When the summer transfre window opened, it seemed obvious that Arsenal were desperate for a new attacking midfielder to compete with Emile Smith-Rowe, and our first choice was reported to be Emi Buendia, but that option was quickly when Aston Villa stepped in and snapped him up.
Yves Bissouma was hotly tipped to go to Arsenal, but with Brighton allowing Ben White to move to the Emirates, I can’t see Brighton letting us have another one of their players.
Another top target was supposed to be Martin Odegaard after he impressed in the six months he was on loan at Arsenal last season, and after the Norwegian returned to his parent club, Arteta made it clear that he wanted him back at the Emirates this season.
But then Zidane left Madrid, and Carlo Ancelotti took over, throwing Odegaard’s return in doubt but it was not a total impossibility as time moved on.
But now it looks like the door is firmly shut, as the Madrid mouthpiece AS has reported an injury to Toni Kroos has made Odegaard’s departure impossible for now.
AS reported…..
The injury of Kroos closes the exit to Odegaard and Ceballos
The Madrid club does not want what happened last season to happen again, when Zidane had to pull homegrown players due to the lack of midfielders
On Tuesday, August 3, at 6:14 p.m., Real Madrid issued a statement stating that Toni Kroos (31 years old) suffers from pubalgia that will keep him off the pitch during the first days of the League. At that moment, the exit door for Martin Odegaard (22 years old) and Dani Ceballos (24 years old) was closed.
Now it would appear that James Maddison is our new top target, but with the price spiralling out of control I don’t think that is likely to happen now, although Arteta may be so desperate that he could end up paying whatever Leicester ask for.
What happened to the rumours about Ruben Neves? He is now reported to be on Man United’s radar, but seems very happy to remain at Wolves with 3 years left on his contract.
Manuel Locatelli has snubbed the Gunners in favour of moving to Juventus, and the thought of Bernado Silva leaving Man City to join us is simply laughable without and European football.
For me, there is a good possibility of signing Houssem Aouar, but Arteta doesn’t seem to fancy him, and if Arteta runs out of options, I am thinking that we may just keep Joe Willock to fill the role instead….
Darren N
We’re running out of time. This could be another last day job
I’ll be surprised if Ancelotti lets Odegaard go, because Odegaard is the only senior left-footed CAM at Real Madrid. I’m glad we didn’t contact Matheus Pereira though, because he’s shown his priority
Bernardo Silva would likely cost more than 50 M and Lemar has replaced Saul Niguez at Atletico, but Lucas Paqueta, Charles De Ketelaere, Kang-in Lee and Antonin Barak are still available
Again with your obsession with left footed players.. A player’s preferred foot has nothing to do with anything unless they were a right or a left back.. So stop this nonsense
I reckon it’s important for Arteta and Ancelotti, otherwise Arteta wouldn’t have waited for Odegaard and Ancelotti wouldn’t have recruited Rodriguez at Everton
If Ancelotti lets Odegaard leave before the transfer window closes, it means he doesn’t really care about the attacker types at Madrid
But this criterium of left footed midfielder is killing me. We have seen Liverpool hammering the teams with Henderdon, Wiji and Fabinho is anyone among them left footed. Let us see Lordri, Gundogan and KDB of City anyone among them left footed???? Finally the Champions Chelsea: Kante, Jorginho and Mount. None of them is left footed. Why this shoul be set as a pritoriy for the upcoming midfielder?
Liverpool very rarely changed their 4-3-3 formation when they won UCL and EPL
Man City got two left-footed mezzalas in David Silva/ Bernardo Silva when they won EPL and they also rarely changed the formation at that time. After David Silva left, they could change their formation sometimes by assigning Bernardo Silva and Phil Foden to the central midfield
Chelsea were also stable with their 3-4-2-1 formation, whereas Arsenal tend to change between 4-2-3-1 and 4-3-3. Italy also started three right-footed midfielders in Euro, but they have Pessina if they need to change their tactic and Chiellini acted as a makeshift left DM from time to time
its up to the manager….
not for the fans to decide
GAI
If right footed players is the realistic option we have in the absence of Odegard and B Silva, Arteta should be flexible with his tactical formation. Good coaches are always dynamic like Italy Pellegrinoi it’s as simple as that.
If care is not taken Arteta and Edu could end up missing out on even good and quality right footed midfielders.
