Bergkampesque

… and keep our romanticism re using lots of youngsters under control…

Remember those bad first halves we used to play at the start of last season? We sat back and made ourselves seem vulnerable and thus invited and encouraged the opponents to come and have a go. We were desperate for space to operate in, and by sitting back and having a go at teams with quick rebounds and counter-attacks we sometimes got the first goal. Unfortunately, it just as often did not work as we regularly conceded during those first halves, leaving Emery no other option than to take off players during the break as to turn things round again (and in the process affecting their confidence and not doing much good to the player-manager relationships – the days of the effective autocratic manager are well and truly behind us, thank Dennis).

Luckily, we had the likes of Torreira, Ramsey and Auba on the bench: the sort of big guns that can really make a difference. For a while, this formula worked but during the second half of the season we saw our super-subs more and more used from the start rather than from the benh.

There is no doubt that we cannot pooh-pooh the need for having a strong bench of players to change things round if and when necessary. For this we need experienced and self-motivated players who have the quality and confidence to have a meaningful impact on the game within a short period of time. Youngster are almost always not suitable for this.

Ramsey is gone and Torreira really has to feature in games from the start, so Auba is the only one left who could start on the bench and be our supersub-hero later on in games next season.

I am going to state the bleeding obvious that to win games we need to score goals – lots of goals given our lack of prioritisation of defensive discipline these days. Auba and Laca had a share in 48 of our 73 PL games (35 goals and 13 assists), so it does not take a genius to realise how dependent we are on them. That is why the idea of selling either Auba or Laca really does not wash with me. We need them both, and if we don’t buy another quality attacker (like Zaha for example), Arsenal will simply not score enough next season now that Ramsey and Welbeck are no longer donning the home of football.

It is all good and well to say we need to give more of our youthful players a chance, but you only have to look back at the likes of Jack Wilshere, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, Iwobi, and many a young CF, to conclude that the one thing young players struggle with is producing the bread and butter stuff: assists and goals.

So for me it is clear that we need to keep both Auba and Laca and need to buy another quality attacker to add both assists and goals next season. We need to have the firepower at the start of the game and on the bench if and when it’s required.

But what do you think?

By TotalArsenal.

It has been hard for our midfield maestros to produce the goods last season. Xhaka and Ozil have formidable passing ability but they really had little to play with, especially on the wings. And without effective wing-play even the very best creative midfielders will come to look poor. I know quite a few believe Granit and Mesut are not good enough but imagine a left wing with Tierney and Zaha and a right wing with Bells and Nelson. Our young and upcoming Nigerian star, Iwobi, is also developing fast, and he and Auba and Mkhi can also add something different to our wing-play next season.

All of a sudden we really are a team with wings, and as Emery does not really believe in defending we may as well invest in those positions and become a ‘score one more than we concede’ sort of team, as he solemnly promised us when Gazidis recruited him last summer.

Our team could look like this next season:

Of course it will only work if Emery can also sort out our midfield balance, which means he will either properly partner up Xhaka and Torreira in deeper laying midfield roles, or he has to come up with something different, especially now that Rambo has deserted us. Only Dennis knows whether he is capable of doing so, and we will see what he will come up with during his second season.

For Tierney and Zaha the club have made offers and we will probably have to wait for a long  time before the negotiations will be concluded. Will we get them both this summer? You tell me. It was obvious that we need to strengthen our left wing this summer, as we were pretty toothless there for most of the previous season. Kola’s final ball was not bad but his defending was nothing to write home about; and Nacho is not able to reach a high levels of consistently anymore. So we need another option on LB. Is Tierney the man, though? I think so but only time will tell. Zaha is a class player with a Gooner heart and he will offer us that extra width and penetration that was missing so much last season. The Ivory Coast international will bring goals and assists from the left and no doubt form fine partnerships with Ozil, Laca and Auba, etc.

On the right we had a strong wing when Bells was fit and firing on all cylinders. He should be back in a few months time and this will improve the team significantly. We also have Reiss Nelson who did not play that much for Hoffenheim last season, yet still managed to score a goal every 90 minutes in the Bundesliga (seven in total). That is impressive for a man born just 21 days before Millennium Eve and playing in a foreign land. Furthermore, most people have given up on Mkhi but he is still a good player to have available and he will also benefit from the return of Hector next season.

