Would Arsenal’s B team walk our Europa League group? (Opinion)

With Arsenal getting to know their Europa League group stage opponents, it’s worth casting the light on the backup team at the disposal of Mikel Arteta.

Many Gunners fans would agree that their club has strengthened for the 2022/23 campaign which lies ahead of us.
Arsenal have a good chance of finishing in the top four while they are also being considered as one of the favourites for the Europa League title.

However, Arteta would have to chop and change the squad, if he wants his team to fight on maximum fronts this season.
Here’s a look at how ‘Arsenal B’ team might look like this season:
Turner
Cedric Holding White Tierney
Lokonga Elneny
Marquinhos Vieira Smith Rowe
Nketiah

If you ask me, this squad looks capable of getting a top spot in the group stage which have the likes of PSV Eindhoven and Norway and Swiss champions Bodo/Glimt and FC Zurich.

If things are not going Arsenal’s way, Arteta can always make up to five changes, which can alter the course of the game almost immediately.

This Arsenal squad is already a pretty robust team, and if you replace Marquinhos with Pedro Neto and Elneny with Youri Tielemans, you can only get more excited.

This year, we finally have huge numbers that can make the impact from the bench. And the squad depth will only increase with the addition of Neto and Tielemans.

With less than six days left for the transfer window to shut down, the Gunners’ hierarchy should definitely try to bring in few more additions.

Everybody knows why those additions should be made.

Yash Bisht

36 Comments

  1. You can comment on squad depth without making a silly statement that we will walk through a competition we’ve never won.

    1. Yep. If Ben really has that RB spot tied down then Tomi would be starting CB in our “B” team next to Rob.

    2. Lokonga is absolutely viewed by our coaching staff as a future potential replacement for Partey. You can take that to the bank. As to Tielemans your right he’s more of an 8. In terms of this B team given that it includes White I’d assume Tomiyasu is in the writers A team at RB.

  2. Hope and reality are different things. If we do not sign another two top players we WILL NOT win anything. Reality is to have a full, top squad. Edu can still get complacent. I’ve seen it too many times at Arsenal than to ‘hope’ it won’t happen…..like it did in the January screw up when we gave Tottenham our gift of 4th place

    1. Go read the Telegraph article on the ffp issues and our January business might enlighten you slightly. There is a reason we are on the watch list and not being sanctioned directly.

    1. I love this article. I agree that reinforcements in the team are needed, according to popular wisdom, “a reserve is better than a shortage”

      1. Based on what? His many competitive games for us or winning MLS GK of the year last year? Was also MLS All-Star Game MVP after making two penalty saves. Certainly our other American signing Austin Trusty oft forgotten has impressed well enough in the Championship since signing in Jan.

  3. Youri Tielemans and NATO will add depth for our Europa competition, 22/23; And even other Trophies. This is our level to be truly competitive

  4. Our “B” team is more than enough to get past the group phase in EL. White has been playing well as an RB in EPL, so I’d prefer Tomiyasu in the LCB position

  5. Stop with the ‘B’ team nonsense, we have a squad of players from which Arteta will pick the best 11, in his opinion, suited to the game to be played. Whilst there have not been any changes to the starting 11 so far, I am expecting rotation in all competitions this season, including the Premier League.

  6. I saw someone on Twitter describe Pedro Neto as the spanish Danny Welbeck. I’ve never watched Neto play so this was really discouraging.

    1. Strange comparison – neto looks like a dribbler and more similar to someone like hazard in style. I guess it just depends how good he is and how good he could be. He’s also Portuguese.

  7. OT: Admin I think we need a loyalty system for JA fans. I’ve managed to stick around on this site for over 10 years and other than @Got-an-Idea, I can’t see the guys I used to see back in the days.

  8. Agreed we need the likes of Neto and Tielemans in to really push on. I’ve been saying about Arsenal signing Pedro Neto for 3 seasons now, this boy will transform Arsenal. Tielemans I’d be very happy but I feel he misses a few key attributes like pace aggression and ability in the press but he’s young enough to address the last 2 things on my list.

