There would appear to be just four teams in the race for the 4th and final Champions League place, with Arsenal holding a slender advantage over West Ham, Man United and Spurs at the moment.
But with nearly half the season to go there is nothing set in stone, but the Gunners legend Ray Parlour believe that United are the current favourites since changing their manager, with the other three fighting it out for 5th and 6th.
But he thinks all four could give a boost to their chances by bringing in the right acquisitions in the transfer window. This is what Parlour told TalkSport (transcribed by the Metro): “If he [Rangnick] can get that little bit of a buzz around Manchester United again, they’ve got better players probably than most of the squads,” Parlour told talkSPORT before Manchester United’s loss to Wolves.
“Then you look at Spurs, I think it’s close between Spurs and Arsenal. The north London derby coming up will be massive for both sides.
“And then West Ham, you still can’t write them off. I know they had that little bit of a blip but they’ve bounced back very well against Palace and Watford. But it’s all about the transfer window for me, West Ham need a few more players coming in. Certainly a striker is desperate. They’ve really been dismantled at the back… whether they look at a centre-half.
“A lot of it is going to come down to signings in January. Not just the top four, but at the bottom as well. If I’m going to stick my neck out, I would certainly go with Manchester United still [to finish fourth].”
Parlour continued: “I’m hoping Arsenal can do it, I really like the way they’re playing at the moment.
“[Thomas] Partey had his best game I’ve seen in an Arsenal shirt at the weekend [against Man City] and now he goes away on Africa Cup of Nations duty, so he’s going to be a big miss.
“Striker-wise, not got a lot of backup. [Alexandre] Lacazette if he gets injured, [Pierre-Emerick] Aubameyang is out of the picture at the moment, they’ve got no real player that can go up there.
“[Gabriel] Martinelli can play up front but he’s probably better of the left-hand side at the moment with the way he’s playing.”
So, Ray obviously thinks that a new top striker is Arsenal’s biggest priority, as a lot of us on here have been saying for a while, and maybe an urgent back-up for Partey.
Let’s hope Edu and Arteta can work their magic again like they did in the last window…
THE JUST ARSENAL SHOW – Dan Smith has a rant over Arteta and ‘Players Welfare”
A new CF will help, but we can also make Lacazette and Nketiah more focused by extending their contracts. If they refuse to stay, we’d better try Balogun, Pepe or Smith-Rowe for the CF role
How bad this analysis is,how on earth can you put Pepe or Smith Rowe for CF role
Smith-Rowe played decently as a false nine against Villareal, whereas Pepe is quite tall, technical and pacey to be a CF
Gunnersauras is quite tall. Technically I have never once seen him fall over. And he is much more pacey than Xhaka. Perhaps we should try him then.
You mean the Villarreal game where we played a complete different system one we hadn’t not played all season and then went on to get beat by a team that if we are honest are way way below our standards and against a manger we had just sacked for getting bad results ,is that the Villarreal game your talking about .
Gai
We don’t need someone that can be just “decent” for CF I think Pepe can help there. But the challenge remains he will be in AFCON and for those periods a lot of games would be played. Nkethia is refusing to sign. Balogun don’t seem ready, R. Palour is right we surely need a CF signing. We also need to be worried about who partners G Xhaka when T Pathey leave for AFCON.
Perfectly agree with Ray. Point is we desperately need a CF and a DM to stand a chance to make it to the top 4.
Why not get Yves Mbesouma for DM position? Yes he may be off to AFCON bt i rate him way better than Xhaka in the long term
Will be interesting to see whether the Kroenke’s are willing to push the boat out this window. I suspect the original plan was top six this year and then make a couple of big signings in the summer to put us back in CL./title contention
But we are arguably ahead of schedule and if the right players are available now, maybe the owners can be convinced to splash the cash now.
Not sure which approach is better. I tend to be a slow and steady kind of guy and think better players will be available in the summer.
On reflection, I’ll take the middle path again – loans for Jovic and Wijnaldum. That would do me.