I wouldn’t mind if we don’t buy an AM, because we’ve got plenty of them and their main task is mostly to pass the ball around. I prefer to buy someone who can win duels and score goals from set-pieces
After Aron Ramsey Arsenal have not had a high goal scoring midfielder. The purpose of AM is not only to pass the ball we need goal scoring Midfielders like Man U Fernandez Okay Gondogan, Debruine and Mason Madison. We don’t have many youthful, quality and elegant midfieders AM apart from S Row.
GAI, what was Matheus Pereira supposed to do: spend the whole transfer window waiting for the phone to ring and risk having to return to battle in the Championship with WBA? He is a player, who would have strengthened Arsenal’s midfield, but didn’t get a call. You can’t blame him for taking the big money offer on the table to go to Saudi Arabia.
We or not signing anyone now after white signed that’s it . We will av to trust youth players because stan arteta and edu all lied about we going to make signings so but think there’s signings coming in
its the media that created these stories and have you to belief
theres nothing wrong with a balance of youth and experience players…..
Somebody needs to pull their finger out! The clock is ticking…
Interesting how Willock took part in Media Day at Colney yesterday, pictures of him in the new kit – is he staying??
OT.. Partey out for 3 weeks
Sue, hopefully, yes.
Arsenal have been wasting time on the wrong players, where transfers obviously have not been possible. How naive by Arsenal to keep on wasting time on players, who prefer to play elsewhere. We are now running out of time. Chelsea and Tottenham can make transfers happen in few days where Arsenal need weeks.
Websurfer, same old, same old, rinse and repeat. Management will say they tried, when we know who was available, while Edu rode his jetski in sunny Majorca.
Won’t be surprised to see Elneny, Xhaka and perhaps Willian the three trusted generals of Areta to run the midfield. Tired of watching this useless booribg football with no entertainment and no result atleast give us something attractive football or results we can not go on without having none. Why can we not move Saka in middle he has got all the talent in world, all right attributes and maturity to play that role. Let’s do what Wenger did to Santi and move Saka from wing to mid. I would rather see and be excited by midfield trio of Saka, ESR and Partey then bear the trio of Xhaka, Elneney and Willian for 90 minutes.
Arsenal board just sniffing around the transfer targets and atlast adjust with the same sqauad or some club rejects like willian, other club fix thier target and pay the price and deal is done, look at the way aston villa doing their buisiness, they already spend grealish money even before they sold the player, no rumours and transfer news for almost months we have been linked with most of the players. Our preference was very clear that we meed a creative midfielder until now we have been sniffing around the whole world for the player. If you fix one player and pay the price and its done.
Just like last year, AFC may end up with a great second-choice midfielder: the player who was first choice last year, Houssem Aouar.
IslanderG, I hope you are right, with the icing on the cake, being Houssem Aouar’s team mate Bruno Guimaraes as well.
However, it is hard to be optimistic about either (especially Brazilian Guimaraes) when our Brazilian Edu is on holiday in Majorca.
That every player available is linked to Arsenal is nobody’s fault, it’s all media speculations. We would only conclude that arsenal lost out on signing a player if we hear it from the manager. No one is sure of what’s going on in the background. I’ll rather wait till the close of the window to pass any judgement on the coach and Edu. So far we are not doing worse than other clubs, the global financial crunch is real as football is not exempted from it’s effects.
JAY MUCH TRUTH IN WHAT YOU SAY.
BUT I forsee the final few hours of AUG 31st, with at least 6 or more prospective Arsenal AM hopefuls all waiting fruitlessly on their phones, while we sign no one of any standing and keep Willock instead.
OH, AND SAINT GRANIT, MIKELS BLESSED ONE!
IMAGINE THIS SITE in the hours after midnight Aug 31st. Nuclear war, no less!
YOU AINT SEEN NOTHING YET, AS THE SAYING GOES!
jon, keeping Joe Willock will be a positive outcome. There are plenty of other players to be sold on, before Arsenal sells their young talent. Selling the future won’t improve the overall quality of the squad, if the poor performers are retained. Arsenal needs to rebuild its identity and Club spirit.
Imo I don’t get the obsession with an
Attacking midfielder, but we definitely need a 20 + league goals striker for next season i have no faith in abb& lacca
Thank you Tony Kroos!!!!……Forgive me for celebrating your injury, but I really don’t wanna see Martin Odegaard any where near Arsenal foot club when the season starts, ….