One of the great hallmarks of Wenger sides is he allows, said to even encourage, creativity around the box, hence them sometimes trying to walk the ball in.

At our best there was a queue for the ball. Sometimes cut backs into the box, sometimes players like Freddie off the last person, well timed, and Fabregas or Bergkamp flipping the ball over and if not a goal, the defender desperate and sometimes fouling.

I don't see that with Arteta as much. I don't see players making runs when we have the ball in a dangerous area outside the 18 yard box. Players would sometimes stop their forward progression instead of attacking spaces that makes defenders have to make a tough choice. We were masters of that before. I recall Gary Neville saying that Pires and Freddie would sometimes end up on each others side of the box and his defenders complaining they get over run and not sure who to follow and he saying 'just play your area'.

I hope that Ødegaard and Ramsdale is not the end of our transfers in, otherwise it makes no sense when we still need a RB and a striker.

We could have got a cheap loan or experienced GK in and diverted the £24m to a right back or striker, then gone back for Ramsdale next year because there didn’t appear to be any competition for him.

I suppose that will be the frustrating thing if we don’t end up strengthening other areas of the team. If Ramsdale sits on the bench this year you can add in Saliba on loan and we’ll have spent £50m on 2 positions and players who aren’t helping our starting 11

I think Ramsdale is being brought in as a backup to begin with, but with the view to take over as no 1 if Leno's form doesn't pick up. Maybe a little competition will light a fire under him. Leno also has two years left on his contract and there's not been any word of an extension, so next summer we'll probably be looking to sell if he hasn't signed on. In that scenario we'd already have a replacement who's been a starter in the PL for a couple of seasons.

We’re allowed 17 non home grown players in our squad. I think I read Tavares is young enough to not take one of these spots and also when Martinelli and Saliba turn 22 they will count as home grown players - which is quite important if we see them as long term squad members AND if the rules change they’re only going to change to increase the number of home grown players you need.
So we currently have 17 non home grown
Leno, Runarsson, Tierney, Mari, Gabriel, Cédric, Kolasinac, Partey, Xhaka, Lokonga, Elneny, Torriera, Pépé, Lacazette, Aubameyang, Willian, Ødegaard
You would think Runarsson, Kolasinac and Torreira won’t be at the club so it would open up 3 spots for new signings….

Haaland, Ronaldo and Kane.

We have 4 right backs on our books at the moment !

We shell out 282k a week to pay the salaries of the right backs at the club at the moment. Not sure you can justify signing a 5th right back without selling first.

Signing a homegrown back up keeper of decent quality makes sense to me. Doing stuff like getting short terms loans and transfers in Willian.... ceballos .... oh look Lichsteiners a bargain everyone says . I think we’ve been burned by all that stuff. It never works out.

The short term loan for Ødegaard worked out. I don’t think we should overlook them. Lots of teams have explored creative ways of getting players in. Juve have just signed Locatelli on a 2 year loan with obligation to buy for £34m….in 2 years time.

But that would kill Balogun
Speaking of Haaland, I’m amazed City are prepared to go for Kane at £150m when Haaland could be available for a similar amount. And also because Haaland’s release clause at around £70m comes in to effect this time next year, and with a clause that ‘low’ City’s bottomless pits of money won’t be the biggest factor. There would be a number of teams in at that price. City, Man U, Liverpool, Bayern, Real Madrid

Then it’s not a loan is it!

Ødegaard was the exception surely

Look how Denis Suarez, Willian, lichtensteiner, ceballos, runnarson, Kim kallsttrom worked out.

No more of it. Just fix it once, it doesn’t make sense paying a fortune in wages for sticking plasters it’s got us nowhere. No more loans or giving players a free final contract

I am excited by the Ramsdale deal, as I was with the Ben White deal. Not because I have any particular knowledge or opinion on either player but because I have made the assumption that to splash that much cash on two young emerging players the club's recruitment team must see something very special in them indeed.
If they have got these wrong then goodness knows what the implications for the club will be.

What I will say is that spending £24m on a back-up keeper is unlikely to improve our top four chances this season, unless he starts immediately and starts turning in worldclass performances (which is unlikely) whereas spening £34m on Tammy Abraham or another striker might have improved our chances a little more.

You pays your money and you takes your chances.

Spot on. A pointless competition for clubs of any decent size.

Another possibility would horse blinders for our midfielders?

If they still pass sideway then neutering may become necessary, as you suggest.

Spurs are a decent size, thirsty for success ... any success. Even another Korea Peace Cup or Sun International Challenge Trophy would be welcome, let alone glory in the conference league

I understand your point but if for example you have £20m left to spend and need 2 players I would prefer to get a £20m permanent solution for 1 of those positions and take a loan for the other and we can fix that position next year. The other option is signing 2 x £10m players and neither is suitable. The right loan signing can help you in the here and now without busting your budget or to help you get your primary targets in other positions

What are the forums thoughts on a Bellerin/Trippier swap deal?

When Trippier's name was first linked to us I wasn't keen mainly because of his age, but given time to think about it there could be a 3 year or so role for someone like Trippier to come in as a more experienced player to hold up the right side of our defence and attack. He's certainly better than Bellerin and any of our other right backs

I know what you mean. My comment was more aimed at the Denis Suarez, licthensteiner, ceballos type decisions.

My general feeling is those type agreements haven’t worked out for us and added to our lack of long term planning and focus. Gives the impression the club is a revolving door of players that pass like ships in the night.

Ultimately it comes down to a simple problem. What do you do when you need 250 million quids worth of players but only have 130 million. Surely only Harry Potter can fix that ?

Interesting to note that currently, the Chelsea game is not sold out. Tickets are available to anyone who wants them I think.

