different quality GKs close to their peaks, problem solved at least for the next 3 seasons assuming we keep both. I have nothing on Macey.
End of conspiracy.
Thank you for reading!
ArsenalAfroArmy
