I hope as part of our preparation for WBA we have a list of penalty takers who have done a lot of practice.

It is very easy to criticise Arsenal for where the money should have been spent or distributed better and we can convince ourselves of how much players we didn't buy would have been had we bought them. The over riding thing for me is that the squad had huge problems in virtually every position - and in some ways still does. It will take time to fix, but at the same time it doesn't excuse Arteta for not getting more out of what he already has. There are some difficulties with a lot of players out, that anyone apart from Chelsea, City and Man U would probably struggle with - Liverpool certainly did last year.

The midfield we had when Arteta took over was: Xhaka, Guendouzi, Torreira, Willock, Ceballos(loan) and Elneny away on loan. It really wasn't great, Willock was the one who could be sold for a good price but none of the others are good enough for where we should be so an entire new midfield of at least 4 players needs to be built. If that was your only problem then you should be able to do that in a the 18 months and financial backing Arteta has had. But he's also had to fix plenty of other areas.

Again, he should be getting more from what he has but I think the inability to shift on some players has hampered what we can get in, and there are many areas to fix.

We should play our best 11 for WBA. Need to get a win.

We also had Özil and Maitland-Niles? Mkhitaryan was away on loan like Elneny. I don’t think we should forget how well Guendouzi often played under Emery, or how well Torreira did initially (dec pointed that out yesterday), or that Ceballos had a more than decent first season resulting in him making an important contribution to winning the FA Cup. Saka had already made his debut before Arteta arrived so he should probably be added too.

Sheer poverty for midfield options Rich. Also got lumbered with the costs of supporting a Mesut Özil who was on the beach, deliberately ostracised himself and trying to engineer a move away.

Nothing was ever going to change until those players moved on. (Willock aside)

David Ornstein has done an interview with Jack Wilshere which is quite a sad listen. 29 years old, traning by himself, no offers from any club. He's contemplating retirement now, seeing there's little interest for him. Not exactly what anyone would've pictured when he broke through and had that performance at Camp Nou as a teenager.

Four transfer windows later you presumably think much the same.

Nope

2 good midfielders Partey and Lokonga. Artetas signings

2 bad Xhaka, El Nenny. Wenger

Ta.

So you must think our midfield is now quite good. Fair enough, I’d got the wrong impression from you.

No I think when the latter is involved which is a lot it’s pretty average, when we swap them out then your cooking on gas,

Considering how Sanchez performed at Manchester United and how Mkhitaryan did at Arsenal, I wonder how many worse swaps deals there’s been in football? Has there been a less successful one?

He has 34 caps for England. Didn't realise it was that much.

Kane stays.

No matter what you think about Levy he knows how to deal with those situations. Buyer has to pay their price or will get nowhere and the player to go *%^@ themselves as they are under contract unless it happens.

From the Independent.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.indepe ... .html%3fam

I don't think it follows.

He's happy to splash 50 million on White because he sees him as the right player. You can't argue that central defense was our major weakness last season, so it doesn't follow that Arteta is thinking the way you imply. He can't be unaware the CM is problematic. As you note, Elneny is still the alternative.

I suspect Arteta's transfer priorities are driven less by 'which position is the weakest link?' that 'is the player I am getting the right one long term? That and 'holes all over the place'.

You almost think there is a element of going to the shops to get some bread and finding yourself somehow back home with a carton of milk you didn't need.

It happens to all of us, I'm sure.

But just think how bad it would be if we played our best 11 (whatever that is) and then lost.

Hi Decaf,

Reminds me of the good old Wenger days when he would go out transfer hunting determined to bag himself a big, solid defender or a topclass keeper and somehow always came back with a jinky winger

I'd throw £60m at West Ham for Antonio. What a player. He would shake up our attack no end.

I nearly wrote that that is unlikely but.....................

Hard to think of one. In fact I often see this particular swap deal bought up as the barometer for bad swaps. I think everyone came out of this worse off.

Mkhitaryan has rebuilt is reputation at Roma I'd say, but I had to google to double check where Sanchez now is. He's only scored 16 goals since leaving Arsenal. Criminal that we didn't accept the £60m Man City bid for him only 6 months before this swap

Really fun footballer who is unpredictable but a very good forward. He's 31 though so I'd be throwing a bit less than £60m at them for him!