So it looks like Arsenal are going to invest heavily in our left wing and I reckon that is the right thing to do. What do you think?

CoyGs!

By TotalArsenal!

 

We are the:-
6th most valuable football club in Europe @ Forbes,
8th highest revenue earner in Europe @ Forbes,
9th highest wage spender in Europe @ UEFA,
28th placed, ’18/19 season rating, in the top 5 European Leagues @WhoScored.

Based on the size of our club we should be 6th placed. 28th is a gross underperformance.

We are the:-
3rd most valuable football club in EPL (behind United and City) @ Forbes,
4th highest revenue earner in EPL (behind United, City and ‘Pool) @ Forbes,
5th highest wage spender in EPL (behind United, Chelsea, City and Pool) @ UEFA,
6th highest  transfer spender (gross) in EPL over the last 5 years (behind City, United, Chelsea, Pool, Everton) @ Transfer League,
4th highest net transfer spender in EPL over the last 5 years (behind City, United, Chelsea) @ Transfer League.
5th placed, ’18/19 season in the EPL, 28 and 27 pts behind City and Pool respectively.

Based on the size of our club we should be 3rd placed and not 5th. We should be ahead of Pool who finished the league 27 pts ahead of us. That’s gross underperformance by us.

Lets compare ourselves with Liverpool.
We’re a more valuable club but they’re earning more than us.
They’re also spending more than us, gross.
But over the last 5 years our net spend is bigger than theirs in spite of our self sustaining model.
What the last line means is that we’ve been spending the f****** money more than Pool.
Only we’ve been woeful with our sales and purchases. The blame is more on Gazidis and co than on Kroenke.

Lets compare ourselves with the Tots.
We trounced them in all the parameters: worth, revenue, gross spend, net spend, wage bill.
They trounced us by 3 consecutive CL appearances to 3 consecutive EL appearances.
Not that they are that smart, we simply are meh!
The blame, this time is squarely on Gazidis and co.

Last year, 21 year old Tanguy N’dombele was about £19m.
With all the promises his value was shooting up.
He is now valued at upwards of £60m.
Or 21 yr old Rodri Hernandez from £22m to now about £70m.
I hope that Douzi and Torreira @ £7m and £26m, now @ about £30m and £45m respectively have opened some eyes. No more been-around from bargain-basements shops with no resale value. Gazidis and co’s idea of growing the club was by parsimony; tighten the purse strings. I hope Sanllehi and co know how to make money by spending money.

As the 6th most valuable team in the world and the 8th highest earner we’ve got what it takes to play this game, on and off the field, on the highest level.

#28 is not our home. The right address of our home is … The Arsenal,
All we are saying to Raul and co is … take us home.

By PE.

There is no doubt that Arsenal need to improve their defending next season. Only two teams in the PL top-ten conceded more goals than us and Citeh and Pool combined ‘goals against’ was lower than ours. For quite a while now we are rubbish at defending, and although we could improve the quality of our individual defenders this summer it remains to be seen whether it would make much, if any, difference.

With Holding and Bellerin back at some point this Autumn, we should have more than decent options to choose from at the back. It would be good to add a quality LB and of course I would not mind a quality CB either, but unless they are of the ‘Van Dijk’ pedigree I don’t think it would make much difference. It is time to build the defence around the Holding-Sokratis axis, supported by Bels (and Nacho, at least for one more season).

What is as important to defending is the set-up of the midfield and the instructions they will get in terms of protecting the back. And this is where Emery appears to be all over the place. One (half of a) game we play more compact, sit back and look to play on the counter, and the next one we stretch ourselves and the midfield is split vertically between supporting the attack and somehow offer some protection to the defence as well. As a result our defending becomes kamikaze, we look disorganised and our defenders have to deal with loads of unprotected space for opponents’ attackers to run riot in. The difference with the likes of Pool and Citeh is immense: when they lose the ball whilst attacking the opponent, the shape of the team remains strong and relatively little space is given away. As a result, their defenders are able to remain calm and organised and very few  goals are conceded, despite the attacking nature of these teams. They also seldom suffer bad injuries, whereas our defenders suffers badly physically from all that last-ditch defending, with devastating consequences.

