Tag Archives: She Wore

Zaha a no-go for Arsenal

3 Replies

Wilfried Zaha is reportedly Arsenal’s number one attacking target this summer. That worries me.

The Ivory Coast international is one of the most overrated players in the Premier League. One of those players who makes Soccer Am’s highlights reel week in, week out, but actually has very poor output.

Zaha turns 27 next season, and last year was the first time he had ever scored 10 league goals in a single campaign. Crystal Palace’s reported £70million asking price for is too much for a player with his ability and age.

Were Zaha 22 or 23, you would be entitled to think “fantastic young talent” but he is not. In November he turns 27. That means he is not going to get much better. He is at his peak. And any transfer fee spent on him is unlikely to be recouped.

Last season he had a decent season. But it was not an exceptional one.

Yes, he scored 10 goals, but he averaged nearly 300 minutes per goal. The much maligned Theo Walcott Only averaged as high as this twice in his Arsenal career, the last being when he was 22.

In Walcott’s last full season with Arsenal, he scored 19 goals. He was deemed by many as dead wood. Not good enough.

Comparing Walcott to Zaha is one of those ones where Zaha looks a lot better, he beats a man more often, has more tricks. Yet Walcott gets more goals and more assists. Throughout his Arsenal career, Walcott was ugly yet efficient. Zaha is the opposite.

Zaha’s 10 goals this season have come at a very high minutes per goal ratio. Out of all the wingers to score 10 Premier League goals, he had by far the worst ratio.

I understand that on the list, he played for the worst club. But this also means he got the most game time.

Whilst Sterling had to share the limelight with Sane, Silva x2, De Bruyne, everything that Palace did went through Zaha.

Zaha is a good mid-table player. Inconsistent but can win you games. He is the type of player that will put in 5 match winning performances a season, and those 5 performances will be enough to take a team from a relegation battle to mid-table safety.

He would do a job as an impact substitute at a top club, but certainly not at the price Palace are demanding.

There is an argument that he is “better than what Arsenal already have” which whilst true, does not mean we should buy him. Being better than what we have does not necessarily make him the best option.

Even if he was on the market at £40million, I would still feel that as overpriced. There are younger, cheaper, more exciting players in world football.

Keenos

What would a Homegrown Hale End squad look like?

3 Replies

Yesterday I read an interesting blog from out friends over at GunnersTown where it was suggested that with Arsenal unable to compete with Manchester City financially, that we should perhaps stop trying to chase them in the transfer market and concentrate on promoting youth.

No matter how much money we generate through our self-sustain model, or how much Stan Kroenke would mythically pump in, Manchester City owners would just pump in more.

It is why many argue that we should concentrate on doing things smarter, doing things better, as it is completely unrealistic that we can match the oil-state funded side unless we also become oil-state funded.

The argument in the blog from GunnersTown is that if we accept that we are not going to be able to compete financially, and therefore it is unlikely we will challenge for the title; should we concentrate on playing youngsters. On playing local lads who actually care about the club rather than the crazy money they are on.

There is an example as to what GunnersTown are talking about in Germany.

German football is dominated by Bayern Munich who have won the last 7 league titles.

Based on 2017/18 accounts, Bayern Munich have a total revenue £255m higher than Germany’s 2nd richest club – Borussia Dortmund – and there wage bill nearly double. There revenue is higher than the 2nd and 3rd richest teams in Germany combined (Dortmund & Schalke) and they generate £420m more a season than Borussia Mönchengladbach in 4th.

The financial inequality that teams and fans basically write off competing with Bayern Munich for the title. They know it is nearly impossible. There is an acceptance.

So what happens instead is these clubs concentrate on developing and bringing through young players. Seeing youngsters break through into the 1st team, and then go on to the national team is the goal of almost every Bundesliga team bar Munich.

The success of the national team then becomes the success for these fans to celebrate because, even if the players move elsewhere, they remain linked with the club they came through. They are very much still seen as “their players” regardless if they end up at Manchester City, Real Madrid or, inevitably, Bayern Munich.