We did have those players but I was really concentrating on the options for the two players who sit in central midfield rather than those 3 positions behind the lone striker - which is the primary formation we've played for probably 12 years now.

It will be interesting to see how Torreira's and Guendouzi's careers go from here to see whether we made the right call getting rid of them or whether we should have persevered.

Other central midfield options (excluding attacking mids) for our rivals in the 19/20 season:
Chelsea: Jorginho, Kante, Kovacic, Gilmore
Leicester: Tielmans, Ndidi, Praet, Mendy, Choudhury
Liverpool: Fabinho, Henderson, Keita, Wilnadum, Milner
City: Fernandinho, Gundogan, Rodri
Man U: Fred, Matic, McTominey
Spurs: Sissoko, Winks, Ndombele, Wanyama

Of the 6 I listed for Arsenal: Xhaka, Guendouzi, Torreira, Willock, Ceballos(loan) and Elneny away on loan. We've lost 1 (ceballos), sold 1 (willock), sent two others on loan Torreira/Guendouzi) with a view to a permanent deal, were trying to sell one this summer (Xhaka) and would snap anyone's hands off for any decent offer for the last one (Elneny)

Of the 24 players listed of the 6 other clubs only 2 of them are not currently with the club.
We've had a lot of work to do, and still have a lot of work to do.

......and Arteta should be doing better with what he has. Both opinions can co-exist in my opinion

One thing I read is if we take Cédric, Mari and Willian signings - all were made by Arteta. So some fans will say 'well Arteta wanted or chose those players and look how bad they've been'. Or you could look that they all came from the same Agent, an Agent shared by Edu and possibly think Arteta said he needed a RB and CB and a winger and those 3 options at a combined £7m transfer fee were the players put to him by the hierarchy.
The trust as always is probably somewhere in between, because I doubt there are many situations at any club where the manager has zero or 100% say in all the transfers

My guess is Arteta would tell Edu what positions he wants prioritised at the start of any window. Edu then gets the details of who might be available to Arteta who states his choices in order. If Edu comes across a player who is available in one of Arteta’s non-priority positions I would expect him to tell Arteta to see if he wants him.

As such, I believe your implication is right that Arteta and Edu will both have important roles in transfers. But I hope Edu would not buy a player that Arteta says he doesn’t want. So while Edu will have a big role in finding players, maybe the bloke’s pay and even persuading him to join (Arteta will also have a very important function here), I would still expect Arteta to have the final say on whether a player is signed.

I find it very hard to believe Edu signed Willian, Partey, White, Ødegaard, Ramsdale or anyone else without speaking to Arteta about them first, with Arteta saying he’d want him or them in his playing squad.

I don’t know how Arsenal’s modern transfer activity gets carried out. But something along the lines of what I’ve just described is my first guess.

Arsenal XI: Bissouma, Bissouma, Chambers, Holding, Kolasinac, Elneny, Xhaka, Bissouma, Pépé, Saka, Aubameyang.

A pretty strong team.

There’s a lot of unsubtle and obvious messages built into that team selection you can draw on.

I think the most obvious message is that Arteta wants to win it, most certainly the game and hopefully the competition. So he should as well considering we’re not in Europe.

Strong side considering West Brom have made 11 changes. Players like Pépé 'should' be having a field day against a second 11 championship side.

AMN can't even get a game here, he needs to leave.

Tavares at right back ahead of the 4 right backs we have in the squad is a clear message that he wants a new one. I think Arteta will sadly have to keep wanting until we can shift some out the door

Very excited to se Ødegaard link up with Pépé, Saka and Aubameyang.

Yes But also

Message to the board .. Get me a right-back

Message to Fenerbahce and Kolasinac. .. you guys sort out a deal or we will use him. Fake threat

Message to Bellerin and AMN they need to move. (I mean how can they not get in that side)

I find it odd playing Saka again but there you go,

No excuses tonight against a weakened West Brom.

He looked a bit off against Chelsea so I thought he might need a rest. Then again, he's come back from holidays recently and hasn't had a pre-season so maybe he needs to play a bit to get back into shape.

Will Odegard cramp Emile Smith Rowe's development? Similar players and hard to accommodate them both.

Chambers at right back, Tavares left back, Kolasinac centre back with Holding.

Looks like Kolasinac is playing centrally, going out left when we're in possession with Tavares in front of him?

Tavares is pretty rapid.