The question is whether our defending as a team will get much better under Emery, and I remain sceptical, very sceptical. I reckon we have to hope for an even more lethal attack next season to make progress in the table. Citeh managed to score 22 goals more goals than us, and with the likes of Auba, Mesut and Laca in the team we have the potential to get much closer to them this time round.

And if there is one position I would like us to buy a top quality player for to make this happen, it is on the wings. We have Iwobi and Nelson and then there is Auba who is also positioned on the wing during most of our games. But none of these are as yet the quality wingmen we so desperately need. A fit Bellerin and further improved Kolasinac offer good additional attacking wingplay from deeper in the team, but to get the very best out of Mesut, Auba and Laca we really, really need a Hazard-esque winger.

Non-participation in CL football is of course not great when trying to attract such a quality player. So it needs to be somebody who still has some years ahead of him and who can be convinced that Arsenal are going places again. Somebody with a strong desire to win and with high levels of intrinsic motivation and, of course, the quality to really make a difference.

That player is somebody I have been watching carefully recently. He is Dutch, delightful on and with the ball, and devastating in front of goal: Memphis Depay. Memphis is Ligue 1 leader in key passes, with 3.1 pass on average per game. He is fourth in terms of assists (10) and shared second for crosses per match. He scored 10 goals this season, which is an area where the (only) 25 year old still can improve, but 10 extra goals from the wings next season would make a big difference, no doubt.

Depay would bring that extra energy and desire to our attack, a bit like Sanchez used to bring. But Memphis is much more of a team player than the self-adoring Chilean; and I have no doubt that his cooperation with Ozil, Laca and Auba would make all the difference, allowing all of them to shine even more next season. He worked his socks of in the Dutch national team to give them an attacking edge somehow, and it’s those performances that made me think that he is The man we need at Arsenal next season.

I am not sure whether he can be bought away from Lyon, but if I was Emery – and therefore allergic to defending – I would spend all our money on Memphis Depay this summer.

By TotalArsenal.

We love a scapegoat we do. And the Gunner-goat of the summer is without any doubt Granit Xhaka.

I reckon you can judge somebody’s football intelligence on their views re Xhaka. If you don’t get what Granit brings to the team and the role he is playing for us, but rather like to focus on his occasional brain-fart, then I seize being interested in speaking to you. The problem, however, is that I cannot ignore you because I run a blog and can see that this collective digital Xhaka-goading could well lead to our Swiss Maestro leaving us this summer. Time to put the record straight and fight the Xhaka-ignorance all the way!!

Granit is in the top-four of the entire PL for average passes per game, only behind LaPorte, Jorginho and Van Dijk. He is, no doubt, the fulcrum of the team – everything revolves on making Granit tick like a Swiss wristwatch. If Granit is buzzing, the team is buzzing.

Our deepest laying midfielder produces 1.4 key passes per game, as many as LaPorte (0.4), Jorginho (0.8) and Van Dijk (0.4) combined; the Swiss is second re this at Arsenal (behind the other ‘misunderstood’ Gunner… Mesut). Xhaka is The Key Player in our team and, no doubt, first on Emery’s team sheet. He was also this pivotal to Arsene. Furthermore, Granit leads the team in terms of average number of long balls and crosses. He also is our joined-MOTM for the season (four times), together with the much more openly loved and appreciated Laca and Auba.

Because so much is expected of Granit and he is receiving the ball constantly, and often in dangerous areas, he will make the occasional mistake… and some have cost us. He has also made some painful unforced errors which have cost us. There is room for improvement, but guess what, Granit is only 26 and his best years are yet to come. He will get better and better at avoiding these mistakes, and a more solid defence behind him would also help tremendously. Key is also to partner him more ‘horizontally’ with Torreira, so they can be a joined-up wall all over the midfield (something Unai just doesn’t seem to value as a constant requirement).