Returning to Arsenal; if we accept that we can not compete for the title whilst Manchester City are state sponsored, should we stop spending hundreds of millions on mercenary footballers chasing them? Would fans not get more joy seeing local fans breaking through, developing, and then pushing into the England team?

I think at this point we have to make the distinction between match going fans and TV fans which GunnersTown also does.

If you are not challenging for honours, I think match going fans would rather see local players getting their chance, whilst TV fans would want to “see the best players possible.”

Now Arsenal would have to “give something back” to match going fans if they decided to accept not chasing the title and instead promote youth. To put simply, Arsenal would half the season ticket prices.

That would mean my £1,000 season ticket would not only cost £500.

Halving ticket prices would reduce revenue by around £50m (gate receipts currently equal ~£100m a season). Arsenal would then have to shave £50million off the wage bill to manage this.

It would also be sensible for the club to budget without any European football, just in case the worst happens.

In 2018/19 Arsenal earned £37million from Europa League prize money and TV rights.

All other revenue streams would stay the same as domestic and overseas TV rights are agreed by the Premier League and our major sponsors are tied to long term deals.

So Arsenal’s revenue would drop by £87million a year. A huge drop that would come directly off the wage bill.

Arsenal’s wage bill in 2017/18 was reported as £223,000,000. Knocking off £87,000,000 would see the side have an annual wage budget of £136,000,000. That is similar to what Tottenham and Everton pay. Tottenham showing that if you spend right, and develop youngsters, you can still create a competitive team.

Shaving £1.5m off the weekly wage bill is not an easy task, but is manageable:

Ozil: £350k
Aubameyang: £200k
Mkhitaryan: £180k
Kolasinac: £115k
Ramsey: £110k
Xhaka: £100k
Cech: £100k
Mustafi: £90k
Koscielny: £90k
Welbeck: £75k
Monreal – £75k
Elneny – £50k
Jenkinson – £45k

All of the above cost Arsenal just a little shy of £1.6m. 3 have already left and I imagine bar Aubameyang, most would not be too upset to see the others leave.

The key now is that instead of Arsenal going out and buying the likes of Yannick Carrasco, Joachim Anderson, Dennis Praet or Wilfreid Zaha, the club looks internally to replace the majority of those that leave, looking at Freddie Ljungberg’s U23 squad.

Martinez
Ilev
Bellerin
Chambers
Sokratis
Holding
New CB
Mavropanos
Ballard
New LB
Medley
Torreira
Guendouzi
Maitland-Niles
Beilik
Willock
Iwobi
Nelson
ESR
Saka
Amaechi
Lacazette
New ST
Nketiah

Arsenal would still require a new left back, central defender and striker, but with intelligent recruitment on young players, we should not need to pay more than £70,000 a man on all 3 players.

So where would that squad finish?

In the short term we we probably be looking at 6th – 8th. But as the many teenagers continually improve in the mid term, as few sold for big money and reinvested, there is no reason we could not build a Champions League challenging team in the same way Tottenham have done.

It would perhaps be a 5-year project to strip the club down and rebuild it before we become regular Champions League challengers again, and it would take a huge mental shift for fans (and I am sure we would lose some of those fans who only support Arsenal due to certain players).

But lets roll forward 5 years.

We are sitting watching young, local lads, with a conveyor belt of them coming through. Season tickets are half what they are now, and we are back to being a settled top 6 team.

It is well worth thinking about…

Keenos

Arsenal could target Lucas Torreira “friends” to help him settle

4 Replies

Talk of Lucas Torreira joining AC Milan is intensifying.

The majority of the talk of his departure comes off the back of an interview with talkSPORT’s International presenter Alvaro Romeo

Romeo has interviewed Torreira on numerous occasions over the last 12 months, and he explained how Torreira has struggled to settle at the London club.

