Afternoon! A very late blog from me today. Sorry about that!
The eve of our biggest game of the season. We will either be leaving the ground tomorrow on the highest of highs or the lowest of lows – there will be no in between.
Like Everton when they faced Liverpool mid-week, Tottenham do not need to beat us to spoil our party. A draw will be more than enough to derail our title challenge.
Things can change very quickly in this title race. It was only a couple of weeks ago that Liverpool were some peoples favourites. They are now 1-nil down to West Ham and a defeat for them today will end their title dreams.
Jurgen Klopp’s farewell tour is coming to a limp end. We need to ensure that our season doesn’t petter out in the same way.
We have to win the game. There is no debate. We then have to win our last 3 games. But even 4 victories from 4 might not be enough.
Away from the North London Derby and are we seeing the development of the next great Arsenal striker?
16-year-old Martin Obi has just hit his 6th goal in an u18 game against Norwich City. Before this game he had already scored 21 goals in just 16 games for the youth side.
I don’t often hype young players up as stepping up from the youth team to senior is huge, and he is still only playing U18s.
Obi doesn’t turn 17 until November and he is clearly one to watch.
Back to the senior team. Win tomorrow and it will be a good drink up in Islington. Lose and we will be drowning our sorrows!
Now before I begin, let’s put away the debate surrounding it not being the old cannon, and it pointing the wrong way. We will never change the decision made by the club 20 years ago, and for many fan under 30, the current cannon is the real cannon.
This decision by the club is something that I can get behind.
Since we changed our badge to the cartoon version, most other clubs have followed suit – and they all must have used the same designer as they all follow almost the same spec.
Why are we changing?
Ultimately, top sporting teams are brands. Therefore, when it comes to marketing themselves, they will follow the trends of the time to ensure that they stay on top.
Modern logos, however, are simple. Designers would call them “minimalist”. Think the nike swoosh, Apple logo, McDonald’s M.
Arsenal are simply following suit by stripping back the logo on the shirt to its most basic part – the cannon.
Following in others footsteps
Liverpool currently use the liver bird with the letters ‘LFC’ underneath it, whilst Tottenham have just the seagull sitting on a beachball. Manchester United mimicked Arsenal by opting for a stripped back logo for just one of their shirts this season (a red devil on the away shirt).
In recent years, we have also seen Puma produce kits that contain no club badge, and instead have the names of the club across the front.
A stripped back logo rather than full club crest looks a lot cleaner and sharper, and creates a much stronger brand awareness.
Nothing is ever really new
I am a big believer that history just repeats itself when it comes to trends.
You only have to look at music and clothing to see what was once popular will become popular once more in the future.
This move by Arsenal will not be the first team we have gone with just a cannon. Infact, two of our clubs greatest moments came with a stripped back logo rather than a full crest – Anfield 89 and the 1971 double winning team.
Logo’s on shirts became a regular thing in 1967 (prior to that, a club would only really have their crest on a shirt for an FA Cup Final).
From 1967 through to 1990, Arsenal only ever had a cannon.
As the trends changed, clubs moved to badges in the 90s, and Arsenal adopted the Islington based crest (which was also the official club badge). This remained the case until the 2002 change.
So a cannon on the shirt is not new. It is just the trend returning to the minimilistic logos of the 60s, 70s and 80s.
And what is happening with the crest?
The cartoon crest is going no-where. It is still going to be the official emblem of Arsenal Football club.
Whilat it was not the style to have crests on shirts prior to the late 60s, Arsenal still had an official crest (the most famous being the “art deco”. The club changed this to the Islington crest in 1949 but still played without a badge on the shirt.
When it became common for logos to be on shirts, Arsenal went for the cannon in 1967 rather than the Islington crest, thus leaving us with a “shirt emblem” and an “official club crest”.
This change is just us going back to that era where we have a simple logo on the shirt, and then the official club crest sitting alongside it.
Final thoughts
I have thought for a long time that we should simplify our crest to just the cannon, so I am delighted we are making the move.
Now it will be interesting to see whether this is just a one-off, or whether the minimalist logo is here to stay…
No one would have predicted the scoreline. The Arsenal FIVE, Chelsea NIL.
It was the sixth time in 2024 that we have struck four or more goals against the opponent. And 5 out of 6 of those games had something in common – no Gabriel Jesus up top.
Against West Ham, Sheffield United, Newcastle and Chelsea, Kai Havertz was given the role of the central striker. In the 5-0 win at Burnley, Leandro Trossard played up top with Havertz deeper.
It was only against Crystal Palace back in January that Jesus started – and Havertz once again played deeper.
For those that love a process, we are in the middle of the next stage.
In 2022, Arsenal signed the players needed to make us a top 4 team again – the likes of Gabriel Jesus and Olexsandr Zinchenko. A year on and we were challenging for the title.
The 2023 transfer window was no longer about signing players to help us get into the top 4, it was all about signing players that would make us regular title challengers – in came in Declan Rice, Kai Havertz, Jurrien Timber and David Raya.
The Raya signing (initially on loan) was controversial at the time, and this drew a lot of criticism from fans. But as always Thierry Henry was the voice of reason saying “he [Arteta] sees David Raya as a guy that can make him win the league.
