Players That Arsenal May Look At by Lance
Once again we are at that time of the year when clubs look to sign new players to strengthen their teams/squads for the next season.
Arsenal finished fifth after two seasons of eighth place finishing in Mikel Arteta’s three seasons in charge. For some that may represent failure, while for others, though it’s disappointing that Arsenal did not qualify for the UEFA Champions League, placing fifth is obviously an improvement over the last two seasons. However, it is heartwarming that they have qualified for the UEFA Europa League after a one-year absence from Europe.
The points haul of 69 also show an improvement over the 56 and 61 points garnered in 19/20 and 20/21 seasons respectively.
A look at the matches won and lost, as well as the goals scored and conceded will help Arsenal fans to determine the areas the club needs to strengthen. In the 19/20 season. Arsenal won 14 matches, lost 10 and drew 14 for a total of 56 points.
The following season, the club showed improvement by winning 18 games, lost 13 and drew 7, collecting 61 points in the process.
In the just ended 21/22 season, Arsenal made further progress and won 22 matches, lost 13 and drew 3, garnering 69 points. But we have struggled to score goals since Arteta came on board. Arsenal scored 56 goals and conceded 48 in the 19/20 season; grabbed 55 goals in 20/21 and gave away 39, and scored 61 and conceded 48 in the 21/22 season. In the last three seasons under Arteta, Arsenal have scored a total of 172 goals but have conceded 135 in the EPL, leaving a goal difference of only 37. Undoubtedly, this is a poor goals return in three seasons.
These statistics point to the fact that Arsenal have a goal scoring problem and have a poor defence too. Therefore, it’s important that Arsenal should sign at least a striker, central defender, left back, and two midfielders.
Going through the results of the 21/22 season of the top five leagues, I have come to the conclusion that Arsenal should look at signing any of the following players:
1. Christopher Nkunku, 24, of RB Leipzig. … A midfielder who scored 20 goals with 13 assists.
2. Domenico Berardi, 27, of Sasusuolo….. A forward player. He scored 15 goals with 14 assists.
3. Gianluca Scamacca, 23, ………….. A striker, also of Sassuolo. He scored 16 goals this season.
4. Sergej Milinkovic-Savic, 27, ………. From Lazio. A midfielder, he scored 11 goals.
5. Lautaro Martinez, 24, of Inter Milan…. Scored 21 goals.
6. Ciro Immobile, 32, of Lazio. ……… Scored 27 goals. He will also provide the much needed experience and leadership for the team.
7. Patrik Schick, 26, of Bayer Leverkusen. Scored 24 goals.
8. Victor Osimhen, 23, Napoli…………. Scored 14 goals.
9. Tammy Abraham, 24, Roma,…………… Scored 17 goals.
10. Taiwo Awoniyi, 24, Union Berlin……… Scored 15 goals. Striker. His goals helped propel a small team into the Europa League.
11. Cody Gakpo, 23, PSV,……………….. Scored 12 goals, 13 assists. Winger.
12. Moussa Dembele, 25, Lyon,…………… Scored 20 goals.
13. Raul de Tomas, 27, Espanyol…………. He was voted into the la Liga team of the season, stood out at Espanyol this season with 17 goals.
Personally, I would prefer players who don’t only score goals but also provide a lot of assists such as Nkunku, Gakpo, Savic and Berardi.
What do you think Gooners?
Lance
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Nkunku and Schik are my preference
My realistic striker wish list in order of preference –
Laurturo Martinez.
Gabriel Jesus.
Victor Osimhen.
Patrik Schik.
– Nkunku : We’ve got similar goalscoring CAM and LW in Smith-Rowe
– Berardi : His performance in Euro wasn’t impressive. Maybe he can play as a false nine or a CF, because he is strong enough to play with his back to goal like Saka
– Scamacca : A good towering CF if he’s willing to be a plan B, but I don’t think he wants to play second fiddle to Nketiah or Jesus
– Milinkovic-Savic : Is going to cost more than 50 M. I’d prefer to try Fabian Ruiz as he’s younger and left-footed
– Martinez : A diminutive striker who thrived when playing with a taller one like Lukaku and Dzeko, as Sanchez did when he played behind Giroud. He’s going to cost a fortune and we need to buy someone like Lukaku/ Giroud to win aerial duels for him
– Immobile : Was perfect for Mancini’s system in Euro, but too old for Arsenal’s youth project
– Schick : Wasn’t impressive in Euro and inconsistent in Italy, but recently scored many goals for Leverkusen. I wouldn’t take any chance with him after his Juventus’ medical exam result came out and he didn’t press well in Euro
– Osimhen : Was a great option before his horrific facial bone injury, that required six plaques and eighteen screws to stabilize the fractures. His efforts in aerial duels will never be as great as before due to fear factor, similar to Raul Jimenez
– Abraham : Great choice, but he’s going to cost more than 70 M as he has a long-term contract at Roma, he’s in his prime and young
– Gakpo : Is going to bench Martinelli and Smith-Rowe, unless he plays as a CF
– Awoniyi, Dembele and De Tomas : Maybe you could tell us more about them?
