With the summer giving off those yearly “start of a new season” vibes for Premier League fans, we’re beginning to make our predictions and assumptions about what’s going to happen this upcoming football season- however football is never usually predictable. I’m going to take a deeper insight on Arsenal of London, otherwise known as “the Gunners”, their possible signings, which areas of the squad need improvement, and what pre-season has looked like so far!
New Signings?
Having made a few additions to our squad which looks like it really needs some maintenance judging from last season’s results, and statistics, Emery has brought in a glimmer of hope into the squad in the shape of youngster Gabriel Martinelli. Gabriel was required to take an Italian passport in order to gain a work permit to link up with the gunners, we’ve seen the boy play his first match in the USA pre-season tour bagging himself a debut goal! So far so good, but the attacking minded player is still a raw talent that requires nurturing from the experienced players, coaches and the manager himself in order to build the correct foundation for his career to thrive at this level.
We’ve got two other transfers that are still awaiting completion but are looking like they can be announced any second now. Firstly we’ve got the creative midfielder Dani Ceballos from Real Madrid. The former Betis man played in the u21 euros not too long ago with Spain, winning the competition averaging an 8.01 rating throughout the tournament which is impressive. It looks like this is a high quality player who could thrive in the premier league. However we’re getting the Spaniard on loan but it looks like there are rumours of a possible permanent clause being inserted in his contract. Overall last season he averaged a 7.03 rating, which is better than our midfielders Henrikh Mkhitaryan (6.88), Mesut Ozil (6.78), Aaron Ramsey (6.70) now of Juventus, and the exact same rating as our midfield anchor Granit Xhaka (7.03). His pass success percentage is 92% which NONE of our midfielders surpass.
William Saliba of St. Etienne, another player we’re currently on the verge of signing, yet he will be going back to France on loan for the remainder of this season. We’re paying somewhere in the region of £30 million for the French centre back, meaning our budget will be even more limited due to the small funds granted to Emery by Stan Kroenke. The 18 year old centre back will most likely be seen as a long term option for our defence once he comes back from his former club. While still a young budding player, St Etienne mostly utilised him for the Ligue 1 matches last season which saw him record an average rating of 6.91 last season. Should we be attempting to mould him into an ideal centre back readily prepared for the premier league’s physical challenges- he should be a regular face in the starting 11 before the age of 21!
Nicolas Pepe from LOSC Lille has made his long awaited venture to our beloved city of London for a current club record fee of £72 million. The Ivory Coast international winger was on blazing fire last season for the French club, scoring 22 and setting up 11, in 37 appearances. Pepe is strong in creating key chances which will help us up top. His average rating of 7.62 beats every single one of our players back at Arsenal (Lacazette 7.17, Aubameyang 7.10), making this a big signing for us. We hope to see the rapid maverick link up with our duo, bolstering our team’s overall attacking prowess.
Expectations for the new season
Realistically, I don’t expect Arsenal to win the premier league with the current quality of the team during Emery’s second season in charge as he will be continuing his re-build of the team he began when he was first appointed in 2018. We’ve got the Europa league campaign to look forward to, having a decent shot at it rivalling fellow English giants Manchester United for the trophy.
There has been speculation surrounding the plans for our youth players this season. Seeing Emile Smith Rowe, Eddie Nketiah, Reiss Nelson, and a few others being granted spots amongst the first team gives us hope for new blood in the starting 11 and subs for this season’s Europa and Premier league campaigns. This will add to the excitement of watching our newly brought up youngsters play and gain experience, hopefully leading to an all new team with a good bond leading to good results. Having integrated Freddie Ljunberg into our list of people working in the background for the first team, the aim is to help settle the youngsters onto the big stage of first-team action, seeing Arsenal are on a limited budget this season, this is a really good way of building the squad.
Many fans are calling upon the defence to be rebuilt and improved, we are making too many mistakes at the back. Callum Chambers, Rob Holding, Hector Bellerin are all making awaited comebacks and will most likely be in Emery’s plans for this season, meaning an overhaul in defence. Mavropanos is another decent squad rotation option and a good accomplice for Sokratis who is most likely a mainstay in our current defence in terms of communication via their native Greek language.
Many of our players are experienced, yes, they have the knowledge vital to form a thriving team in the top flight division- BUT, last season oversaw some of our players playing way too much minutes- such as Aubameyang who reportedly played out 2,733 minutes (according to FourFourTwo) which is too much! The introduction of younger players, and squad rotation players would definitely help the team’s momentum and fitness. Our Europa league campaign, which starts with group stages, could be played out by the lesser experienced, young, and squad rotation players with a view to improvement, gaining more experience, showing how they play, finding new positions, and impressing our boss.
The Tactical side..
What it seemed like, Arsenal last season liked to play by attacking down the wings and creating long shot chances- but we barely gave our all. We took 467 (170 on target) shots compared to Chelsea’s 607 (198 on target) in our premier league campaign which is quite embarrassing. The team altogether failed to stress out our opponents and didn’t take enough chances well and barely took shots! This season, with the arrival of Nicolas Pepe, and Emery prompting our men to try their luck more, hopefully our free-scoring duo Aubameyang and Lacazette will not be the only two to be carrying our squad on their backs.
What else I have noticed, is that we are EXTREMELY prone to individual mistakes- consider Shkodran Mustafi, the German centre back of Albanian origin who came to us via Valencia CF of Spain’s top flight, he just wasn’t the man he was during Valencia’s league campaign of 15/16 where he formed a strong partnership with Nicolas Otamendi, both men were courted by Real Madrid even at one point- but the defence was dismantled by Arsenal, and Manchester City signing the defenders respectively. We registered 13 errors leading to goal last season, compared to Chelsea’s 3, and Liverpool’s 4…
Offside, we really need to work on avoiding just that. Last season we recorded 89 offside calls from the linesman to our players. Emery has to go over this in training with our men! Surely he’s noticed the problem from his constant post-match observations of replays of our clashes. It’s a problem that needs to be addressed and will prepare and organise our team further.
Emery needs to spend some time to devise new tactics. The Spanish workaholic shouldn’t have a problem in mixing up some of his old ways to give opposing teams next season an element of surprise and avoid our team being predictable, and scouted by fellow premier league managers looking to bolster their squad’s winning runs, or looking to save their jobs.
Conclusion
It’s clear to see what the fans want, we need to bring in young players from our academy to enable our senior players to recharge for the push for top four, and we need to reconstruct our defense carefully. We’ve not got much time until our opener against Newcastle, and we must be prepared- tactically plus mentally. Every player needs to fight for our club, and if not, replacement should be imminent.