‘The language has cost me, to be able to relate with my peers and with the people. It is very difficult when you can’t have dialogue.’ Said Torreira

‘And so is the climate. You go out in the morning and it is cloudy, you arrive late to your home and it is cloudy.

‘It is strange a little bit, the sun, the more of us that we are here and we are accustomed to having always or almost always the sun.’

Whilst Uruguayans speak Spanish (according to Google), it is not a pure form of the language, and is also influenced by the Portuguese of Brazil and Italian language. The Portuguese influence is a variant of Rocha, with bilingualism or the fusion of Spanish and Portuguese, known as Portuñol.

So whilst Unai Emery and most of his staff speak Spanish, as well as Nacho Monreal, Hector Bellerin, Shkodran Mustafi and Mesut Ozil, they do not speak the exact same language.

In Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang and Sokratis, Arsenal also have a few players that speak Italian.

The problem is football clubs are full of cliques.

At Arsenal the biggest clique is the Franco-German one, containing the likes of Aubameyang, Ozil, Mustafi, Sokratis, Alexandre Lacazette, Matteo Guendouzi, Henrikh Mkhitaryan and Sead Kolašinac. Think back to nearly a year ago and “balloon gate” and those that were present.

This has meant that Torreira has perhaps felt isolated that many those who he could “relate to” would prefer to speak in German or French than Spanish.

You then have Bellerin who has been in England for so long he is basically a cockney.

Bellerin is a mysterious individual. There is always a feeling that he enjoys his own company, doing his own thing such as going to fashion shows. You rarely see or hear of him socialising with team mates, and it is clear his friendship group is not really football related, but with the Spanish community within London.

So the talk of Torreira struggling to settle probably has some legs in it.

Arsenal perhaps need to work harder at ensuring players do settle in England. Players struggling in their 1st year is not a new thing in football., and is certainly not just a problem Arsenal face.

Didier Drogba spoke brilliantly about his struggles to settle at Chelsea following a move from Marseille. It took him and his family a few years to settle and he had very little help from his club. As he became a senior player, Drogba went out of his way to ensure new signings had an arm round them and Chelsea developed a “new signings programme” based on Drogba’s advice.

In an interview back in 2009, Drogba said:

‘My family were feeling so good there so it was difficult for them to adapt here because of the difference between the language and everything.

‘But I think every player when they leave their country they need one year to adapt.

‘It took me one year so I think maybe one year is enough.’

It is nearly identical to what Torreira has said about Arsenal. Talking about the struggle to adapt, the language, the climate, everything.

Robert Pires struggled with life in England, but was surrounded by the likes of Patrick Vieira and Thierry Henry. Arsenal’s French clique at the time could often be found frequenting the coffee shops around Hampstead. Had Pires not had the support network around him, he stay at Arsenal would probably have been brief.

To ensure Torreira does settle, and is not swayed by a move abroad, Arsenal need to provide him the support required.

Whether that be instructing the likes of Bellerin and Monreal to look after him (maybe this is why Monreal got another year). The club could help Torreira is go into the transfer market and sign him a “friend”. A team mate who he could relate to, build his own clique around.

Arsenal have been linked with Dennis Praet and Joachim Andersen this summer – two players who were team mates of Torreira at Sampdoria.

At Liverpool, Luis Saurez was taken under the wing by Lucas Leiva to help him settle.

Those speculating about Torreira’s departure are only focusing on the first part of the quotes where he talks bout his struggle to settle. They ignore the 2nd part of the interview where he says:

‘But as the years pass, I’m going to be adapting.

‘But for me, the balance was positive and I am satisfied and happy with what I did in the year.’

AC Milan may well be chasing Torreira, and looking to exploit the fact that it has been a tough 1st year for him to adapt in England. But Torreira is speaking about the future at Arsenal and clearly understands that as time passes, he will adapt.

What is clear is that Torreira is not demanding to leave Arsenal as he is ‘homesick’ and Arsenal just need to ensure that they build a support network around him (and other new signings) to help them settle.

If this means going out and buying him some “friends” then so be it.

Keenos