Tag Archives: Lucas Torreira

Positive, positive Arsenal

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As I sit here on Sunday afternoon writing this I am in a relaxed and reflective mood.

A weekend of seeing family, a BBQ in the sun and then a pub lunch in Epping Forest on Sunday in the rain, I have had a cracking weekend even if it meant I missed going to The Arsenal.

And The Arsenal result has certainly helped with my mood.

After a tough two opening games for Unai Emery, we face West Ham on Saturday, winning 3-1 in what was a fairly rusty display.

Some tried to paint Emery as a man under pressure. I saw one journalist say he was “favourite for the sack race”, and that he was under tremendous pressure from the Arsenal fans.

It was certainly a case of the journalist trying to create a story rather than report the news.

The only people I have seen being super-negative about the start of the Emery-era are attention seeking wankers in social media.

Regardless of whether they were previously Wenger-In or Wenger-Out, there is an equal number abusing Emery for RTs and recognition. On both sides, thy have shown themselves as not true Arsenal fans and are best off ignored.

As for the game, I was not at it as have only seen brief highlights on Match if the Day.

From the 8 minutes of football I saw, the following observations were made:

  • Sokratis is the proper defender we have missed for a decade
  • There is a player in Granit Xhaka; he just needs to be used correctly
  • We need to play Lucas Torreira behind Xhaka
  • Mkhitaryan is a different player when Ozil isn’t playing

There are clearly some huge positives to be taken from the beginning of the Emery-era; even if it has taken 3 games to get the first positive result.

The difference between the Liverpool / Arsenal punditry made interesting listening too.

They heavily criticised Arsenal for sending both full backs forward, but then praised Liverpool for employing the same tactics and saying “thats the modern game”.

It highlights that the “expert” pundits will change their mind on tactics depending on what agenda they want to pursue.

In this case it was criticise Arsenal & praise Liverpool.

What would have been good is for someone to take the time comparing the way both sides set up.

The issue is not that Arsenal’s full backs bomb forward, but the lack of cover they get from their midfielders.

Liverpool played with Georginio Wijnaldum and James Milner sitting.

Both men would cover outwide when their full backs bomb forward.

Manchester City use a different tactic, with Fernandinho sitting between the centre backs creating a back 3 when Kyle Walker and Benjamin Mendy bomb on.

Arsenal’s problem is, and has been probably since Gilberto Silva left the club, that no one in the middle of the park covers the full backs when the go forward.

It just further supports playing Torreira and Xhaka together.

A two man shield will mean that we can have a solid 4 men covering the full backs when the are in the opposition box.

It is all about balance.

Whilst I have mentioned Liverpool. They are top. 9 points from 9; and are being talked up as potential champions. The crown already on their head.

But they have played West Ham (h), Crystal Palace (a) & Brighton (h).

Some perspective is needed.

Last season, Arsenal were awful in finishing 6th. Yet they beat West Ham (h), Crystal Palace (a) & Brighton (h).

So had we had Liverpool’s opening 3 games this season in 2017/18, we would have been top of the league, 9 points out of 9.

This season I would expect Arsenal to win all 3 of the games Liverpool have – we have already won 1 of the 3.

We are 3 games into the season. Just like Arsenal were not a bad team after losing to Manchester City and Chelsea, beating West Ham, Crystal Palace and Brighton does not make Liverpool a great team.

Have a good bank holiday Monday and it is back to football on Sunday with a visit to Cardiff.

Let’s be positive and ignore those negative attention seekers.

Keenos

Arsenal spend right rather than big

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As the transfer window trundles to a close today prior to the Premier League opener tomorrow, I thought I would share some thoughts on the market, and how Arsenal have performed.

My thought can be summed up in the statement it is not what you spend, but who you buy.

Fans can often become obsessed with the value of the player, rather than the ability of the player. Thinking that the more expensive the player, the better he must be. But with brilliant recruitment you can sign top class players at the fraction of what other clubs are spending.

It is dangerous to look at what other clubs have spent over what they have actually signed.

This summer West Ham, Everton, Fulham and Leicester City have all outspent Arsenal (at the time of writing – Wednesday lunchtime), and some people might use that fact to attack the club. But look at what the actually signed.

