There was a time, not so many years ago, where any Arsenal previews I wrote would be heavily redacted. Part of that was due to what appeared to be… “shenanigans” happening behind the scenes. Those “shenanigans” were fairly clear to knowledgeable observers around the sizes of transfer fees, fees paid to agents, and just general horrible choices made by those in charge of Arsenal at the time.
Not that you would know it listening to the fans, but Arsenal finished comfortably 2nd last season even after a ton of injuries. Reminder: Arsenal finished 8th in 19-20 AND 20-21. They finished 5th in 21-22. Man United finished 15th this past season. Spurs finished 17th.
Life (and bad management) comes at you fast.
So unlike the not-so-recent past, Arsenal qualify as fairly well-run these days. The leadership is slightly in flux with Edu Gaspar leaving and Andrea Berta arriving, but ownership seems significantly involved, and stable, sensible decision-making abounds.
In Mikel Arteta, they have a highly competent head coach who largely seems to get along with upper management, and continues to learn and get better. He has some critical weaknesses (squad rotation and risk-reward in tactics among them), but he’s considerably better than your average coach, and a fuckton better than most outsiders Arsenal could bring in from the job market.
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The question now becomes: can they progress from a string of 2nd-place finishes and one near-title into a juggernaut that contends across competitions every single season?
I know what they did last summer
Our analysis of Arsenal’s transfer business last summer was lukewarm. They brought in some new players, none of whom seemed like particularly great buys or value, but they had a functioning squad.
It’s not in the transfer grades, but throughout the summer we mentioned one worry about Riccardo Calafiori was the potential for injuries that had been flagged in past potential moves in Italy. After a season in the Premier League, injury concerns around Calafiori seem justified.
It turns out our broader lack of excitement on Arsenal’s new signings was spot on too, as was the note that some magical academy finds might help them fill depth at a couple of positions. Ethan Nwaneri (currently in a contract disagreement over future guaranteed playing time) looks like an excellent ball-striker and did far better than expected deputising for Bukayo Saka. On the other side of the pitch, Myles Lewis-Skelly (MLS) racked up minutes as a quality left back, but his skill set looks world class as a future left-sided box-to-box midfielder charged with zone-moving, creating for teammates, and general destruction and mayhem. The Hale End might now be the best academy in English football.
Who should they keep?
Arsenal are, for the most part, running it back next season with their key players. Some older and injury-prone players have been allowed to leave at the correct time, but pretty much everyone who got big minutes last year is sticking around, and just getting reinforced with new talent around them.
The Gunners’ three big stars are worthy of building around, and of the hype they get. Saka’s injury last season was very unfortunate and was arguably the biggest factor in taking them out of the title race. He was in competition with Mohamed Salah for player of the season when he was fit. With a deeper team and more tactical options around him, these numbers could get even better.
The Transfer FlowAnd I’ll say the same for Martin Ødegaard, who perhaps did not perform as well last season as he did in the previous campaign, and struggled a bit when Saka wasn’t in the lineup. Despite that, he was still one of the most effective playmaking midfielders in the world.
The Transfer FlowAnd William Saliba is one of the top center backs in the world, with as complete of a game as you’re ever going to see. He might not be the unquestioned best at anything, but you can count on one hand the number of guys who possess his combination of skills.
But Arsenal have a bit of a problem — all of these guys are running down their contracts. There’s no indication that any are itching to leave, but they can command huge salaries elsewhere, so they’re not going to be easy negotiators. If I was an Arsenal fan, I’d be very concerned about none of these players announcing long-term extensions yet. Getting this done would be more important than any signing.
Who’s for sale and what is their budget?
First off, their budget appears to be: Very high. If all of the reported signings go through, Arsenal could very easily spend in excess of £200m on new players this transfer window.
They seem unlikely to offset them with huge sales. The Gunners can afford this after keeping things reasonable last summer, but it will likely severely limit their ability to make big moves next year.
Arsenal would probably love to move on from Oleksandr Zinchenko, who has been disappointing since joining from Manchester City. Now that he’s run through 3 years of his contract, the Gunners can move him on to anyone who will take him without worrying about eating a PSR hit.
Arsenal might need to eat some wages to get Reiss Nelson off their books, though I’d be willing to gamble on the injury-prone winger if I was a bottom-half team. He posted some very good performances for Fulham before he got hurt.
And finally, if Arsenal are going to sign all of Viktor Gyökeres, Eberechi Eze and Noni Madueke as is currently rumoured, they’re probably going to sell one of their current attackers.
The most obvious one to move on from is Leandro Trossard given his age, but that’s also the reason he might not collect much of a fee.
The Transfer FlowArsenal fans seem torn about whether to trust the process or sell while the market is still good on Gabriel Martinelli… and so am I. He’s a solid performer, but his development has stalled, and his market value will sink after he’s relegated to backup status this season. It might be time to cash in.
Kepa is a totally fine backup goalkeeper
A quick and easy one here. £5m for a backup goalkeeper with a lot of Premier League experience who was just about a league average starter last year is just fine. Nothing to get excited about or criticize. Kepa is a backup goalkeeper.