Granit is always looking for moving the ball forward intelligently. He makes himself available by moving into the available space and has already clocked what he will do next before he receives the ball. He does that for 90+ minutes and it gives the team purpose, momentum and structure. It must be said that the lack of quality wingers (and having to play without the very important Bellerin for most of the season) has not made it easier for Xhaka to play his quality long and through balls this season. Yet he strutted his stuff game after game and was our fulcrum for most of the season (he struggled with injuries at times and only managed to play in 29 PL games – and let’s not forget he played a lot of games during the World Cup last summer).

So let’s give it up for Granit Xhaka and show him our love before it is too late. Let’s make him our permanent captain, improve our defence/defensive play behind him and give him some good wing-players to be able to stretch opponents again. If you want us to get out of our current predicament you  better start openly appreciating Granit. I am sure they will lift him up where he belongs, and it would be sad and painful if that were not to be at the Home of Football.

By TotalArsenal. 

By now, Regulars on BK will know about my reservations re Emery being the man we need to take us forward. It is sensible to say that we need to give him at least another season, and this very much sits with the club’s values, but the BoD will have to look further than the virtue of loyalty alone. Only if the BoD believe Emery is our man for the long term they should hold on to him. Does he have the vision, persuasion skills, tactical nous and ability to develop, and win over, our players to be that man? You tell me.

Unai was of course Gazidis’ man. From experience I know that if your boss leaves soon after your appointment it very often will become hard to hold on to your role. But I am going to assume that Kroenke will give Emery another year to show us what he really is about. As long as he also forces him to keep working with the established stars in the team, I am fine with it. I am sure Kroenke will not allow the absolute doom scenario of having to sack Emery in 5-10 months whilst having let go already the likes of Xhaka, Ozil, Laca or Auba. Midtable football will beckon then.

It is important that we reconnect with the legacy of Wengerball before it is too late, and the appointment of Freddie is a step in the right direction. Ljunberg was a reasonably talented midfielder but also gifted with a great work rate and a fox-like brain, and those three qualities led to a very successful career at Arsenal. I reckon it is a good sign that Emery will have an Invincible next to him on the bench next season. But Freddie is relative inexperienced and we cannot expect too much from this change by Emery in the next one or two seasons at least.

What we really need is an experienced number-two manager to Emery: somebody who gets the best out of the players on a one to one basis and is seen as an absolute authority; somebody who is passionate about getting the best out of our young talent and is a big proponent of playing total football/ Wengerball,  and; somebody who is happy to work as a Nr2 to Emery for a long time.

This can only be one man and, as far as I am aware, he is not employed at the moment. Dennis Bergkamp was sacked by Ajax at the end of 2017 after a fallout with Directors vd Sar and Overmars. These things can happen but I have no doubt that Bergkamp had a big part to play in the current large group of talented youngsters at Ajax who made it to the semi-finals of the CL and won the Eredivisie in style last season. Such talents do not just arrive but need to be developed over a number of years, and Bergkamp played a big part in this (so I have been told).

At Arsenal we have a number of talented players coming through and it would be wonderful if Dennis could work with them and give them the confidence, skills and attitude to succeed at the top. Imagine Dennis working with the likes of Iwobi, AMN, Smith-Rowe, Nelson and Eddie: how much better would they become?!

But there are also the likes of Ozil, Auba, Xhaka, Guendouzi, Torreira and Laca who would really, really benefit from Bergkamp working with them and get the very best out of them in the next few seasons. Just thinking about this makes me excited!

 

Finally, I also believe that Bergkamp has the ability, persuasion skills and perseverance to work closely with Emery and establish the style of play and tactical disciplines required to compete again with the likes of Citeh and Pool. Dennis is calm and both humble and dominant when it matters, and this might just work well with the fiery, constantly tinkering Spaniard.

It is about time we bring him home. It probably will not happen but that does not stop me dreaming.

By TotalArsenal

Where are we going? What should happen this summer?

The last post on BK covered where I think we are as a club under Emery:

https://bergkampesque.com/2019/06/08/emerys-first-season-on-the-road-to-nowhere-with-an-identity-crisis/

Today’s post will cover the two questions at the top.