Everton spent £42million on Richarlison from Watford. He hasn’t scored since November, and no assists since December.

West Ham also went big on an attacking Brazilian, spending £38million on Felipe Anderson. The former wonderkid has never really developed into a consistent performer and £38million is a lot of money for a man who was restricted to just 9 starts last season due to a serious knee injury.

Leicester City signed James Maddison for £25m, Ricardo Pereira (who?) for £23million and Liverpools 9th choice goal keeper Danny Ward for £12.5million. Over £60million spent on Championship players.

Also buying Championship players are Fulham who have spent £37million on Aleksandar Mitrovic and Alfie Mawson – two players who have previously been found wanting in the Premier League.

Now lets shut our eyes and imagine Arsenal bought the 7 players mentioned in this blog. Nearly £180million spent. Would you say it is good business? No. It would be big money wasted.

Arsenal spent just £67million on Stephan Lichtsteiner, Bernd Leno, Sokratis Papastathopoulos, Lucas Torreira & Mattéo Guendouzi.

What would be the better business? £67million on what Arsenal got, or the £180million on a bunch of tripe?

Perhaps what sums up what I am saying is 4 players signed by Arsenal and Chelsea. Two a piece.

Lucas Torreira + Bernd Leno =  £42million

Jorginho + Kepa Arrizabalaga = £130million

Now I am now saying Chelsea have made poor signings. Joringho is a very good central midfielder and Kepa a top young keeper. But are they much better than Torreira and Leno? Are they even actually any better?

Torreira and Jorginho both played in Italy last season, slightly different styles of play. They both bring a lot of ability to the middle of the park. For me, they are both equally as good as what they do. Torrieira defending, Jorginho keeping the ball moving.

As for the goal keepers, Arsenal are getting an experienced German keeper who is on the fringes of the national team, Chelsea a less experienced Spanish keeper who is on the fringes of the national team.

The uneducated amongst us will point to Chelsea and say “they have spent £130million, they have shown ambition” whilst criticising Arsenal for “going cheap”. But the reality is the quality of the players being bought in is not much different.

Arsenal have not gone cheap, they have bought the right players at a good price. Meanwhile Chelsea have probably over paid for what they have bought in.

I have always been a student of Soccernomics where you do not focus on what has been spent, but what has been bought in, and what Arsenal have bought in is plenty to be happy about.

Keenos

Brilliant recruitment key in crazy transfer market

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A good recruitment team is worth its way in gold.

Anyone ever involved in HR or recruitment will know that if you get a solid internal recruitment team, you do not waste money on expensive recruitment agency fees or poor hires who leave after 3 months.

Football is no different to business.

If you get a good recruitment team, with good scouts, you can save yourself millions.

At a club like Manchester City, with their billions, or Real Madrid with their millions and “pull”, you do not need a top recruitment team. You can keep chucking money at a problem until you get it right.

Just look at Manchester City and their signing of centre backs over the years since, how much they have thrown at trying to get a partner for Vincent Kompany:

Kolo Toure £16,000,000
Joleon Lescott £22,000,000
Jerome Boateng £11,000,000
Stefan Savic £6,000,000
Matija Nastasic £12,000,000
Martín Demichelis £3,500,000
Eliaquim Mangala £40,000,000
Nicolás Otamendi £32,000,000
John Stones £47,500,000
Aymeric Laporte £57,000,000

Nearly £250million spent on centre backs since signing Kompany and the best two were Jerome Boateng (who they did not give the chance too) and Martin Demichelis (who was the cheapest).

Over at Tottenham we can see the affect of good and bad recruitment.

In 2013 they sold Gareth Bale for £85,000,000. That same summer they spent over £100million on Paulinho, Nacer Chadli, Robert Soldado, Etienne Capoue, Vlad Chiriches, Christian Ericksen and Erik Lamela. Only Ericksen turned out to be a good signing.

More recently, however, they have recruited well.

Ben Davies, Dele Alli, Son Heung-min, Toby Alderweireld and Victor Wanyama all came in for a combined cost of under £50million.

