The end of the transfer window is approaching rapidly, and all Arsenal fans are very aware that we have been devastated by defensive injuries for the whole season and, to be honest, we were not defending very well even when we had a fit back line. It seemed inevitable that our situation would get worse and we were devastated when Rob Holding was ruled out for the whole season as well. It is no exagerration to say we have had a defensive crisis all season!
January has even been more unkind to us, with Hector Bellerin also ruled out for the season, after just coming back from a 5-month layoff, and now Sokratis has been confirmed as being unavailable for the next month at least as well. You would have thought that it was obvious that Arsenal would be trying to bring in cover in the back line, but it would appear that were completely wrong, as Emery has now told Arsenal.com when asked about our targets: “..I don’t know exactly which players, but it’s players with the possibility to help us who can play on the wing, right or left.”
And when asked if any defensive signings could be coming in: “It’s the same. I can’t say to you and example, it’s for all the situations. It’s not easy because I don’t want to come here, sign and player and it’s not very clear if he can help us be better than the players we already have in the squad. It’s a difficulties and [there are] other things, but this is one example where we can only bring players that we are very convinced will be able to help us with a good performance.
“We have enough players who can play centre back in the squad. The problem is we’re having a lot of injuries in this position. We have enough players. If we can bring another player, and all the other players we have are well to play, then we could maybe have a problem in the future.”
How can we have a problem in the future? We have Lichtsteiner who was only signed on a one-year contract. We have Koscielny who is much too old and unlikely to be here next season. Nacho Monreal is also ageing and is out of contract in the summer. That leaves the youngster Mavropanos, who has not kicked all ball all season and has only played for us a handful of times, and Shkrodan Mustafi, who is hardly anyone’s favourite choice as our mainstay in defence. We will definitely need more defenders in the summer, so why would it cause a problem if we got someone in now?
Admin
Wasn’t Monreal’s contract extended by a year?
I don’t get this “when we have all fit, we will have problems” crap. The fact is, we will NEVER have all the players fit. Someone will always be injured. We might have most players fit for a week or two but then the injuries will mount.
And we can alway sell players on, can’t we?
I believe that Mustafi, Monreal and Mavropanos would be enough as long as the outfield players in front of them press the opponents hard
All CBs could be fit at some point and it is difficult to sell players with a good price tag. Remember when Arsenal had to sell Gabriel with low price
I’m glad that Emery is looking for a winger. I hope the new winger is going to be a young one
Not for a profit we can’t, bud!
Very soon, Emery himself will be force to enter the pitch and play for us as a defender. With the way injures and woeful performances are affecting us now ,common sense dictates that we bring in another defender or two this January .I am shocked Emery is saying we have enough cover at the back. How sad. Arsenal should just forget about top four this season. Period.
We have enough defenders in Mustafi, Monreal, Mavropanos, Medley, Pleguezuelo, Kolasinac, Lichtsteiner, Jenkinson, Xhaka and Elneny
Xhaka and Elneny are not defenders, even in an emergency.
OT
Why didn’t Arsenal go all out for Perisic or for a winger when Sanchez left?We instead went and spent £55m on Aubameyang when we had Lacazette as a striker who looked promising that season and did not need replacing.I believe Aubameyang wasn’t signed for him and Laca to play together but rather for them to compete with each other and imo that was money poorly spent.Now that Perisic is playing poorly we then go in for him and hope he gets his old form back.The team needs a winger so I could see Perisic heavily being relied upon.If he fails nothing changes but if he succeeds he can help us achieve top four.There are lots of young wingers in the market and I expect us to go for all out for one in the summer.This will ensure that we get a player who will continually improve and has more good years ahead of him.In case the player should flop we could also sell him for a relatively more substantial amount compared to Perisic.No need to sign him permanently in the summer and should that be the case would be an economically bad move.
We must secure Nicolas Pepe before anyone else. That feller is lethal and quick!
Except that his club might not want to let him go cheaply
Never worth £45m in my opinion.Also I don’t think he’s the kind of winger we need.We need a dribbling and chance creating machine.I want someone who can penetrate a defence with his dribbling and can make excellent crosses seeing as Emery’s style of attack comes a lot from the wings.For e.g Chamberlain would’ve been immense in this team today.