I’m excited about Arsenal’s midfield
With the departures of Jorginho and Thomas Partey, who had both slowed down significantly by last season, Arsenal had the opportunity to significantly upgrade their midfield this summer. We can quibble about the prices they’ve paid — £56m for Martin Zubimendi certainly isn’t cheap — but I don’t think anyone can deny that they’ve significantly upgraded their defensive capabilities.
Zubimendi and Christian Nørgaard — who arrived from Brentford for £10m — have very similar-looking statistical profiles and should make for a great rotation in the defensive midfielder spot.
Nørgaard was well-regarded as a leader for Brentford and is expected to be a great character addition to the locker room, at the kind of reasonable price where you don’t worry too much about age curves or resale value. And much more importantly, Zubimendi gives Arsenal the kind of athleticism and ground-covering defensive ability that they haven’t had from that position over the last two seasons as Partey started to decline.
These additions should free up Declan Rice and Mikel Merino to play the box-crashing 8 roles they’re best at on a full-time basis. I don’t think there’s any question that Arsenal’s midfield improved significantly this summer, even if neither of Nørgaard or Zubimendi has particularly impressive passing numbers.
I am neither excited nor disappointed by Viktor Gyökeres
In turning their attention to Gyökeres for center forward, Arsenal is betting that any lack of goal-scoring they had last season was more of a weak link problem than anything else. You’ve seen this radar before, but one last time, his Primeira Liga numbers compared to Champions League. He was very solid, not spectacular in CL. I expect his Arsenal numbers to look similar.
The Transfer FlowGyökeres had big shot volume in Portugal and overperformed his xG, but he really farmed stats against poor opponents. The high number of blocked shots reflects an issue that I think we might see pop up in the Premier League a lot: He’s not amazing at getting shots off quickly or beating defenders in tight spaces. He gets his shots blocked pretty frequently when facing good defenders or packed penalty areas.
He’s a quality ball-striker and can place one in the corner. His off-ball movement is solid. But I think he’s a guy who scores the ones he’s supposed to and is not a ceiling-raiser. Arsenal think that this is better than the boom-or-bust potential of Benjamin Šeško or Hugo Ekitike, who have the potential to raise your ceiling or screw up the great stuff that Bukayo Saka and Martin Ødegaard create.
If you think those guys are the real stars and the best you can do in the current striker market is enhance their output, it also makes sense to sign a guy who’s pretty unselfish and willing to run the channels, then play a cutback when he gets onto the ball in a wide area of the box. Gyökeres does this a lot.
So, the summary: Gyökeres is well-rounded and a good teammate, but I question his ability to duplicate this output against top competition. I think he will be a good, not great player for Arsenal, neither a bust nor a huge success at the rumoured £60m price.
Why aren’t more teams trying to buy Noni Madueke?
Chelsea have been rumoured to have Madueke available for around £40m this summer. Then they saw that Mohamed Kudus and Anthony Elanga, who are probably inferior players, are going for prices in excess of £50m. They now, very understandably, appear to want at least £50m.
The Transfer FlowI really liked Madueke last season, and I didn’t understand why he was getting benched for Pedro Neto so often. He rocks. And between the end of the season and Club World Cup, he’s shown he can be productive on the left as well.
You should read this Scouted piece by Ashwin Raman about how he’s been trending upwards as a dribbler and shooter. Madueke also showed at the end of the season and the Club World Cup that he can be effective on the left as well. He’d be an amazing rotation piece for Arsenal. He’s probably too good for that and should be a first choice starter somewhere.
An alternative: Maghnes Akliouche
In the event Madueke realizes he should go start somewhere or Chelsea continues upping the price, may I once again present a newsletter favorite. Maghnes Akliouche was awesome for Monaco last year. There are basically no other left-footers who dribble, assist, and shoot at an above-average level in a top 5 league besides Mohamed Salah and Cole Palmer.
I also think Akilouche is solid with his ball-striking and shooting decisions, and was unlucky to underperform his xG. You’re buying low on someone who’s going to get better. The price of the brick is going up next summer.
Eberechi Eze is fine. I wouldn’t pay £68m
I am assuming that Arsenal would only buy one of Eze or Madueke, unless they already had a very good offer in for Leandro Trossard or Gabriel Martinelli. But since they are different profiles — Madueke is a lefty and pure winger, Eze is right-footed and a winger/10 tweener — we’re going to look at both profiles.
And yeah, he’s a pretty good player. He managed to get a lot of shots on a Crystal Palace team that wasn’t good, and where opposing defenses could zero in on him. His shot selection wasn’t great, but I think that this was out of necessity, and he would not take a bunch of crappy 25-yard rips if he was on Arsenal. His pass OBV and xG assisted, for a winger on a team that wasn’t great at attacking generally, are pretty encouraging.
But you should not pay £68m for a 27-year-old who is not an obvious, nailed-on superstar. This would be a poor allocation of resources.
An alternative: Harvey Barnes??
You probably just laughed reading that, but if Arsenal are dead set on signing a player who fits this profile, here’s a guy with better numbers who will probably cost less money. I’m just saying.
The Transfer Flow