Although it quite clearly looks like Mikel Arteta has made a massive improvement in Arsenal’s defensive abilities, the Gunners are still seriously lacking in the goalscoring department, with Aubameyang our top striker with just 2 goals in the League.
But we have an on-loan defender over in Stuttgart who is making waves this season as a goalscorer, after not being deemed good enough to challenge any of our defenders in the Premier League. Konstantinos Mavropanos was sent out on loan last January and after an impressive 12 games last season, was allowed to stay in the Bundesliga for another season’s loan, with a very small sell-on clause of just £2.5m next summer.
He has probably already increased his value tremendously after starting all 8 of Stuttgart’s games so far, and also scoring three goals in the process.
This was his latest one this weekend against Borussia Moenchengladbach, and what a superb strike it was!
What a goal Mavropanos pic.twitter.com/lYQqSFGC9X
— Billy (@Billyinho7) October 16, 2021
Personally this would persuade me to allow him to play further up the field, as maybe he is better midfielder or striker than a defender.
One things for sure, Arsenal may regret letting him leave for such a minor fee at the end of his loan…
Dan Smith stars in this week’s The Just Arsenal Show ahead of the Crystal Palace match
You may just have a point Dan, as he was extremely reckless in giving away a needless penalty for Greece against Sweden last week.The penalty was converted but prior to that ,Greece were by far the better side.Ended up 2-0 to Sweden.
Actually Auba has scored five goals this season ( Epl + carabao ). Mavropanos by the way has done really well by adding goal scoring to his defensive duty and that I deem commendable. Now the problem we are having is Arteta and Edu who seem not to recognize the potential our loanees possess.
We have Dan Ballard and Saliba on loan and they are doing well even mav but the problem with Mavs he has been injury prone since he arrived at the club.How many CB’s do we need really.🤔
simply put, there’s no legitimate reason whatsoever that this player was never given a proper chance to earn his way into a regular starting position here…he’s tactically flexible, as he’s proven himself adept within a back 3, 4 and 5, he’s got some skills with the ball at his feet, both left and right and he would have provided us with some much-needed height in and around the box, at both ends of the pitch…not to mention, from a purely financial perspective, he was a good bang for your buck proposition, something that we’ve failed miserably at in recent years…fact remains that as soon as Diamond Eye expressed serious interest in him we should have brought him back home immediately and given him a chance to prove himself…even if he didn’t exceed expectations, some regular minutes here would have propped-up his market valuation far beyond the amount of monies we’ll receive should he remain in Germany beyond this season…another short-sighted, amateur hour organizational move by our novice triumvirate, especially considering the supposed “build for the future” mandate currently being peddled
we seem fine at CB. What you accomplish in Germany cannot be easily translated to EPL. Think the decision has been made to move on from this player and seems like the best decision. Saliba is more promising anyways and still holding out hope he gets a chance at Arsenal.
keep in mind, there’s a very real possibility, considering our investments in both Gabs and especially White, that Saliba will never wear our kit and, in regards to the Bundesliga, many of the most coveted defensive players this off-season were plying their trades in Germany…of course, that’s not always the case, but I think sometimes the case against other Leagues, from a player evaluation perspective, is vastly overstated
Hindsight is always a wonderful tool, when trying to prove a point.
Mavs has been injury prone since he arrived at out club and MA couldn’t rely on fitness as he started to rebuild the club in his image.
My only beef is the very small fee we will receive for a player who, in glimpses, seemed a very promising CB.
Sensible words KL.
of course, you can always find some sort of justification for any managerial decision, but the real question is do these particular reasons outweigh the potential benefits of retaining the player in question?…based on your final statement, regarding the questionable financial aspects of this situation, I would suggest not
Pls, can he still be retained by Arsenal even if the club he was loaned to has a purchase option?