Should Arsenal have gone the extra mile for Mudryk and Caicedo?

Has Arsenal Done Enough by Vuyo Mataka

Arsenal’s refusal to spend beyond their limit might cost them the title

With the conclusion of the January window, Arsenal have brought in Leandro Trossard, Jakub Kiwior and Jorginho. Trossard and Kiwior and sensible signings that add quality to our depth, however, Jorginho, a good signing in my opinion, is seen as a polarizing signing due to his age and the clubs history with Chelsea players. Only time will tell how these signings will turn out but, is it enough for Arsenal to win the league?

It the beginning of the window, centre forward was a priority for the club. With Eddie Nketiah making his mark in the team and Jesus recovering at a rapid rate, it made it a less of a worry.

Arsenal proceeded to bring appropriate cover for Gabriel with the signing of Kiwior. Arsenal proceeded on acquiring a wide forward option to compete with Martinelli.

Mykhaylo Mudryk was a long term target for the club, a promising talent with the utmost potential that would have been a solid addition. With a drawn out transfer saga, Arsenal lose out on the prospect to Chelsea, who were willing to pay more upfront. Same with Joao Felix, a player Arsenal were briefly interested in. Arsenal shifted focus to a more proven and more experienced option in Trossard.

The missing piece after that was an option in defensive midfield. The dream target was Moises Caicedo, a phenomenal player who has proved himself over such a short period of time. With the club pushing to get the deal done, Brighton were reluctant to let him go as a result of him being an essential player for the club. Arsenal not wanting to go above and beyond, settled for the singing of the experienced midfielder, Jorginho.

With arsenal missing out on the signing of Mudryk and Caicedo, due to financial reasons, it begs the question has Arsenal’s spending decisions cost them the league? Should they have broken the bank and paid a king’s ransom for these players or is the club in the right for choosing more sensible options

Arsenal have a long season ahead. With a target on their back, will they be capable of handling the pressure of becoming premier league champions. With how the league is going, it is going to be decided by a tough run of games in April for Arsenal.

I do not speak for all Arsenal fans, I truly am amazed how far the club has come. This club has come from disarray to a united club and fan base that is striving for success.

It is a dream, an achievable dream, to see Arsenal lift the league trophy but, at this point in time, Have the Arsenal done enough?

From this Arsenal fan, it is an unforgettable season regardless of the outcome.

Vuyo Mataka


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56 Comments

  1. Arsenal was doing just fine before the transfer window. We just increased our chance by adding 3 very good bodies to our squad.

  2. Please can we stop this here.

    We all need to respect the club for not bidding higher than they did, cos they clearly decided those players weren’t worth the extra amount. Would any of you pay more to buy something you would like? Probably not. So why should it be any different in football where the stakes and amounts are infinitely higher….?? This is a business and not a game simulation we’re talking about.

    As for the #eduout brigade – perhaps you should stop supporting our club if this is how fickle you really are. We’re top of the PL with a 5 point gap and a game in hand over the supposed greatest ever PL team in City and the greatest striker in the world right now in Haaland. What more do you actually want??

    The fact is, we’ve had a very solid window – we’ve brought in two VERY seasoned PL players in Trossard and Jorginho, the first of which has slotted straight in and can play in several positions; and the second of whom has an honors list that puts most players to shame. He also has stats over the last two years that match (if not better) that of Partey in many depts.

    Throw in we bought Kiwor who can give us extra depth where needed.

    Granted, all three wont be immediate starters – however we have 3 much needed positions covered now and can rotate these players to give our first XI a much needed rest for the 18 PL ‘cup finals’ we have left.

    Big money signings dont necessarily buy success, so can certain quarters of the Arsenal fanbase understand this.

    We are actually FAR STRONGER now with these three signings, then we wouldve been had we have blown 80m on either Mudryk or Caciedo alone. And we’ve spent about half of that amount in the process.