What an article *Lance
Am I love with the analysis of *Gotanidea
Very accurate.
Well I’m tempted to believe we might have Osimhen …..as we seems to be pushing for him, but then once bitten twice shy, we pursued Vhlahovic all January …
Being realistic, I think we may settle with Gabriel Jesus
However I wish we afford ….. Tammy Abraham and Jesus
before you fall victim to the siren sounds of the usually affable GAI, please keep in mind that, by his own admission, he doesn’t watch any other football than ours, minus maybe World/Euro Cup competitions, so take his player evaluations with a exceptionally large grain of salt…his offerings are little more than an unhealthy dose of youtube deep dives and a whole lot of stating the obvious
@.TRVL
What gives you the authority to dismiss another fan’s subjective opinion while encouraging others to accept your own subjective opinion?
And what football qualifications (managerial, coaching, scouting etc) do you hold that should somewhat elevate your personal opinion to GAI’s..
I sincerely apologize to both you and the aforementioned GAI for anything you or he might deem as offensive, as that wasn’t my intention…that said, I guarantee you that my qualifications in such matters would far supersede yours or the other party in question, but that fact alone certainly doesn’t mean that I have the right to be so dismissive
@TRVL
I never said that anything offended me.
I just asked you a very simple question that you have failed to answer. Your reply is what we call a red herring or a deflection.
And everyone can be anything they want behind the anonymity of their computer screen. You claimed that you have qualifications in what? Is it in Managerial matters? Scouting matters? Coaching matters? Or pompous Armchair punditry like everyone else?
And how can you claim to be more qualified in these matters than the rest of us when you don’t even know who we are personally? Have you ever met me in person and compared my CV to yours? Poor fallacious reasoning that, isn’t it?
I can also hide behind the anonymity of my computer and claim that I am richer than Jeff bezos and Elon Musk combined. Isn’t it?
Again, what gives you the authority to dismiss @GAI’s subjective opinion while you go ahead and big up your own personal subjective opinion?
Can’t you detect a bit of hypocrisy, confirmation bias or lack of self awareness in your statement?
This guy is just an attention seeker.. Ignore him
you Goonster are simply a lightweight clown who went on a late night troll rant…if it weren’t for the fact that I will be judged vastly differently by Admin than yourself, as is now glaringly obvious, I would put you squarely in your place, so you should be very thankful that I’m not an Arteta Apologist or you just might have received the verbal thrashing of your posting life…keeping in mind, that my original comment wasn’t directed towards you and simply stated facts that GAI himself has acknowledged…get a life and stay in your lane
👍 @Goonster
Why don’t you post your own player assessment man
Thanks bro, I also hope we can sign those EPL strikers
Nice GAI, I agree, priority is an out and out striker. If Eddie left in addition to Lacca. Arsenal will have zero strikers. Balogun, Moller and Mika are still not ready. Though Balogun seems to me like he could have a shot in the cups and Europa League as a second/third fiddle.
In all cases, if you want a perfect striker you will have to break the bank and may be the perfect striker won’t be available to come to Arsenal.
My parameter for buying any player, would this player improve club’s 1st 11? if yes and he is willing to come and club can afford him, add to the list.
Choose best option or lower risk players that will allow me to improve other areas in my squad?
For me, some of the players mentioned in the list would do the trick.
Abraham, Osimhen, Scamacca even Berardi would do.
Gakpo, played as a forward for 4 games this season and did very well and he has the physicality. For me, if he is willing to make it his position (unlike Pepe), he is on my target list as well.
Immobile, 32, old, long contract, won’t leave Italy. I also agree on Martinez.
Schick: nice catch about the medical info, never knew, Arsenal would have to be very precise if they thought about him. I was a fan to be honest.