I also believe that Aubameyang was purchased because Lacazette needed a strong competition due to his low goal tally and there was a chance to sign a big name player at that time
I think they chase Perisic despite his poor form because he has vast experience and tall enough to be a forward or CAM
They made the wrong choice big time.Priority wise a winger should’ve been signed then a striker.They just thought they’d get away with it because Aubameyang was a quality player but it was wrong to spend all that money on him when we needed a winger first.It was always going to come back to haunt us.
kev, if Arsenal only had Lacazette and no Aubameyang, who would have scored goals if Lacazette was injured. After Van Persie left Arsenal had difficulty in replacing his goals. Sanchez and Giroud did their best, but weren’t as prolific.
Arsenal has now sorted the striker situation, and as you stated, width in attack now should be addressed.
You’re not getting my point.Im talking g of priority.As I stated a winger should’ve been signed before a CF when Sanchez left.It was wishful thinking by the Arsenal management to think that there won’t be a time where questions marks will start rising over the need for a winger.We needed a winger not a striker.The striker situation was sorted when Arsenal signed Lacazette not when Arsenal signed Aubameyang.Hence you even hear people saying if Arsenal had Laca in 15/16 season we most likely would’ve won the league but not with Giroud.Auba was Laca’s competition when Giroud left.Also Sanchez was primarily a winger and more than prolific for Arsenal even at times when played at CF.
To complain at getting Auba strikes me as weird. When you also consider he is second only to the redoubtable Salah in the Prem goals chart, it begins to look like the terrific deal it was. This man is clearly our best finisher since Henry and better even than the much injured RvP. So I DISAGREE WITH YOU AND SUGGEST MOST GOONERS DO TOO.
I don’t agree, it doesn’t make sense to buy a 60million striker just to give a 50million striker competition. We are mot man city. I love auba but we should have spent that money wisely as we have very little of it.
Exactly kev, we had just bought lacazette for 50m but go and spend 60m on auba when we needed a winger and Dm at the time especially when you consider that wenger didn’t play with two strikers, doesn’t make any sense. It just shows that gazidis and wenger never knew the right profile of players to buy, all they were after was if a player was available and easy to sign, no planning went into buying specific players for specific positions. Its why wenger always said they were looking in the market to see if anything turns up instead of having specific targets that fit specific positions and our budget. Remember we signed ozil the season after cazorla had a brilliant first season in the CAM position even though the DM spot was still a glaring weakness, its just incompetence.
I share in your view.The mismanagement of funds in this club is world class.We most of the time don’t consider priority in our signings at all until it starts to really really affect us.We are now stuck with two strikers and have no good winger to create chances for them.It would’ve been better to even spend that £55m on a winger.
So, Aubameyang is now a Wenger signing? You lot were busy banging about how it was Mislintat and Gazidis because you wanted to discredit Wenger. Now the story has changed because you want to blame Wenger. Confused lot.
Please disassociate me from such things.To think I was happy when the club sanctioned a big money move for a striker when the team was in dire need of a winger is an assumption.Some say he was signed by Misliintat,others Wenger and for some some both.It was still a poor move regardless of who signed him considering the team’s priorities.The media try to confuse us so I dont really trust them.They failed to accurately state the level of influence both had in that deal.
TH14 – TW14, you beat me to it.
This is the hypocrisy and double standards that show fans up.
We all have memories and that’s why it’s so amusing to see them hopping from one opinion to another in the space of a week.
Confused lot? No they know what they are doing and that is the sad part about it all.
Ken1945 please stop, every fan has got an opinion, how do you know the specific fans that said auba was a wenger or mislintat signing? Stop with the generalising. And whether it was mislintat, gazidis or wenger that signed auba, it still doesn’t change the fact that a winger and DM should have been prioritised then.