That is not to say there recruitment has been brilliant. Daniel Levy is often lauded for his fantastic business as the transfer window comes to a close, but the truth is he has recruited poorly towards the end of a transfer window.

https://twitter.com/KeenosAFC/status/1025062638852743168

As prices continue to spiral and we see high prices for average players, it is more important than ever to have a top notch recruitment team who can scour the globe and find that superstar.

Some of the prices we have seen this summer have been incredible. Rumours of Wilfried Zaha for £70million. We are seeing Championship standard players moving for £20million+.

https://twitter.com/KeenosAFC/status/1025077776209129473

All this does it further highlight how important Sven Mislintat and his team are for Arsenal now, and moving forward.

We are never going to be able to sign a Kylian Mbappe for £166m, Philippe Coutinho for £110m or Cristiano Ronaldo for £80m.

But what we can do with the right recruitment is find the next 17-year old kid who could turn into Mbappe, or recruit a 21-year old Coutinho struggling in Italy, or a £12m youngster from Portugal who becomes the next Cristiano Ronaldo.

Arsenal recently spent around £50m on Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang. 5 years ago Sven Mislintat took him to Borussia Dortmund for just £13million.

In 2013, a lot of people knew of Aubameyang. Everyone knew his story, his struggles to break through at AC Milan, his sparkling form at Saint-Étienne in Ligue 1. But only Mislintat pushed to make the move and Dortmund ended up developing one of the best strikers in the world.

Good recruitment is not new to Arsenal.

Dennis Bergkamp was struggling in Italy. Marc Overmars had 2 injury hit seasons in Holland. Emmanuel Petit was a journeyman centre back in France.

A teenage Patrick Vieira was languishing in AC Milan’s reserves. Thierry Henry struggling to make an impact at Juventus. The early years of the Arsene Wenger era was defined by brilliant recruitment enabling us to compete with the much richer Manchester United in the league.

The late years of his time at the club, however, was defined by poor recruitment. A policy that had perhaps lost its way.

You probably have to go back to the 2012/13 season for the last year Arsenal had a real good summer when it came to recruitment.

Santi Cazorla and Nacho Monreal were not big names, but they became big players. It was also the year we took a risk on Olivier Giroud.

Since that year we have had a mixture of big money signings (Mesut Ozil, Alexis Sanchez, Alexandre Lacaette, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang) and relative unknowns who have not really performed (Gabriel Paulista, Calum Chambers, Mohamed Elneny, Lucas Pérez, Shkodran Mustafi).

The difference is between now and those late 90’s days is the relative unknowns are often costing a lot of money, and every top side has now invested heavily in scouting systems and statistical analysts teams, meaning it is even harder to find a talented youngster that no one knows about, or a senior pro who is perhaps underperforming or being under used.

In Sven Mislintat, Arsenal have one of the best in the world.

This summer we have spent a little under £70million.

When you consider that we signed Lucas Torreira for £22million, you realise how important a good recruitment team is.

Chelsea have signed Jorginho (£57.4m), Liverpool Naby Keita (£48m) and Fabinho (£39m), and Manchester United Fred (£47m). Based on his World Cup showing, Torreira is in the class of these players, but cost half as much.

The likes of James Maddison has gone to Leicester City for more than Torreira, and this week Tottenham have been linked with Lewis Cook for £30million.

Cook is a good young player, but Torreira is clearly superior – and only 1-year older. Torreira could turn out to be one of the signings of the season.

Arsenal also secured Mattéo Guendouzi for just £7million.

Guendouzi is the sort of player that Diamond Eye Sven was bought in to discover.

Playing for Lorient in Ligue 2, he only turned 19-years old in April and he looks a delightful talent. When you consider that “known” prospects are going for £20million+, if you can find an unknown prospect, you are quids in.

Leicester snapped up Riyad Mahrez from Ligue 2 and N’Golo Kante from Ligue 1. The unknowns are out there if you wish to take the time to find them.

We then have Bernd Leno.

Now he is certainly not an “unknown” but for Arsenal to have got a goal keeper of his quality for £19million is an absolute steal.

Arsenal have made some brilliant signings for less than £70million. For that we could have signed Richarlson and Lewis Cook. Two mid-table players at best. Or we could have spanked all of that on Zaha. An average player who flatters to deceive.

Sven Mislintat could be the most important appointment at Arsenal since Arsene Wenger.

Keenos