Where are we going (under Emery)?

Many fellow Gooners believe that Unai should be given time and that a club like Arsenal should not sack managers willy-nilly, and especially not after one season. So let’s assume Emery will stay and ask ourselves the questions where we are going under him the coming season.

Will it be more of the same or something totally different?

I am going to hope for the latter, so let’s go with that. But it all depends on whether the BoD will give Emery actually the time to build something up and do not just require him to finish in the top four next season. If they tell him to do the latter then I am afraid we will see more of what we saw last season but with the hope that we will make it this time round. The short term obsession/business necessity(?) with finishing in the top four is probably one of the biggest threats to our club: it may keep us back from (re)building the team around a vision and our values and therefore erode what Wenger had tried to build up during his tenure.

But maybe the club realise that they need to take a strategic view and ask Emery to tell them what he needs to make us structurally competitive, so we can win the title in say 2-4 years. I have my doubt about Emery having such a vision and being able to bring it to fruition at Arsenal, but I could be wrong of course (and would love to be wrong… of course).

What should happen this summer?

I would like Arsenal/Emery to make a decision on what our style of play/formation will be next season. There are two main options if you ask me:

1. Play compact at the back and aim for quick turnarounds and counter-attacks.
2. Push opponents back into their own half and pass and press them into submission.

Last season we did a bit of both; more of option one at the start of the season and more of option two in latter part. But we never played it with conviction and Emery kept changing things, even within games. It made our players look crap at times and we seldom looked like a focussed, energetic team that rose above itself.

For option one  we need Bellerin and Holding to come back strong at the start of the season. We also need to allow Xhaka and Torreira (and AMN/Elneny) to stay deep and in a horizontal line as much as possible. To make it really work we need better options on the wing, both in defence and attack. We need to buy a quality, ready to rock LB and a quality winger on the right (or left). Another CB would complete my wish list for option one.

Option two is what I believe Emery would really like to do. For this option he needs a beast of an all-round DM: dynamic, fast, strong and big. AMN has potential to become such a player but he is too young right now. We would need to buy such a player whilst AMN gets better over the seasons. Emery can then play two attacking midfielders in front of that DM beast, which could be two out of Ozil, Iwobi, Mkhi, Torreira, Guendouzi and Smith-Rowe. He would also need very dynamic CBs of which we do not have many. He would also need to buy quality mid-winger(s) as to give the AMs better opportunities to make things happen.

I reckon option two suits Arsenal better LONG TERM but will take a few seasons to get really right. It would also mean that Xhaka would need to leave as this system does not suit him (he needs to play deep, supported by Torreira or AMN). It also means buying quite a few players and working hard with our young talents to come good.

Option one should be much easier to implement given the squad we have in terms of style and qualities of key players, but it is un-Arsenal and un-Emery like and that’s why we struggled so much last season imo.

Of course these options can be nuanced and there will be variants, but I reckon the main decision the club have to make is whether we absorb and pounce or push forward and pass and press our opponents into submission. Whatever it is I will support, as long as a clear choice will be made and structural player investments will be made to make it a success, especially long-term.

By TotalArsenal. 

So Arsene left us a year ago and Unai took over. The season is over and these are the big questions:

1. Where are we now?
2. Where are we going?
3. What should happen this summer?

This post will cover the first question only.

Where are we now?

You tell me. We finished fifth and reached the Europa League final. We fought till the end for CL football and some very rare European silverware to be added to the trophy cabinet. We did not succeed but nobody can say we did not compete till the end.

So we are relatively in a good place then?

Well no, I don’t think we can say that. The gap between the top-two and us is frightening and there are no signs that we will overcome this any time soon. Emery played with a pragmatic approach, heavily leaning on our two top-quality attackers to somehow get us back into the champions league. But I struggled to see any lines in our style of play and tactical approach on which we can build further in the coming seasons, and very few players have actually grown under the wings of Emery.