Both Savic and Ruiz would do the trick for me, since we definitely need a midfielder, though my take is that we need a tackler(since Partey seems to miss more than few games) unless MA can balance the defense with fullbacks who can defend better (than Nuno and Cedric).
Nukuno is great but not a striker and most likely other big clubs will hunt him first.
I think Arsenal will make one big signing in the striker Area and a second fiddle (incase Eddie left). For the second Fiddle, I would make some free signing .
Origi may be even more than a backup but probably that ship has sailed.
Ben Brereton Díaz, and Belloti are worth thinking for free signings.
Suarez is available, he can still do the job good enough to be a backup.
Awoniyi, Dembele and De Tomas are all interesting but can they carry Arsenal as main striker? In any case as I said we may not have the luxury of choosing the best striker in the market.
Forgot to mention Richarlison (yes ahead of DCL Watkins and Toney), especially due to years left in contract though Toney is interesting too if he is available in the market.
Thanks @Ba elkhirsawy. I’m worried about Osimhen, because of his horrifying facial bone fractures
Brereton Diaz sounds worth to be tried out. As for Bellotti, he couldn’t perform well in his limited opportunity in Euro
In all honestly, can you answer if you have watched half of them play? Because this comment makes literally little to 0 sense, unless you are just repeating numbers and random positions you think these players play at.
-Nkunku, plays nowhere near and has very few things in common with ESR. Initially an attacking midfielder, he was employed at CF role this year and this is the reason for his high score tally.
Berardi: No, he cant. And neither can Saka.
Scamacca: Second fiddle to Nketiah? Where will Nketiah be first fiddle? Nowhere in the premier league.
Milinkovic-Savic: 2 times the player Fabian Ruiz is, top teams try to sign him every year but the owner wants a huge amount of money, undeservedly. So yea, he would be awesome, he would be far better than Fabian Ruiz, but no, he is not coming and there is not even 0.1% chance.
Martinez: He did excel with a tall striker close to him, but he did just as well on his own. Does not need a tall striker next to him, even though it would be good to have a striker that could play both solo and with a partner upfront. Expensive indeed.
Immobile: There is no such thing as too old. Not all players are being signed with the intention to outlive the process, but to serve a specific purpose. If he was to be signed, the purpose would be to offer an immediate goal threat and his vast experience to the rest of the attacking players. In my opinion though, he would not be a good fit to the way we want to be playing.
Schick: how does being impressive in the Euro affect if he is a good fit for us? completely different competition, in a team that could barely fight and dominate anything at all, attacking players (especially strikers) are hard to judge. With that in mind and having watched him several times, i am convinced he is not the answer, too many limitations at his game play (speed, awareness, one touch) and most of his strengths would not benefit a team like the current Arsenal squad.
Osimhen: You are assuming that a person that had a horrific injury on the face will certainly behave in the same manner as a person that had faced a similar injury. Without having any proof of that, despite the injuries having nothing in common (bar being in the face) and the players being completely different people, therefore will most likely handle a difficult situation in a completely different way. Osimhen is an awesome player and if you had seen the last matches of Serie A you would have seen that not only was he not affected, but he was trying even harded. Good option, huge pricetag though. Would be awesome for 50-60mil.
Abraham: Good option, not great. Unable to dribble and score a solo goal (maybe asking too much here), decent speed and very good in the air so that he can take advantage of the 0 good crosses we do per game. English tax here as well.
Gakpo: Would most certainly NOT bench Martinelli, not even half the player he is. Very fast, agile, with limited end product (his numbers are not that great and that’s on the eredivisie, being the “best” attacking option of his team). I watch psv and ajax almost every weekend, my best mate is an Ajax fan (Gravenbergh would be a beast, but Bayern bound unfortunately).
The rest i have not seen a lot of either, but judging by reports of Dembele and De Tomas am pretty sure that they would not bring the X factor in our team.
My response is not meant to be sarcastic or ironic, but to make you think before you comment on something that you clearly do not have a solid foundation to comment on. And not only that, but you actually present it as not only an opinion, but as a fact. And i stand by the fact that i am CERTAIN that you have not watched most of these players. Otherwise you would be able to understand how irrational the above comments are.
It’s just my opinion and I’ve never said it as a fact, but some people might take it differently. To each, his own
Fair enough, even though i still think that your comment is stated more as a factual truth rather than merely an opinion. Nevertheless, can you please reply if you have actually watched these players play at all so that we can understand how you have formed an opinion about them?
