First some general apologies for the lack of content even though the holiday season is well and truly over. I am in the process of selling and buying a home as well as preparing for a trip to London next week and frankly I have been all over the place. Frankly I feel disconnected from Arsenal as I go through all this.
That doesn’t mean I am not watching or following. It just means the level of my following has been diminished somewhat. Still I am not devoid of knowing what’s going on.
In the wake of Theo Walcott’s season ending injury everyone went into overload trying to determine what it was that Arsenal needed to make up for the speedy and influential scorer. Theo has grown into one of England’s best players. Once chided as not having a footballing brain, he is putting that brain to good work as he has learned to time his runs to perfection and the shooting – well there is a reason he was the team’s leading scorer last year and had he stayed healthy showed all signs of returning to that summit this season.
So who replaces him and who do you get. The former part is easier to answer than the latter. First off, really replacing Theo isn’t going to happen. I always cringe at comparisons that so and so is the next so and so. The reality is each player is an individual and each player has their own specific traits. We will never see a player like Henry, Messi, Ronaldo, Bergkamp, Maradona or even Theo ever again. So in short no one can replace Theo.
But with the return of Alex Oxlade Chamberlain and the emergence of Serge Gnabry, Arsenal have more than enough talent to slot in the right wing and cause the opposition no small amount of trouble. The key here isn’t to replace Theo – it’s to plug someone into the spot that fits well into our system, plays our football and makes defenders shit themselves. Ox and Gnabry certainly have that in abundance.
Of course Ox is just back from a long injury so expecting much from him his maybe asking too much. But as he comes to form he will offer us his own bag of tricks. As for Serge Gnabry, well when you put on show like you did against the scum of North London and with such ease, it’s easy to get catapulted into lengendary status. The thing about Serge is at 18, he has all the tools to be a great player outside of just that isolated performance.
You only need look back to United away. Without any true wide players on the pitch, United contained us because we played everything narrow, through the middle. In the two minutes after Wenger subbed Gnabry we got our real best chance after Gnabry got behind Evra with his speed and movement and created that chance.
I think until Ox gets fully fit, Wenger wouldn’t be wrong to start Gnabry out there. He is a special talent and unafraid of the big bad premier league.
So that leaves us with what to do about our striker situation. The ripple of fear about Theo’s injury was that at the time Giroud was out with an ankle/illness issue, Bendtner wanted out and was out injured and now Theo who started against Sours as a CF was also out.
So the need for a striker became even more glaring. Giroud is back. But Bendtner is still out for a few weeks and Theo is gone. We are once again thin up top.
So what is Wenger to do?
We all know that Wenger wanted a striker. He tried and didn’t get one. It was Higuain, then Suarez and on the last day of the summer window Ba. The question is what does Wenger do for January?
Is it a case of getting a loan like for Morata of Real Madrid and letting him go in the summer. It makes sense. It fills a need, there isn’t a long term investment and he is a talented enough youngster that giving spells to Giroud might just work.
Obviously the down side is getting a player who is still early in his development without any big game experience or premier league experience and asking him to slot in during Arsenals drive for a title.
It all comes down to risk/benefit with Morata.
If not a loan move then perhaps a low risk purchase for a player who won’t cost much and if you let him go in the summer, wouldn’t really be a bad idea. Like say Fulham’s Dimitar Berbatov. Berbatov isn’t going to be a starter at Arsenal. But he could come in and with his finishing ability might actually be a good option coming off the bench for the last 18 games of the season.
Problem with Berbatov is, he clearly doesn’t want to work anymore. His laziness is legendary now. As prolific as he was at United, Fergie clearly had enough and felt comfortable shifting him to someone else in the Premier League because he felt he was done.
To me that is a bigger risk. We had enough players in here in the past who mre than happy to just collect a check and put in a performance every 7th or 8th game. Sorry for me there is no room for that at Arsenal anymore and we should be taking a pass on Berbatov.
That leaves two other options for Wenger. He either buys big now or stands pat. Buying big now would be paying over the top for either Jackson Martinez of Porto or Atletico Madrid’s Diego Costa.
I think we should really move away from considering Costa in this transfer window. I would need a compelling reason to believe that given the chance to make history in AM’s title hunt in La Liga and be a force in this year’s UCL he would up and leave. I just don’t see it. Sure he could make more money at Arsenal. But it’s more likely he would rather stay and try and beat the likes of Barca and Real Madrid and break the duopoly of La Liga.
Now if you want to talk this coming summer – well that’s another story.
That leave’s Jackson Martinez as the most likely big January signing option. It likely would cost Arsenal a pretty penny and it would also mean likely forgetting making a play for Costa this summer. So it is a risk that has to be weighed.
He certainly has shown skill and deftness all his own and likely would offer Arsenal something they don’t have up front. The question really becomes if Costa is your real target, do you really make a play for Martinez now? Which to me makes this unlikely.
That leaves then either Morata on loan or nothing at all. Wenger today has come out and said the injury to Theo has forced him to change his thoughts on the January market. What that means is anyone’s best guess.
I am still leaning to actually nothing being done. I just think when he looks at everything he would like the option of trying to win it all with what he has. If Bendtner comes back early as has been speculated then to me it seems even more unlikely that Wenger makes a move in January.
Whatever the track he takes, I don’t think he needs to be rushed. Giroud is back and there are options for the RW position Theo would occupy. For Wenger, for the team and for the title charge its all about striking the right balance. Here’s hoping the boss gets it right.
And . . . if you are reading this . . . and in London . . . I will be there on business Wednesday thru Friday next week. I will be at the Arsenal v Fulham match and starting my Saturday at the Tolly. If you are around come in and search me out. I’d like to meet as many as I can.