    But our winter spending as you put it was not a screw up. I think it showed where we are at with our recruitment policy atm sensible and no knee jerk. Unlike under Wenger in the final years with his underperforming panic buys. We enquired about Vlahovic he wasn’t interested and only wanted Juve. So we kept our money till the summer to sign Jesus and saved 30m to boot.

    Some people would have had Arsenal sign light weight 6 goals in 36 games Alex Isaks for 65m, I think not. The lads got talent but he is talent in the rarest form I’ve seen for a long time like Ryan Babel for example. Or they would have had us sign that striker from social Sociadad I think can’t remember his name, but he was quoted 65m.

    We are doing things in the right way now and I’m proud of that fact. I think our spending and yes I’m going to say it is looking alot more organised and impactfull than the Wenger glory years. Wenger had to add to a good squad when he came in, inheriting the best back 4 and one of the best GK in the Premier league. Arteta has had to rebuild a squad.

    It took klopp 4 seasons to bare fruit and even though now when you look at it, 2 major trophies in 7 years is not great considering the money he’s spent 750m. Compare that to Arteta’s possible 320-350m by the end of this window, shows the level of investment required to claim just 1 prem title and 1 Champions league these days thats not considering Peps 1.5bln spend Utds 1.6bln to win nothing and spurs 700m to win nothing.

    So when you say Arteta has been given enough funding that’s what he’s competing with, but I think success is coming and more sustained hopefully than our rivals

    1. If I am not mistaken klopp was back in the CL in his second season … and hasn’t been out since .. we are in to our 4th season with arteta and there are no guarantees we will get there given some unfixed weaknesses .. and I’m pretty sure his net spend is less than ours or similar .. wrong comparison

    2. A lie though
      If you look at the Invincibles ….a better achievement then Arteta’s 5 th ( a position Wenger mostly bettered )here are the players Wenger did not inherit …..
      Lehamnan
      Cole , toure , campbell , Lauren , Clichy , cygan
      Silva , pires , lungberg , edu
      Henry , wiltord , Reyes

  9. Netos numbers 9 goals in 77 PL appearances
    Howe transformed Newcastle last season and as signed some good players if he’s signed ISak for that money then I would say he knows what he doing.
    So you think this squad is better than wengers glory’s years ?
    After 3 good games you might be getting ahead of yourself there

    1. And Arsenal invincible’s squad only 2 players were from the previous regime so Wenger also rebuilt the whole squad .
      Martin .k
      Ray parlour

  10. Agreed Dan but another caveat to that is the league was far less competitive and the transfer market was also less competitive. until the likes of Chelsea and City got their hands on oily money. Wenger capitalised on and uneducated footballing system he was the pioneer for all modern football clubs today in some way or another. I would say he even Influenced peps tiki taka to an extent.

    But I think any manager who is at a top 5 club (excluding spurs cause their not a big club just because they have a nice stadium) has a tougher task than the wengers and fergies of times gone by

    1. Exactly James. I try to tell them this but they don’t want to hear it – it goes in one ear, misses the grey cell and flies out the other.

    2. No he said
      Our spending is more impactful and organised then wengers glory years and that Wenger inherited a good squad
      Wenger inherited a squad aging , boring and with a drinking culture
      Oh and who had finished 5th
      In his first full season he made them champions
      Arteta inherited a team who finished 5th and took them to 8th , 8th and 5th
      Factually the worst period in our Prem history so let’s wait till we compare them to our greatest ever manager lol

  11. Complacency is a major factor and there seems to be a lot of it about regarding the EL group stage.

    Bodo/Glimt… ask Celtic how bad they are. Celtic may not be the force they once were in modern football, but this year Bodo beat them 2-0 in Norway and 3-1 in Scotland. That’s still not easy to do.

    And the town is inside the Arctic circle – it’s not like a trip to Burnley.

    Anyone who thinks PSV will be a pushover is probably missing a few things. Rangers may have got through their playoff match, but they walked on water in the leg in Eindhoven – with PSV (uncharacteristically) missing a lot of chances, including Gakpo.

    The “uncharacteristically” is important – we can’t excpect them to keep doing that.

    A “lesser” Arsenal team *might* get through this group but IMHO it wouldn’t be wise to try. Rotating players in some matches, yes – but playing some kind of “B team” if there is such a thing… that feels suicidal.

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