In fact, a lot of players have played worse under the new supremo, most likely caused by forcing them to play a different way without it being clear how this would strengthen the team, and subbing players often during the break, leading to confusion, ineffectiveness, and drops in confidence and motivation. We scored 73 goals, almost two goals per PL game, but also conceded 51 times, which is much more than Pool and Citeh combined!

Arsenal are a club famed for, and strongly reliant on, competing on the basis of its great vision and values, style of football, and nous to get the best out of the squad and do some clever shopping when opportunities arise. But currently we are being outmanoeuvred by the likes of Pool, the Chavs and the team that shall not be named, and the BoD needs to act now to get us back on track.

Furthermore, we have entered the era of Millennials wearing The Shirt and to get the best out of them they need to be respected and communicated with, trusted and persuaded. As McGregor would put it: Y-managers and not X-managers are required these days. This may not be to the liking of many (older) Gooners, but it’s the way it is. Citeh and Pool have understood this and have recruited managers who are loved and trusted and for whom the players will give everything. Both Klopp and Guardiola know how to work and connect with the talented Millennials; it does not look like Unai has won many of our Arsenal ones over.

But the biggest worry is the lack of a clear vision/style of play under Emery. We still cannot defend and we still do not have the right balance in midfield, despite the Spaniard trying a variation of formations/midfield combinations. 17HT believes we hardly had a midfield last season and I tend to agree with him. Emery got caught between not wanting to sit too deep and play two more defence minded players in midfield, and desperately trying to stretch the two midfielders ‘vertically’ so one of them can support the three or four ‘pure’ attackers up-front, thus avoiding that Ozil in the hole became too isolated. It did not work and we paid for it during the latter part of the season with some very poor away performances: our defence was left exposed and our attackers were left too isolated.

It is fair to say that Iwobi (work in progress), Mkhi (limited on the wing) and Auba (limited on the wing) were not the ideal mid-wing players to have enough creative strength in attack, so Emery did not have a lot of choice. But he is there to work out the balance and get the best out of the players and he failed in doing so this season.

It was the Europa League final, the final game of the season, which showed us all that is wrong right now: we started under clear instructions but lacked the real conviction and bite to get in front (other than through a bit of luck), we then conceded and never looked like we had the strength, tactical adjustment and belief to get back into the game. Emery made a few changes but they had no effect, and it all ended up like a bad dream and total deception. 

The attentive reader will have noticed that I have not touched much on (the quality of) the players until now. I have no doubt that two or three players are required to further strengthen the team, but in general I believe in this group of players.

It would be wrong in my view to let a lot of our players go and give Emery a big budget to make changes as he sees fit. For this, he has shown us far too little from a football philosophy, system of football and tactical point of view; he has also not convinced in terms making our team a TEAM on the pitch and get the best out of our players.

If Klopp can win the CL with for example the likes of Wijnaldum, Milner and Henderson  in the team – players who looked pretty average in Portugal when playing for their national team this week – then I want to see more of this from Unai with our players. We have a nice mixture of talents, experienced players, and those in their prime at the club and, other than one or two players, I believe they are all intrinsically motivated and have pride for the shirt. Yes a few on the fringes need to leave and be replaced (mostly by youth) but it would be wrong to let any of our prime players go this summer, and that includes Xhaka, Ozil and Auba.

If Emery cannot get the best out of them – and I have seen nothing to believe he can – he needs to leave right now. The one scenario we need to avoid at all costs is having to sack Emery in December or later because of  a total lack of confidence in the team, woeful results and performancesm and having let go of our established stars before then. But now I am starting to answer my ‘second season question’, and that is for another post!

By TotalArsenal. 

It is widely being circulated that Arsenal have budgeted about £40m net spend for this summer transfer dealings (average net spend over the past 6 years is approximately £42m @ Transferleague). If it is true some fancy footwork is needed to get us to where we want to be.

It was embarrassing at Baku, but if truth be told we played at our true level. 70 pts in the premiership and 5th position, one point from Champions league qualification is so flattering of our season’s performance. We are mystified about our poor away form. The truth is that it is our excellent home form that is the aberration. What with Newcastle about to be taken over by an Abu Dhabi Prince, Leicester and Everton surging with their top 6 ambition, our situation at this moment looks dire.