“When Bernd Leno left Arsenal, he saw Ramsdale as a guy that could make him go into the top 4.”
And this is where we are now at in the process.
To compete on a regular basis, and to have a chance of becoming champions, we need to buy better than what we have. In turn, that could lead to some fan favourites being relegated from starters to back up dancers, and potentially leaving the club.
This summer will be a bit like last summer, where we recruit 2 or 3 top players that can start week in week out for us. The result will be that those starting will have to accept being squad players, and those currently on the bench will be sold.
I have made no secret of the 3 players I want – Benjamin Sesko, Nico Williams and Martin Zubimendi. Signing these 3 would put pressure on Gabriel Jesus/Kai Havertz, Gabriel Martinelli and Jorginho/Thomas Partey. The final result will be the likes of Eddie Nketiah, Reiss Nelson and Emile Smith Rowe leave Arsenal.
No one can make a case that Nketiah, Nelson and Smith Rowe are better options than Sesko, Williams and Zubimendi, and if those aforementioned players are struggling for game time now, they will see even less of it as we continue to strengthen.
The next big step for Mikel Arteta’s Arsenal is a new striker. And that man will be in a similar mould to Kai Havertz.
We have seen the advantages of having someone like Havertz up top in all these big wins we have had. The team now needs to transition from a Jesus type striker to a Havertz type. And this is where Arteta always wanted to go.
In the January transfer window before signing Jesus, we were linked with strikers of a completely different profile – Dusan Vlahovic, Dominic Calvert Lewin and Alexander Isak. It was clear Arteta wanted to play with a big, mobile centre forward who was comfortable coming deep and playing wide.
Vlahovic ended up at Juventus, Calvert Lewin got injured and lost form, and we opted for Jesus over Isak.
The links this summer are to players of a similar profile to those previously – Sesko, Viktor Gyökeres, Joshua Zirkzee and the previously linked Vlahhovic and Isak.
I think it is clear the direction Arteta wants the team to go in to take us to the next level again, and that is having a more physical, direct striker who is mobile enough to press and technical enough to drop deep.
That strikers natural cover will then be Kai Havertz. The German will also still provide an option as the left sided 8 when we want to go more attacking, and also cover for Martin Odegaard.
So what would all of this mean for Gabriel Jesus.
In the first half of last season, Jesus was integral in our fast start. He, and Zinchenko, bought a new mentality to the team. But there was a reason why Pep Guardiola was happy to let them both go – neither are that level you need as starters if you want to win the league.
Both are brilliant squad players – I am actually excited to see Zinchenko finally get to play a role more centrally and further forward (replacing Granit Xhaka) next season. Jesus meanwhile is a fantastic option across all 3 forward positions.
Jesus has never really been a striker, he has also never really been a winger. But what he does is provide cover and competition in all the positions. You would not be upset if either Bukayo Saka or Gabriel Martinelli were rested and Jesus came in.
The Brazilian would also provide a “Plan B” striking option to the more physical new signing. In some games Arteta might deem it better to go with someone smaller, trickier and less predictable. Jesus would also become a formidable option off the bench.
Jesus transitioning to a squad player would also mean that we do not necessarily need a new winger – we would have Saka, Martinelli, Jesus and Trossard as wide options with a new striker, Havertz and Jesus as the options up top. That would enable us to invest more in a top striker if needed.
Imagine a world where we are bringing on Havertz, Jesus and Trossard to try and win a game rather than Nketiah, Smith Rowe and Nelson being unused and untrusted subs. There is no doubt that the right recruitment at the top end of our squad will dramatically improve it.
Unfortunately for Jesus, he will have to accept a return to the utility role he played at City.
He joined us in the hope of regular first team football playing down the middle, but due to injuries and drop offs in form, Arteta and Arsenal now need to look in a new direction.
The selling point to Jesus will that despite him becoming more a utility player, he will still see plenty of game time. And the example is with his (sort of) replacement at Manchester City.
Julian Alvarez has played more Premier League minutes than any other player for City this season, but he has rarely started in his favoured centre forward position.
Alvarez has played the majority of this campaign either behind Haaland or out wide. the only time he got a run up top was when the Norwegian striker was injured. Jesus would play a very similar role to us.
You could see Jesus still starting 70% of games when fit, allowing Arteta to continually rotate between him, Martinelli and Saka. And as above, there will be times when Arteta might want to go with Jesus down the middle.
This change will certainly not be the end of Jesus’s journey with The Arsenal, and we should not consider selling him under any circumstances. 2024/25 will just be the start of a new journey with Arsenal, not to dissimilar to the role Sylvain Wiltord played in the invincibles.
Jesus being relegated from starter to squad player should be seen as a positive. It shows we are no longer only looking at players to take keep us in the top 4. We are looking for players to make us champions.
And then looking into my crystal ball at 2025, when we need to improve again, you might see a surprise like a new left winger coming in that is better than Martinelli, or a new right back better than Ben White.
Teams need to evolve, and making players or fans unhappy as you recruit better players is part of the process.
She Wore A Yellow Ribbon 