It’s annoying when they do that but if I was to follow logic then I can say with much confidence that Aubameyang and Mkhitaryan were mostly Sven ideas of which Wenger shared in, particularly with Auba.It cannot be a coincidence that when Sven joined the club,we targeted Auba who was a Dortmund player and then Mkhitaryan who was a former Dortmund player.It was unlike Wenger to spend huge sums on the same position in which he had already just spent on.I found it bizarre but then realized Sven was around.Some months later we go and sign Sokratis also of Dortmund which was consistent with Emery’s idea of bringing in fighters and leaders.
I agree Kev – Buying Auba whilst being as financially restricted as we are and as short as we were in many places on the pitch (but not at striker thanks to Laca), was a poor decision.
Vision is lacking in this club.
Aubameyang top goal scorer for the club since his arrival in your eyes “imo that was money poorly spent”. What type of football fan are you? Absolutely outrageous statement. You’re the reason i hate people in this world.
@ wee-fella
Come on man, hate is a strong word. Nobody is saying they hate Auba, all we are saying is, due to our lack of financial strength, we will need to prioritise signings. It will be like us signing luis suarez who i think is the best striker in the world, even though we have auba and lacazette right now. Definitely luis suarez will then become our highest scorer because he is better than what we have but will that we a smart signing? When we have such an unbalanced and deficient squad. Won’t that money be better spent elsewhere? Anyways, we have two good strkers now so lets hope the club get them wingers and creative midfielders to create chances for them and most especially lets hope the sort out the defence in the summer too.
Don’t waste your time on such a person.The fact that he brought ‘hate’ into this disgusts me.The ironic thing here is that we have people here questioning why our club is currently prioritising the signing of midfielders over defenders but the same think it was right for Arsenal to sign Auba when we had Laca.This argument is more of common sense and a waste of time the longer it carries on.
What kind of unintelligent comment is this?You’re the reason why Arsenal continue to fail.So you mean if you were the one in charge you would’ve also signed Auba when Arsenal had Laca??Did you criticize the running of the club by Wenger and co?If so then you’re not any different from them.I hope Arsenal go all out and sign Messi for you when the club is need of defenders,midfielders and a winger.
LOL, it is Wenger all over again. Attack! Attack! Attack!
That’s not accurate really because he did get Torreira, Guendouzi and Sokratis
Yes, and now he thinks his job is done. When our defense hasn’t improved.
I will rather we give mavropanos and medley the chance to play than go for gary cahill who hasn’t played for chelsea all season. We have been so unlucky with injuries, if you think about it, we actually have a good number of center backs, the problem is the lack of quality and the injuries. I don’t think the quality aspect can be improved in this window because no club will loan us their starting center backs in january so lets give mavropanos that chance till sokratis and koscielny are back. We need to hope the injury stops because if it continues, loaning a center back wouldn’t help us as he would get injured too. We have holding, sokratis, mustafi, koscielny, mavropanos, thats five center backs, how many clubs have more than five center backs in their first team so the injuries is our main worry.
Lupe, I agree; no where have I seen any CB’s (apart from Benatia, previously injured and now signing in the Middle East) listed as being available for transfer or loan.
Well its only 3 months remaining. We still got Monreal, Mustafi and Mavropanos who can play CB. Pelguezelo as well. Sokratis will be back in 4 weeks. We can wait till the summer to get proper wordlclass defenders without much consequence.
World class defender in the summer oh my sides ?
OT: Just read on the Times that Arsenal’s decision to bring Arsene Wenger’s reign to a premature end cost the club £17.1m in pay-offs to him and his staff… This shows indeed he was sacked
Yikes! ?
So that’s where the money went!
Can’t believe any rational Gooner could EVER doubt he was sacked! They said he “resigned” but all bright fans know that left to him, he would still be our manager aged 90!
I very much doubt if Arsenal will conclude any loan deals during this transfer window but the summer window will be a critical one for the Club as we are unlikely to make the top four.Emery has plenty of defenders but apart from Holding, Bellerin and hopefully young Mav ,they are not of the quality we need to make a real impact on all competitions.The acquisition of at least two top grade defenders and a natural winger should be the priority in the next window by which time I suspect lots of efforts will have been made to somehow get Ozil off the payroll.Unless Ozil and our poor performing/aging defenders are moved on, Emery will be severely restricted in terms of new acquisitions.