Gabby Agbonlahor believes Eddie Nketiah has to step up and justify his new contract and the huge salary that comes with it.
The striker was given a new deal in the summer worth around £100,000 a week after he showed improved form in the second half of the season.
However, Arsenal added Gabriel Jesus to their squad in the last transfer window, and Nketiah has been struggling to play regularly.
But the Brazilian suffered a serious injury at the World Cup and will likely be out for around three months, offering the young Englishman a chance to show he can lead the line for the Gunners.
Agbonlahor says he has to step up and justify why he is earning such a huge salary. He tells Football Insider:
“Eddie Nketiah has got to step up now. He’s getting paid £100,000-a-week. He’s got to repay that faith by banging in the goals until Jesus is back.
“Arsenal shouldn’t have given him that money if he wasn’t good enough to step up and be their main striker if needed.
“I’m sure he will provide some really important goals. I think Man City will win the league anyway, but just being in that fight for the league will give you a top-four place.
“I think Arsenal would be happy with that.”
Just Arsenal Opinion
Nketiah delivered towards the end of last season, and the striker proved he could be relied on. However, he was playing under less pressure at the time, so it was different.
All eyes will be on him now, and he didn’t do so well during the Dubai Super Cup to inspire confidence among Arsenal’s fans.
—————————————
CALLING ALL ARSENAL FANS! Anyone who would like to contribute an Article or Video opinion piece on JustArsenal, please contact us through this link…
Mikel Arteta pre West Ham talks about injuries and Arsenal’s transfer window.
Please enjoy, watch and subscribe to JustArsenalVids
I would t say huge salary ,compared to what some players get ,but a salary way more than he should have got for his talent .
Hopefully if he’s put into action he can justify that outlay .
You never know he could turn into a scoring machine ,but I doubt it IMO .
Eddie will produce the goods.
Trust him.
When are the press gonna start reporting the actual cost of players? Wages plus transfer fees..
Nketiah is on 100k if reports are correct, that is £25 million over 5 years plus he is young and will should recoup most of that if we sell him
A recent alternative is Neil Maupay, £20 million plus £50k a week. That is £32.5 million for a player who will score less and have no sell on value due to his age.
It’s not just about overall cost, it’s also about how much goes to that player. It could be said that maupay does more to earn his 50k pw salary, whereas Nketiah so far hasn’t done much to earn double that amount.
You’re looking at it like an accountant, from the club’s monetary perspective, although you don’t consider (seemingly) that it’s hard to justify over paying one player and not over paying the others (if a squad player is on 100k pw, every other squad player can demand the same, and every first teamer can demand 150k pw at a minimum, justifiably). How much can we realistically spend on salaries?
Eddie’s current deal is a hangover from the old-style Arsenal days where a 2nd-rate player puts in a few good performances at a critical time (I seem to remember Eddie being instrumental in putting away Chelsea in one game, in a run of a few good games) and then an insecure Arsenal offer them a contract that’s totally out-of-proportion with their actual contribution and based on a dream that they will “Finally fulfil their great potential”. Those few games set-up Eddie for life, but that’s his ceiling and it’s not going anywhere upwards from now on. In reality I doubt Mikel Arteta has any illusions that Eddie will become Erling Haaland anytime soon, and no doubt is dreading restarting the season without Jesus, but he can’t exactly come out and say that can he?
If Arteta didn’t believe in him then Nketiah wouldn’t be here. Trust the manager!
I think you have a point. It is important to note as well that Arsenal cannot currently take the kind of risks that the likes of Chelsea or Man U can take in the transfer markets. This is one of the reasons we ended up with the kind of deals we have had with some former players. Nketiah’s deal is still relatively low if you were to compare with the kind of cost that would come with the transfer of a truly elite player.
It is also important to be fair and say that we don’t know Nketiah’s “ceiling” even if most of us would agree that he has not shown enough up till now to give us confidence that he is good enough to the lead the line and score enough goals for the rest of the season.
Eddie case is a little different in my opinion, let’s look at it rationally.
If Arsenal was to dip into the market for a striker say Eddie, DKL level etc, they would have to come up with £10 – £20 mil minimum, up front to purchase the player then that player salary would maybe far less say maybe £50,000 a week.
If you happen to get such a player free now that said player is bound to cost a few more quids in salary, not sure if am missing something here , but that’s just how I see it.
If Eddie had decided to leave, Arsenal would have received around 10M(for his development).Liverpool and Fulham agreed a fee of 7M for Carvalho,instead of going to courts.over 5 years Eddie’s contract will cost Arsenal 25M.i believe that for the same or even less money(I include wages in that 25M),we could have bought a better player but that’s just my opinion.
Think I get your point and didn’t realize we would actually get some quids from he moving on