First of all we are losing the services of those whose contracts are expiring this summer: Ramsey, Cech, Welbeck, Litchtsteiner and Jenkinson. There is need to replace them.

Secondly, Koscielny at 34 years this September and Monreal at 34 the coming February are both overdue to begin to serve as back-ups. They need new players ahead of them.

Thirdly, Emery has come with a philosophy that has no place in it for Ozil. At £350k/wk (or £36.4m in the two remaining years of his contract) Ozil is too fat a salary and too big an ego to be carried along as a part player. He has to go even at the cost of leaving for free or thereabout (Transfermarkt values him @ £31.5m). There would be the need to replaced him.

With respect to these eight players mentioned above, the minimum that should be expected of our summer activity is four signings who should be 1st team players: two players to take over the starter roles from Koscielny (CD) and Monreal (LB) and another two players to replace Ramsey (CM) and Ozil (AM). The four signings should be such as to add quality and balance to the team.

As a model for examining how our budgeting can hold I have selected four such players that we’ve been linked to for these four positions. The amounts against their names are the Transfermarkt.com valuations of the players which are reasonable estimates to work with:

CD ~~ Kostas Manolas, 27yrs, £40.5m, AS Roma until 22, (WhoScored rating 6.89).
LB ~~ Nicolas Tagliafico, 26 yrs, £22.5m, Ajax until 22, (WhoScored rating 7.47).
CM ~~ Adrien Rabiot: 24 yrs, £31.5m, PSG until 19, (WhoScored rating 7.31).
AM ~~ Nicolas Pepe: 23 yrs, £36m, Lille until 22, (WhoScored rating 7.65).

The combined cost of these 4 players is £130.5m (an average of about £32.6m per signing which should be expected of a club of our stature). This combined cost of £130.5m would have exceeded our estimated net spend of about £40m by £90.5m. The deficit can only be accounted for by the sale of players.

Any imbalance in numbers between the outgoing players and the incoming has to be offset from an internal source (on-loan and academy players). So far we have identified 6 outgoing and likely outgoing players (Ramsey, Cech, Welbeck, Lichtsteiner, Jenkinson and Ozil) to four incoming leaving a 2-player deficit. A 5-player maximum deficit looks a number that can be filled from within. This means that apart from Ozil, we have to sell not more than four players whose combined value should offset the cash deficit of £90.5m. Definitely one or two big names should be involved.

Here is the Transfermarkt valuation of our players excluding the 6 already earmarked as outgoing.
1). Leno (£22.4m).
2). Ospina (£4.5m).
3). Bellerin (£36.0m).
4). M-Niles (£6.3m).
5). Mustafi (£27.0m).
6). Sokratis (£18.0m).
7). Koscielny (£9.0m).
8). Mavropanos (£2.7m).
9). Holden (£10.8m)
10). Chambers (£12.6m).
11). Monreal (£9.0m). It is believed that his 1yr extension deal has been activated.
12). Kolasinac (£18.0m). High wage of £119.5k/wk to performance level should reduce sell value to about £10m. (All wages from Mirror UK).
13). Torreira (£49.5m).
14). Elneny (£9.0m).
15). Guendouzi (£27.0m).
16). Xhaka (£45.0m).
17). Mkhitaryan (£27.0m). High wage of £180k/wk to performance level should reduce sell value to about £12m.
18). Iwobi (£22.5m).
19). Lacazette (£58.5m).
20). Aubamayang (£67.5m).
The academy players are not listed as their market values make little difference.

Decision on who to sell does not depend only on unsatisfactory performance. Other considerations could include the balance of the team as well as attractive sell values of players.

Apart from Ozil who is already gone by this post, to meet the different requirements, the others to be sold wouldn’t be far away from: Lacazette or Aubamayang and the three of Kolasinac, Mkhitaryan, Elneny. Don’t forget that if for example Laca (£58.5m) is sold, the fund realized would fetch us, in this model used, a certain Nicolas Pepe (£36m) with 22 goals and 11 assists in Ligue1 competition alone (nothing lost offensively) plus Nicolas Tagliafico (£22.5m) an Argentine international left back who is reputed for his boundless energy.