    Now let’s all get behind the team like we have been recently, cos it’s very well documented just how much strength and positivity the team actually take from all us fans

    1. This absolutely. Deliberately stayed away from deadline day so as not to get drawn into any conflict and was dismayed to read some of the initial comment but comments like this and the various replies from regular posters who often differ on various other topics outside this has been uplifting in general.

    2. Yes agree Ric. The number of articles written and commentary on the ifs or buts of the transfer window is overwhelming. Most punditry agrees that the Arsenal have had an excellent window, but only time will tell. Everton this weekend, that’s what I am interested in.

    3. As so many have said, spot on ric.

      If people really consider themselves fans and/or supporters, they’d be excited about the club addressing every pertinent need. We fell short a season ago due to injuries to our more experienced and talented players. Not appreciating the lesson learned is a mistake too many who claim to love this club keep making.

  3. Yes. I’d rather pay too much and win the PL this year. Generally I’m AGAINST paying too much But this year is an exception. We wouldn’t go into bankruptcy and have a much better chance to win the PL. I think Man City could pip us because they have better quality in depth.

    And just because we are number 1 this year doesn’t mean we will even be in the top 4 next year

    We should have done everything we could to secure a PL win this year

    1. I have seen trossard play in Brighton to know he his a fine player but haven’t seen mudryk play just 15min against milner people shouting he his a great player,as if people forgot how 19yrs martinelli disgrace both kante n d milner or people forgot trossard disgrace milner n van diyk this season n d last but u guys don’t call him great bcos now he his in arsenal.joginho is another different case,which can be seen in 2 different scenario,Chelsea football n arsenal balling is to different kind of balling,euro joginho is a beast

    2. Tbh I think for the short term, to have more chance of winning the title this year, it’s better to get experience and leadership over potential. Jorginho has won trophies and played a lot of European and PL games, whereas Caicedo is still very inexperienced.

      For the long term of course I would rather have brought in Mudryk and Caicedo, but Caicedo is still possible in the future

    3. Hi Stephanie
      It’s like £80 million for one player or the 3 players we bought
      Take your pick…☺

    4. Firstly there is no guarantee that signing Caicedo and/or Mudryk would get us any closer to winning the league. We are talking here about relatively unkown players not Messi from a few years back..Secondly this AFC team is laden with young talent at their or just before their prime. This isn’t a one year leicester like wonder

    5. @Stephanie: You would have overpaid for a player who was not even up for sale?

      Charming, just charming.

  4. No, because their price tags were heavily inflated for non- homegrown players. Marseilla got Ounahi for 8 M + 2 M add-ons, whereas Napoli bought Kim Min-jae for merely 10 M

  5. No ways. They already went too far out in both cases. I’m grateful to Chelsea & Brighton for preventing us from fatal errors.

    The philosophy that Arsenal makes stars than buy them …. makes our club unique and special. This part of the major reasons why some of us are so endeared to the Gunners.

  6. I think this is a question we should be revisiting at the end of the season. Too early to draw any conclusions. 50 points after 19 games is insane. Let’s just hope our core stays fit ’cause they’re more than capable of winning it.

  7. @ Stephanie I hope u eat ur words come end of the season when AFC lifts the epl trophy. By the way, what guarantees do u have that buying just Mudryk or/and Caicedo will win us the league?

  8. Caicedo yes, Mudryk no…..we have a ton of attacking players already.

    He’s the reality, we are very very very unlikely to be in this position again next year with this lead at this stage of the season. I would’ve gone all our for the best DM we could find. Winning the EPL is worth it, Caicedo has already showed that he can do it in the EPL so not a huge risk.

    Would you not risk over paying to take a chance at winning the EPL?

    1. Why are we still talking about this.
      It’s disrespectful to the 3 players bought.
      Let’s just support the lads and take one game at a time.

        1. Don’t be so bloody rude telling me to get over it.
          You’ve got your opinion I’ve got mine.
          My message was also just in general not aimed at you and your comment.

        2. @PJ-SA
          It’s disrespectful , the whole article is just to stir the pot. It’s done- we got 3 players lets support the team and the new comers. No point to discuss-if this if that bla, bla.
          lets go Gunners.

