Arsenal fail to maximise the transfer window … again

Morning all.

So deadline day came and went without Arsenal making a signing, and in the end I don’t think that was particularly surprising. Disappointing, certainly – but at no point over the last few days had we been credibly linked with anyone, so an 11th hour bolt from the blue seemed unlikely to materialise.

It seems like the closest we came to doing anything this window was the Ollie Watkins situation, and that’s one that fizzled out pretty quickly once Aston Villa did a deal with Saudi Arabia for Jhon Duran. After that, there seemed to be no real push – at least publicly – to augment/bolster the squad for the final push in the second half of the season.

In the cold light of day, now that the window is closed, I think most people can understand how the January market isn’t ideal. The best players simply don’t move in this window, or very, very rarely at least, and that means compromise. You either find someone who isn’t really the player you want, or you pay way over the odds for a player you do want to prise them away from their current club.

Do you commit to a transfer and wages for a player who you then have to live with for years – a transfer is not just for Christmas etc etc – knowing that guy then takes up a place in the squad you could fill with a better player in the summer? The balance between opportunity now and more strategic squad building is, I’m sure, a discussion that Arsenal have had throughout this month.

From the outside I absolutely believe Mikel Arteta absolutely wanted a signing this month. There are countless quotes from interviews and press conferences where he makes that clear, particularly after the injury to Gabriel Jesus left us so short up front. We had players go public on their desire to see an addition too. Already without Bukayo Saka due to his hamstring injury, losing one of our two centre-forwards to an ACL was a moment I think we really needed to react to in the market. Jesus was injured on January 12th, the full extent of it was known pretty quickly, there was time.

Obviously, we were a bit hampered by the fact we couldn’t loan a player from the Premier League due to the fact we have Neto and Raheem Sterling filling up those positions. So, a deal for someone like Evan Ferguson, who went on loan to West Ham and might well have been worth a short-term punt, wasn’t possible. We could have brought in a player from another European club on loan, but that didn’t materialise, and again there were so few credible links during the month that it never felt like something we were pushing for.

So, as it stands, we have Kai Havertz for the centre-forward position, and that’s it. Leandro Trossard can play there, and may well have to play there in some games because I don’t think it’s realistic to expect Havertz to play every minute of every game that remains in this season. Not only is it unrealistic, it’s unfair. I saw him shattered at the end of the Wolves game last week, having put in a huge shift, and while I don’t think he’ll complain, I hope that there’s some understanding of what we’re going to ask of him between now and May.

Because, as I wrote after that game, the players put in so much effort, they needed help. Help from the market, someone to come in and give us a bit of depth (and quality) as we continue to fight as hard as we can for the title. I feel for fans who are desperate for us to stay in this chase with Liverpool and try and overtake them, but I also feel for the players who now have to do that without the club giving them the assistance they require.

It’s not just about being able to rest players like Havertz, it’s about getting the most out of them, and if you’re about to run somebody into the ground for four months, chances are you won’t do that. Another option up front would have eased that burden, and I think we’ve taken a huge gamble by choosing not to sign anyone. I get it, it’s hard, the market isn’t great, the options are limited, but we have one centre-forward now and that’s not good enough for a club like Arsenal.

I understand the Jesus injury is a big part of that, but how many times do we have to have the discussion about what we’ve invested in the forward line over the last number of years? No doubt we’ll hear about summer plans to go big, and while there might be some cynicism at that, I actually think we will – because at this point we have to. But, the ‘defence’ – if that’s what you want to call it – of how difficult the January market is, doesn’t wash when you go back to what we did last summer, and I think a large part of the frustration of this window stems from that.

When the best you can do from an attacking perspective in the summer is a last-gasp deal for Raheem Sterling on loan, you can’t hide too far behind the complications of the mid-season window. If we hadn’t spent most of the summer on a wild goose chase for the Espanyol goalkeeper (who would have taken our accumulated spending on keepers above that of forwards), then maybe we’d have had a loan spot available for this month. We had to scratch around for the cup-tied Neto loan at the death, and that’s not good planning, and maybe you need to ask questions of the goalkeeping coach and his influence. Thanks for David Raya, but settle down.

With all due respect to Neto and Sterling, they’re not the players you add to your squad when you’re trying to move the needle and master the finest of margins at the very top of the table. So, to some extent I think we’re paying the price for a poor summer, and that just adds to the sense that we’ve let two opportunities to really strengthen pass us by. Arteta has spoken often about needing to maximise every transfer window, we absolutely haven’t done that in the last two.

I guess there may well be questions about whether or not the absence of an official sporting director played a part. Edu departed after overseeing that disappointing summer window, and there was focus on his deputy, Jason Ayto, going into this one. I don’t think it’s his fault, per se, because there are other factors, but if this was an audition for taking the role on a permanent basis, it hasn’t been particularly impressive – from the outside anyway.

There will be questions too of the ownership, and whether the ambition to really push is there. I get that, but this is a club that has spent a lot of money to get where we are, so I think that’s one I’m a bit more guarded on this morning. It looked like money was available for Watkins, and I suspect it’s more about our inability to find the right player than the resources being denied or withheld.

The ‘right’ player is another one. Are we a little too focused on finding that Goldilocks forward, the one who is ‘just right’? Sure things are few and far between, sometimes you need to take a chance, and I do feel a bit like we’re reluctant to do that. As a club I think there’s some deep-seated institutional trauma from spending massive money on forwards like Lacazette, Aubameyang, and Pepe and getting zero back from them when they’ve left. Goals along the way, yes, and some important ones too, but a combined outlay of £180m+ on three players who all left for free has left us slightly frozen when decision time has come to do something similar.

We have to get over that, but that’s a bridge we can no longer cross until summer. Until then, we’re going to have to keep everything crossed that the players we have can stay fit and healthy. An injury/suspension for Havertz and we’re in big trouble up front, our massive collection of left-backs won’t be much use to us then. If there is a silver-lining this morning it’s that what we have is very good, as Sunday’s win, and our position in the Premier League table, demonstrates.

I think we’ve ‘added’ a goalscorer in the shape of Ethan Nwaneri and one way of dealing with the lack of an addition in this window is to increase his minutes and playing time, because I think he can score goals for this team. He did it against the Champions, he’s done it in the Champions League, he’s absolutely ready for more and we need to give it to him. Maybe it’s a lot to ask of a 17 year old, but what else is there at our disposal? I don’t think he’ll be weighed down by it, like Myles Lewis-Skelly he will relish the opportunity, but asking a kid to step up and be the difference maker will have people asking questions about your squad building and planning.

Ultimately, I recognise the difficulty of the January market and the complications of doing business this month, but also feel disappointed that a club with the stature of Arsenal can’t find a way to help a squad of players who give 100% for us every game they play. Fans want it, for good reason, but the team deserves it as they continue to fight for the title and, hopefully, the Champions League. Have we given them the best possible chance to succeed in what remains of this season? I don’t think anyone can make that case, and that stings having come so close in the last two campaigns.

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Right, I’ll leave it there for now. We’ll have some podcasts for you on Patreon later, rounding up the Premier League action in The 30, and we’ll preview our Carabao Cup semi-final second leg with Newcastle tomorrow night too. For instant access, you can sign up for just $6 per month at patreon.com/arseblog

Have a good one, folks.

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