I presume there'll be a fair few ST holders who don't yet feel confident enough to attend or intend to use their absence as a protest. Some will be on holiday.

On past evidence, the club never confirm the actual attendance but it could be pretty low.

That's what scouts, transfer negotiators and coaches/managers earn their money from.
We could say we need £250m worth of players or we could say we need a raft of top quality players, one doesn't equal the other if we're smarter with our business as other clubs have been.

I wonder if you took the top 30 players in the prem, or top 3 players in each position and see how many of those were bought as a high fee purchase that would have been out of our reach?

Also, you can't always fix everything at once. We're not going to go from 8th place to challenging for the title or probably even top 4 in one summer. We've strengthened central defense, attacking midfield and added depth to our midfield and goalkeepers now. Hopefully we'll get at least a right back in before the window closes, otherwise we'll just have to go with what we have and continue building next time around. Klopp didn't build his team in just one or two summers, it basically took 6 transfer windows until he had his squad.

We still needed a keeper to replace Leno (who looks certain to leave next year) and an upgrade on Holding. Perhaps its a case of making the deals that are available for high potential players in positions we do need players rather than unsuccessfully trying to get in laturo Martinez or hakimi, for example.

There does at least seem to be a clear plan and consistent theme across the players bought in. I'm not sure we could say that was the case for the last 5 years.

This is a pretty interesting analysis of Ramsdale.

Consistent and realistic - Hakimi and Martinez I doubt would be interested in signing for us and even if they were it would have taken £130m to sign the pair.

And Klopp had a lot more success in getting rid of the deadwood which helped clear the way for his new signings.
benteke, Ibe, joe allen, skrtel, balotelli, toure all out in his first window
sakho, leiva,wisdom all out in second window - plus loans for origi and sturridge
solanke, ward, klavan, markovic, flanaghan, can all out in his third window
They raised about £140m for all that lot - and another £140m from Coutinho
That churn and fee provided the basis for the rebuild.

In Klopp's first 3 windows he spent just under £400m on incoming players. It was facilitated by some great sales but he still have £400m to play with

That £140m for Coutinho was absolutely crucial. I can't think of a better deal in the club's history.

That'll be transfers out. As far as incomings are concerned, Kevin Keegan for £33,000 from Scunthorpe United would take some beating.

Kin ell. We really have some low life ‘supporters’. Truly horrible. https://metro.co.uk/2021/08/19/aaron-ra ... sXCc2bCF8g

Not that welcome apparently.

The larger question is can we go back to being somewhat successful (regular CL football, the occasional FA or League cup win, the odd CL semi final or final and challenge for the title in some years or pull off a win every half a dozen to dozen years given City, Chelsea and Man Utds money), with the ownership we have?

Its possible. We can do well but there is not much of a room for error. The catch-22 of this is that being successful emboldens the Kroenkes. It would be harder to rid ourselves of them. I've always said, any success is and would be 'in spite of their' ownership and not 'because of'. Man Utd fans don't credit the Glazers with the success they have since their ownership and fact is Man Utd have had some notable successes (CL win). Their fans see any success as 'in spite of'. As for us, I'm not saying anyone should wish Arsenal not to do well. Impossible anyway. No matter how upset you are at how things are going, when the referee whistle commences play, you are cheering for us to do well.

This is why I'm not bothered anymore. The fella hasn't even signed and he's already getting abused by morons.

Good luck to the lad. Hope he becomes our No.1 for years to come.

Me too Tom, its a disgrace that he's receiving abuse. Give the kid a chance.

He's an Arsenal fan who is being given the chance to live the dream. Its not his fault the fee is so big.

From the compilation videos he looks a big solid lad who fills the goal, has razor sharp reflexes and is as brave as a lion.

So he's joined the forum then ?

Where did you see Ramsdale is an Arsenal fan socrates? He was born in Stoke and raised in a Staffordshire village nearby. I realise we have fans all over the UK, but the number in Stoke-on-Trent is hardly comparable to the total in Islington, Camden and Barnet. Whoever he supports, I do agree with you and others that him getting such stick is a disgrace.

You’re also right about the size of the transfer fee not being his fault. For exactly the same reason, I’ve never been impressed by attempts to criticise the likes of Pépé, Xhaka and Mustafi for not being worth the money paid. The same will apply to Ben White if he doesn’t turn out to be a success.

Torreira is back in London. Some reports floating around that he expressed his desire to compete for a place in our midfield but Arteta has told him he's not in his plans. Surely that can hardly be a surprise to Torreira who has quite regularly spoken about wanting to move away from Arsenal. I'd still probably rather he played as a sitting midfielder instead of Elneny

I read somewhere he was a West Brom fan.

If he isn’t a Stoke City or Port Vale fan, WBA is a lot more logical and likely than Arsenal.

Maybe it happens and I don't see it, but this is the first time I've seen fans turn on a prospective player like this. I'm a bit taken aback by it because typically the fans trust the scouts, the club that the player coming in is good enough. Some players you already know are just going to be makeshift and fill in gaps till we find better quality. But they aren't abused in this manner.

My question is related to what we experience in America. There are a lot of fake accounts and 'false flag' manufactured outrage. Typically in political forums. You may have conservatives/Republicans disguised as Democrats and fermenting trouble.

Is this possible on football forums? Bots or rival fans (Chelsea/Tottenham) having some naughty fun at our expense?

A mate of mine has just been offered a season ticket after years on the waiting list. When he called today they said they had lots of options available as he was trying to get one in block 133 where i am.

Combination of covid and apathy I think. The team really do need to get a few decent results to restore some hope.

Aubameyang is now negative for covid and has a chance for Sunday. Willian possibly as well who also had covid. Lacazette and Runarsson both had covid and are still recovering so unlikely to make the game.