Mini Clockend Clock – £26
Saka and Smith Rowe Shin Pads – £20
Is yours gold? The Arsenal invincibles twentieth anniversary book – £24.99
Signed and Framed Bergkamp testimonial shirt – £394
Personalised Bruised Banana Shin Pads – £20
Odegaard hoodie – £30
Declan Rice print – £16.50
Clock End Clock (wall) – £64
Bruised banana dog blanket – £16.75
As we are in the middle of another international week, there is one question I see continually asked on Twitter (or do we call it X now?):
Why does Gareth Southgate continue to call-up Kalvin Phillips and Jordan Henderson?
It is a valid question, as Kavlin Phillips has played less than 400 minutes of Premier League football since joining Manchester City, and Jordan Henderson has gone into semi-retirement moving out to Saudi Arabia.
The argument against either of them being in the squad is very easy to make. But there is follow up question which is not quite as easy to answer.
What other options does Gareth Southgate have?
Southgate has selected 3 “out and out” defensive midfielders in his squad – Declan Rice, Phillips and Henderson. Are Phillips and Henderson continually getting called up because the England manager has very few other options?
To explore this line of thinking, we thought we would look at the other English defensive minded midfielders playing in the Premier League (minutes correct at time of writing).
Declan Rice – Arsenal
Comfortably England’s best defensive midfielder. Will start if fit. The issue here is who partners him if Southgate decides to go with two defensive pivots, and also who should be the 3rd choice defensive midfielder if not Phillips and Henderson. Rice would be in everyone’s squad.
Conor Gallagher
Has kicked on to another level for Chelsea this season, but not really a defensive midfielder. Tends to play further forward for his club side with Moises Caicedo and Enzo Fernandez behind him. Not really considered as a defensive option. Also, like Rice, in Southgate’s squad.
Sean Longstaff
Can probablt consider himself unlucky to not be in the squad.Started 28 games for top 4 Newcastle last season in the league, and started every Champions League game for them this year. I am sure he is on Southgate’s radar and if he continues to play regularly, it will be hard for anyone to make an argument that he should not be in the squad ahead of either Phillips or Henderson.
James Ward-Prowse
I was surprised when so many West Ham fans were dismissive of the signing of James Ward-Prowse. He is an experienced leader and has been brilliant this season. Those same fans who did not really want him are now up in arms that he is not in Southgate’s England squad. The issue here surrounds what sort of player is Ward-Prowse?
He might sit deep, but he is not do the bulk of West Ham’s defensive work. Ward-Prowse often plays advanced of either Edson Álvarez or Tomáš Souček, and often in a midfield containing all 3 – where he is most advanced. That means his competition in the England squad is with Jude Bellingham, James Maddison, Conor Gallagher and Phil Foden. There is also Mason Mount who has also been excluded.
Trent Alexander-Arnold is also listed as a midfielder in Southgate’s squad. He is the option if England decide to go with someone who is not quite as good defensively, but can launch attacks from deep.
Josh Brownhill
A solid professional with nearly 100 Premier League games to his name. Probably not England level. Not playing at the same level as Kalvin Phillips was at Leeds. Southgate would have seen the Manchester City man in training to establish whether he still reaches that level despite very little club football. You certainly would not be picking him ahead of Sean Longstaff.
Harrison Reed
Same as Josh Brownhill. Decent Premier League player, but not England quality.
Lewis Cook
Captain of England’s 2017 U20 World Cup winning team, he won his only England cap in 2018 and was one of five players named on standby for the 23-man England national team squad for the 2018 FIFA World Cup. Back 5-years ago, you would have had him in an “England squad for Euro 2024” prediction. Two cruciate ligament tear in 2018 and 2021 have stopped his career getting any momentum. Needs to play more, prove his fitness. An outside bet for the 2024 squad if he does that.
So who is there?
I think Longstaff is the only one that can be aggrieved of not being in the squad. He is playing regular football in both the Premier League and Champions League.
Ward-Prowse is a fantastic player, but he does not do what Southgate wants a defensive midfielder to do, and Alexander-Arnold can do the same job in the middle of the park.
The outside bet is Cook. Always been a fan. If he maintains his fitness and plays regularly, he will be in with a shout.
Who would you have in the squad? Join the conversation on Twitter (or X?)
KOM
This blog was originally posted on Kick Off Merchants, the home of The Arsenal shin pads.
“Arsenal bottled it” is still the narrative some fans put out about last season, usually using a graphic that shows we led the league for 93% of last season or something.
I have always found that infographic a bit odd.
Let’s take a marathon race. Would a runner that has been two strides ahead of his opponent for 93% of the race, only to be out kicked, be labelled as bottling the race? Unlikely. So why is it in football?
A team could lead win 37 of their first 38 games of the season. The team in second could have won 36 out of 37 with a single draw. Last game of the season, the team leading could be playing away to the team in 2nd. The team in 2nd win the game and win the league. Did the team who won 37 of the first 38 games bottle it with 111 points? They would have led for over 97% of the season and finished 2nd.
Oddly, I never saw a “lead for XX% of campaign” prior to last season. It is almost like someone invented it as something relevant just because it was Arsenal.
Anyway, surely it is better to be in the title race and finish 2nd, than be like Newcastle and not having challenged, for nearly 30-years, or be Spurs and finish 8th, 29 points behind. Both of their sides would have given anything to finish where we did last season.
Moving on, Manchester City’s accounts for last year are out and they make eye-watering reading.
£423 million on wages is an increidble number. To bring that into perspective, the year before, only 5 clubs had a higher turnover than what Manchester City spent on wages in 2022/23.
In 2021/22, we had a turnover over £369m and spent £212m on wages. Whilst I would expect these to increase for 2022/23, they will not be close to Manchester City’s figures.
The equation is simple:
Higher Wages = More Better Players = More Squad Depth = Higher League position
Of course, there are always exceptions to the rule for poorly run clubs (Manchester United), or clubs that overachieve (Arsenal last season), but the trend data will show that the more a team spends on wages, the higher up the league table they tend to finish.
£423m on wages, an average of £195k a week per player. Arsenal reportedly only have five players earning more than this. So Manchester City’s averagfe is basically nearly our top end!
Man City got stronger as the season went on. This was due to Pep Guardiola being able to rotate his stars more without seeing a drop off in quality on the pitch. That is due to the strength in depth of his squad.
Now some will answer to this blog “well Kroenke needs to put his hand in his pocket”, but that is the wrong route to take.
You do not catch up or overtake Manchester City through spending as much as them. If we spent £423m on wages, they would just spend £623m. We would both still have the squad, and all what would happen is those players just get paid more.
Manchester City are owned by an oil producing state. You can not outspend them unless you are also owned by an oil producing state. Kroenke is a billioanaire, the owners of City are trillions in wealth available to them!
And a £713m turnover is crazy. That is double Arsenal’s from the previous season. Manchester City are clearly bringing in commercial revenue that is unheard of in sport, from companies that are also unheard of.
Thsat turnover is £100m more than what Arsenal and West Ham (both with 60k seater stadiums) generated in 2021/22.
I have always said that I do not expect Arsenal to win the league, and the big reason for that is due to Manchester City’s extreme wealth. Their latest accounts for last season shows just how well we did to get so close.
We are competing with Ferrari whilst only being able to afford an Audi.
Keenos