I watched the ones who played in Euro. As for the rest, I watched them play against big teams on YouTube
So its mostly highlights. Some of these videos manipulate the truth a lot, others are good for showing the qualities of certain players, without ofcourse singling out their weaknesses. Got my answer though, cheers. In order to contribute to the discussion as well (and having watched the players i will comment on several times), i would like to say that i’d love it if we could get both gabriel jesus (not mentioning nkunku as RB leipzig director ruled out him moving this summer) + osimhen (or someone with similar traits and quality) etc. Highly unlikely due to pricing, but we need people that offer different options going forward and can also play together and be productive. As far as the midfield is concerned, we need at least 2 players there in my opinion. Tielemans would be good and i would also consider another number 8-10 that can contribute to the chances creation we desperately need. Maddison would be awesome but there are cheaper options abroad i guess or maybe opportunities like gundogan might come up. who knows. A midfield of Partey/El Neny (he renewed today), Tielemans/Xhaka and/or Lokonga and Odegaard/New signing would be strong enough to handle several competitions both quality wise and number wise(7 players, out of which lokonga and el neny would mostly be backups).
Cheers Chris
Gai, if you ask me considering Arsenal’s problem last season and Arteta also said he doesn’t mind 23 quality players. Arsenal need goals all over the pitch and that was the strength of ManCity. In that case we need Nkunku, ESR can still learn more from such player, Gakpo can prove a strong competition with Matinelli and Osimhen stats shows his facial surgery affected nothing as he his very mobile, physical and good aerially and with his feet. We also need full backs. We should be fine if we can get.
Gakpo
Nkuku
Neves/Fabian ruz
Osimhen/Gabriel Jesus.
Our present youth players needs not be too comfortable and besides we shall be playing more games we need qualities every where.
I wish Arsenal have the funds to buy all those players. If not, they had better focus on two CF types
Yea CF remains the main priority if funds is limited.
Jesus.
Gakpo. Odegaard. Saka.
Tielemans. Partey.
Hickey. Gabriel. Saliba. Tomiyasu.
Ramsdale.
SECOND TEAM.
Balogun.
Martinelli. Smith. Marquinhos.
Lokonga. Elneny.
Tierney. Holding. White. Cedric.
Turner.
Personally I think Gnabry is a real deal as he’s a gunner, Lautaro will be more deadly than Halaand and we can go for Nkuku as well well as Raphinha from Leeds and Gakpo or Leao all great signings and don’t have to be worried about whom to start or to bench, because we have a long season to go and different cup games to play for who would have thought that we were short of defenders at the season end due to suspension and injuries and that was the main reason Tot overtook us, no team depth and our postponed game against them if we have played that game way back we were to qualify in top 4
Hickey’s statistics are not better than Tavares’.
He left out Moussa Diaby.
Balogun should go on another loan for further development.
We need a strong midfield to stop conceding too many goals.
Lokonga wasn’t just good enough. Send him on loan or sell him
You just listing all kind of players to arsenal, they might not buy any of them, we all should know how arsenal board do their business, they will eventually go for someone we did not talk about or we get too know when the deal is getting close, Arsenal will get Jesus unless he changes his mind, also we don’t know the kind of midfielder they will go for but i know they will go for someone cheaper. We all need to look at arsenal system of play & English football evironment for adaptation. Arsenal need competition for Partey. This squad only need Super quality addition in those area that are glaring for improvement.
Nkunku(am) , Awoninyi (striker) and Gakpo (winger)are my picks.
We need 2 strikers who offer different qualities and a winger to replace the outgoing Pepe.
Target man options
– Darwin Nunez(unlikely now without CL)
– Ivan Toney
– DCL
– Patrick Schick-(no CL possible factor)
– Scamacca
– Adam Hlozek
Smaller Pacey options
– Gabriel Jesus(50-50 chance)
– Giouri
Wingers
– Cody Gakpo
– Serj Gnabry(may not come without CL)
Whatever we do it will be slow and dragged out usually increasing tensions, player wage demands and price. Or we put all our eggs in one basket and say we tried(for a player that openly stated he didn’t want to come to the Emirates)
Even Villa can get deals over the line in record speed….but not us.
Not a massive fan of Abraham he should have another 2/3 seasons in serie A
Also add Borre & Kamada to the list
Mcginn/Ruiz
Nunez/Martinez
Scammaca/Osimhen/Awoniyi/Watkins
Beraradi/Kamada
Dream would be one from each 🤣🤣🤣