Danny Murphy has tipped Arsenal to challenge Manchester United for their place in the top four this season, with Donny Van De Beek not the player they needed.
The Red Devils scraped into third ahead of Chelsea and Leicester City on the final day of last season, and have only managed to bring in one player thus far.
They will also be boosted by the return of Dean Henderson from his loan, but whether he will be able to break into the first-team ahead of David de Gea is another story.
Danny Murphy now believes the their place in the top four could be under threat, and expects the new and improved Arsenal to be the ones who could take it from them.
“They could challenge Manchester United for a top four place though United still have a slight edge,” as written in his column in the DailyMail.
“Ole Gunnar Solskjaer has signed a very good player in Donny van de Beek from Ajax though he’s not the holding midfielder I thought they needed.
“If he sent out an attacking midfield of Bruno Fernandes, Pogba and van de Beek against a team like Manchester City, United would lose. I assume therefore van de Beek may be seen as a longer-term replacement for Pogba.
“We are also still waiting to see if United break the bank for Jadon Sancho. He’d make them better but to spend £100m is a big call when they already have firepower up front and I’d consider a centre-half a bigger priority.”
The transfer window is still open of course, with just over a month left to make their respective transfers, but with the new season set to kick off this coming weekend, their squad should have been ready in an ideal world.
We’re also yet to bolster our midfield, and are set to begin our new campaign with the exact options of our previous campaign, but with Willian, William Saliba and Gabriel Magalhaes added to side, we are in a much better position than we were earlier in 2020.
Mikel Arteta has already brought a new winning mentality to the team which is our biggest boost ahead of the new campaign however, and he could well have had our previous squad fighting for the Champions League places, but that task will become much-the-more achievable with our new additions.
Are Man United the only team that need to watch out for Arsenal in the race for the top four?
Patrick