In case you are wondering, Mustafi has not escaped my thoughts. Maitland-Niles would return to his preferred midfield role and Mustafi becomes the back-up to Bellerin. The sales or non sales of players are not necessarily according to likes and dislikes.

This post is premised on a £40m net spend. I’d rather that Kroenke splash-the-cash, say in the neighbourhood of £150m so we don’t begin to sell our tested and trusted.

BK needs your opinion on the five players you want sold to net us about £90m courtesy Transfermarkt.com valuation. The King is dead, long live the King!

By PE.

Emery has seen it all before. He knows as well as anybody else that he has to set up his team as if this Baku final is simply another regular competitive match against Chelsea. The point of difference though, is that a promise has been made to Cech. Or has it?

Chelsea is a possession based team, behind only City in the Premiership. One thing we have to be wary of is gifting them the ball. They would make us sweat to win it back. All judgements say play Leno but sentiment says play Cech whose kick out style would more often than not hand the possession back to Chelsea. Can Cech be brave enough to confide to Emery that he should feel free to select the keeper that better suits his game plan? I think Emery’s starting line up would have Cech’s name in it. Or was there not a promise? “Hey Cech, why don’t you stay on the bench to come in as a late substitution if victory is in sight? You would lift up the cup, not from the bench but from the field. The whole stadium, the whole world would applaud you all the way. What a legacy on and off the field”. That would be an event that would live long in the memory of kids. Still the question lingers. Was there a promise made? A promise is a promise.

No promise, however, has been made to Kolasinac whose pass success rate is rather poor. I don’t expect Emery to have Cech and Kolasinac in the same team against Chelsea, at least not in the starting line up, meaning that, as at this moment, I am still battling with the Cech/Leno conundrum.

Talk about Chelsea and it’s a talk about the metronomic passing of Jorginho and the brilliance of Hazard. These are the two high points that must be facing Emery as he formulates his plans. If Emery can get one of his players to pin Hazard to the canvas for all of the 90 minutes, in effect turning the encounter into 10-a-side game that would be genius of him. The debate isn’t the 10-a-side but who between Maitland-Niles and Mustafi should be assigned the job. Perchance, Emery might opt instead to ‘Wenger it’, focusing on his strength and damning whatever is standing between him and his goal.

Rambo will be missed. He was used effectively against Jorginho the last time the two teams met. Our next best bet Mkhi is 2,500 miles away from it all, a victim of something not of his making. Should Ozil be given that task of shutting Jorginho out? Ozil’s game is drifting into spaces away from people for purposes of offense. He wouldn’t fit. Laca on the other hand likes to tangle and him it could be him. He is a striker that is always dropping deep and you can bet that Emery would whispers a certain instruction into his ears. Part of that instruction would be that he should be attentive to Ozil’s movements as he hunts the spaces. We should expect a lot of lateral swapping of positions between him and Ozil.

The central areas are likely going to be manned by Xhaka and Torreira. While the former spreads out the passes long and short, the latter would be busy correcting the gaps.

Rudiger is out of the game for Chelsea and would be replaced by Christensen at central defense. Christensen is not the quickest and Auba as our frontman (5 goals in the last 2 matches) would very much fancy his chances against him. Remember that Mkhi’s spirit is there in each of our players urging them to do it for him.

Expected line up:

Bench: Leno, Jenkinson, Litchtsteiner, Mustafi, Kolasinac, Elneny, Guendouzi, Willock, Saka, Amechi, Nketiah, Welbeck.

We have to salute the about 3,000 Arsenal fans from the UK who braved it to Baku. We also have to recognize the other Arsenal fans from other countries whose travel details we don’t know about. Also cheers to the Azerbaijan Arsenal supporters who hopefully should be in their tens of thousand. We hope they all can make it feel a home fixture for Kos and co.

There is so much at stake for us in this match that nerves can become an issue. No better way to settle those nerves than to take off with our wheels screeching. Prediction 2-1 to the good guys.

COYRRG!!!

By PE