  9. Was Caicedo even for sale????
    As for Mudryk, we got 3 players for less around 50% of his price, and had we bid 100m , Chelsea would probably have outbid us.
    The fact is we did go the extra mile by spenrding far more than our title rivals.

  10. Arsenal we not willing to bring in expensive players to come and disrupt what is working well at the group.

    1. Oh, ok so Arsenal bring in old cheap, and potentially disruptive players instead. Makes a lot of sense to me ( I think!!!). And be the way what makes it an excellent window when next summer we’ll have to go out shopping again to find players who can give the club a competitive edge in the Champions League? The window was what it was. Mudryk got away, Chelsea got their men, Canciello remained at Brighton and Arsenal now have to get on with making the most of what they have.

  11. I see this article as questioning the decisions made by MA and Edu and why not ask it?

    I believe they made the right decision, because they placed a maximum value on both players and that was it.

    I cannot see that their decision will derail the pursuit of the PL title, as they immediately signed two proven PL players, who are ready to go!!

    We are sitting at the summit of the PL, five points clear and with a game in hand, without these two overpriced and, in one case, untried young wannabes.

    Well done to the manager for sticking with his beliefs on this subject.

  12. Spending heavily on players doesn’t necessarily guarantees success. We have seen this time and again for arsenal fans to trust and appreciate the players brought in. I remember we bought Nicolas pepe to create the kind of impact which SAKA is now creating. Many questioned the boards decisions to buy Odegard for around £30mil instead of paying the £50mil plus Leicester was demanding for Madison, well in hindsight we all would agree odergard was a steal. My belief is the players with the most influence in a team are mostly the ones who were bought with relatively small fees perhaps because they don’t have to live with that extra pressure of trying to prove their hefty price tags. COYG this is our season, everything is going in our favor. Hence missing out on mudryk and caicedo is for our good.

  13. By refusing to pay over the odds for Caicedo and Mudryk Arsenal has set out there stall for future dealings. We might moan and groan right now, rightly or wrongly so, but clearly Arsenal has taken a stand, and sending out their own message that we will not be taken advantage of

    1. Yes, I’ve noticed that we’ve been doing that over a few windows now – and it is essential, as you say.

      For a while the opposite was true – the priority was to show clubs that we wouldn’t lose players to other “big” clubs, Arsenal had to show it was still a big club by keeping them at almost any cost (Sanchez and £500k a week to Man Utd was impossible to stop without breaking the bank).

      This came after the lean years when the RvP types were jumping ship when the stadium rebuild was hurting financially and there was no FFP limiting the likes of Abramovic’s spending – so we were paying a price to stop the rot, including overpaying for some transfers.

      Now, the message we want to send is different and it spells out “We’re back”. And we won’t be pushed around.

  14. Arsenal buying Odegard was all down to Arteta who really wanted the player and now he has turned Odegard into world 🌎 class. Jorginho is 100% arteta’s signing, he loves and believes in the player, now he has him… watch how he turns J20 into a beast. COYG trust the process

  15. Our signing of Tomiyasu and Kiwior are examples of what we trying to do. And I applaud our management for such shrewd business. Knowing when to walk away from a deal when you realize you being ripped off is key. How much do you think Tomiyasu will be worth now. What about Odegaard and White? Saka and Martenelli? I bet you even Zinchenko’s stock has risen.

    1. Yep – our current front 3 cost a truly massive £6m in total.

      Eat your hearts out Chelsea. 🙂

    1. Chelsea have had a lot of instant success over the past 20 years and unfortunately they will continue to do so. For years we waited patiently for Arsene Wegner’s philosophy of not buying success to come to fruition and our club ended up standing still. Yes, we have had a few successful dealings in the transfer market but let’s not also forget the failures in Tavares, Lokonga, Viera and William. Our club is now in the best position it has been for some time but let’s not destroy it by bringing in second raters and then trying to cover it up with some dumb arsed philosophy of ” we are Arsenal and we ore better than anyone else, regardless.

      1. We are, where we are now, because, we have build a team with young players from within and a lot of new young talented players bought at a max. of 50m. Alle have been coached and drilled into a fantastic unit.
        Only that way has it been possible in such short time. had we bought 2-3 players in the 80-100m. catrgory, we couldn’t have done it.
        No club has a 100% success rate with players they buy, and if you buy many, there will be several mis-hits. But they are less damaging and risky, if they aren’t bought for huge sums.

  16. I think every club has a price they will pay for a particular player, some may want to stick to a realistic cost some may pay ridiculous insane cost.

    In general am please with how we conducted our business.

  17. Mudryk unproven and way overpriced in my opinion, he’s also being investigated by the FA for his social media post.
    Caicedo was never for sale however much we bid for him and Brighton told Arsenal from the beginning he was not for sale whatever we offered, also both Partey’s and Jorginho’s stats are better than his in all respects.
    Sometimes you have to stick to your guns!

  18. I see too many comments saying we might not be close or might not even make top 4 next year.
    Why undermine and devalue what Arteta is building? He has the youngest squad and another year with them, they can get better.
    Yes it’s a good year and good chance but why do you think we can’t be even better?

    1. I concur. I expect all of the posters saying we won’t be in the running for the PL or top 4 next year are lottery winners, as apparently they can see into the future.

    2. Last season many of them were saying, that was our best chance of making top 4.
      Unbelieveable, they keep going like that.

  19. Good to read the comments and see a 99% return to common sense on this site. Just after the window closed the rabid ravings made me think I’d stepped into a parallel universe.

  20. The way I look at it is we got 3 players less the price off one.

    I’m glad that we are not overspending on unknown quantities. If Caicedo performs consistently for the next 2 years then I would understand the fee… but only half a season doesn’t warrant that amount of money quoted. Anyway, I want Rice.

    I’m over the moon with Trossard, Kiwior I haven’t seen enough so can’t really make a judgement, Jorginho it is was it is and all I hope is that he proves me wrong… I really do😉

    Transfer window is over so onwards and upwards🤞

  21. I THINK IT WAS A NO BRAINER BUYING THE 3 PLAYERS WE DID, ALSO VERY CLEVER OF ARTETA AND EDU THAT 2 OF THE 3 PLAYERS SIGNED ARE FOR NOW NOT THE FUTURE AND THEY WON’T NEED TIME GETTING USED TO A DIFFERENT COUNTRY OR DIFFERENT CLIMATE THEY WILL HIT THE GROUND RUNNING, I’M SO COFINDENT NOW COME ON THE GUNNERS..

  22. £100m for Mudryk or £80m for Caicedo seems very high. No thanks to the calamity of financial operation at both Manchester clubs and Chelsea. Arsenal maintained their way of conducting things and look at the EPL table. Since all the defence, midfield and forward dept got relatively cheap and quality additions, I don’t know why fans are still mourning and groaning. Must be the ones who still staying with parents and not qualified for a house loan, thus they don’t understand how finance works. Imagine there is a lockdown again next season.

  23. Absolutely NO; Arsenal needs to remain a viable business in the long term, not pay over the odds for players to gain potential short term success at the risk of future financial collapse.

  24. IMHO both Mudryk and Caicedo transfer fees were inflated, and were not worth those prices.

    For around 60 million Kiwor, Trossard, & Jorginho improve our team more than 1 Mudryk or 1 Caicedo.

    I argue that the sum is greater than the parts, and we will see this finishing out the season.

    We should still be able to tempt Rice in the Summer, and hopefully add Balogun to our attacking options next season.

    Signing Saka and Saliba is the priority now, and more important than any possible Summer signing.

    If we have to sell either the bidding should easily start at 100 million or not bother with negotiations.

  25. Reiss Nelson vs Mikhaylo Mudryk after two games:

    Nelson: €0M
    2 games, 2 goals, 1 assist

    Mudryk: €100M
    2 games, 0 goals, 0 assists

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