A leopard never changes its spots.

After a year of chasing Benjamin Sesko, Arsenal pivoted and opted to sign Viktor Gyorekes. That decision is looking better and better as each day goes on.

The issue for Sesko has never been his talent. He certainly has the attributes to become one of the best strikers in the world. But Arsenal became increasingly frustrated with both RB Leipzig and Sesko’s representatives throughout negotiations. And it is the later that likely killed the deal.

Whilst Gyorekes and his people were working hard to get a deal done, the feeling was Sesko’s representatives were becoming tough to deal with.

According to those with inside knowledge of the deal, ‘during negotiations, Sesko’s agent Elvis Basanovic had left club [Arsenal] insiders jaw dropped with his shenanigans. One Insider said he presented Sesko as “Messi”.’

I always laugh when fans of a club celebrate signing a player who either let us contract run down, or who’s agent caused disruption during negotiations. These sort of players and agents are likely to repeat the behaviour in the future. And at that point, those same fans who celebrated will be calling them a disgrace (Exhibit one is Alexander Isak behaving the same way at Newcastle as he did at Real Sociedad).

What Andrea Berta and Arsenal execs would have been thinking during negotiations is the long game. A problematic representative now will also be problematic down the future. Like the leopard, they do not change their spots.

At 22-years-old, Sesko probably would have signed a 5-year-deal at Arsenal. That would have seen us having to negotiate with his representatives again in 3-years-time. And considering how they have behaved the last 12-months, that is clearly something Berta had no interest in doing.

You want players to sign for the club who are interested in winning the biggest trophies at Arsenal. Not players who see us as a stepping stone to Real Madrid or Barcelona. It is not hard to foresee after a good 3 years in the Premier League, the representatives of Sesko hawking him around Europe looking to see if they could get their man a better deal elsewhere.

Sasko, after all, is Pro Transfers only decent player. He is their cash cow. And they will use him to try and create themselves generational wealth.

With just Sesko on their books, they likely would have wanted a decent commission off this deal. And then in 3-years time, they would look to make further commission by either moving him clubs, or demanding a huge agent fee for Sesko to agree a new contract. They are clearly the sort of representatives a club would not want to deal with.

Now I will concede that Gyorekes did some unsavoury things to push through his Arsenal move, including failing to turn up to training. But this is a different scenario to Sesko’s representatives continually moving the goalposts.

Gyorekes has an agreement with the former Sporting Director of Football Hugo Viana that he could leave in the summer of 2025 if a buying club offered an agreed amount. And Arsenal did that.

The issue was Viana had left Sporting in early June, and that left Sporting President Frederico Varandas overseeing the deal. He refused to acknowledge the agreement, going back on the clubs words.

It has been reported that had Viana been at Sporting, the Gyorekes would have happened quickly. But with his departure, Varandas moved the goalposts and forced Gyorekes hand. He had to play up a little to get his move and to ensure Sporting honoured the agreement.

Sesko’s issues are not in the way he has behaved to depart Leipzig, but the way his agents have behaved during negotiations. And in 3-years down the line history will repeat itself.

Apparently, Sesko is now weighing up whether to join Newcastle United or Manchester United. It should be an easy choice. Newcastle is a stop off, Manchester is a destination.

Whilst Newcastle but be in a better position short term, it is easy to forget with the way their fans go on that they have won just one League Cup in 70-years. They are not a big club.

Kids around the globe dream of playing for Manchester United, Arsenal, Liverpool et al. Only kids on Tyneside and in County Durham dream of playing for Newcastle.

What Sesko’s people are doing is seeing who offers their player the most money. And how offers them the most money to get the deal done. And it is grubby.

I for one am happy we made the early decision to move for Gyorekes. Were we chasing Sesko we would still be in negotiations, getting increasingly frustrated.

We have our man, Newcastle and Man U can now fight it out for an overpriced talented football (just 13 league goals last season), who will only cause further issues down the line.

Enjoy your Sunday.

Keenos

There is a loud minority of Arsenal fans who are making the claim that if Mikel Arteta fails to win the league this season, he should be sacked. Absolutely ludicrous.

Some media pundits have also jumped on the bandwagon, claiming that after 6 years at Arsenal (although it has only actually been 5 full season), Arteta is a man under pressure.

Firstly, it will be interesting to see if the same fans and pundits also think Arne Slott should be sacked if Liverpool do not win the league this season. After all, he took Jurgen Klopp’s team to the title, and has since spent close over £250m on his players. That could end up closer to £400m if Liverpool sign Alexander Isak.

Surely if Liverpool spend £400m in a single summer after winning the league and fail to do back-to-back, then Slott has failed with his rebuild and should be sacked?

Likewise, Pep Guardiola should be a man under pressure if Manchester City fail to win the league for the 2nd season in a row.

After winning the treble, and then making it four league titles in a row, no league title in two years should be considered a catastrophic failure. Especially after spending nearly £400m in a little more than 12 months.

Rightly so, neither of these men will be under pressure if they fail to win the league. So why is it only for Mikel Arteta where “anything under champions is a failure and he should be sacked”. If that is the case and we finish 2nd, then every manager who finishes below us should also lose their job.

To repeat above, the viewpoint that a manager should be sacked because all he is doing is competing for major honours is ludicrous.

There is a stark warning for Arsenal and Arsenal fans just up the Seven Sisters Road.

When Mauricio Pochettino came into Tottenham in 2014, their highest league position in 24 years was 4th – a position they had achieved just twice during that period.

On the 5-years in charge of Tottenham, he took them from the “Big 6” side that rarely qualified for the Champions League to title contenders and Champions League finalists. But after 5-years at the club, he was sacked.

Following the Champions League defeat and having not won anything during his time at Tottenham, fan pressure was increasing on Pochettino. Eventually, Daniel Levy bowed down to this fan pressure and the man that made Spurs contenders was sacked.

Four full seasons in charge saw Tottenham finish 5th, 3rd, 2nd and 3rd and make the Champions League final. That was deemed not good enough for Spurs fans and Levy. And you have to wonder if they now regret getting rid of the man with the clubs highest win percentage of any manager managing over 80 games.

Since sacking Pochettino, Tottenham have failed to challenge for major honours. A League Cup runners up and winning the Europa League are not top tier achievements. They have also only finished top 4 just once.

The 6 seasons since Pochettino left has seen them finish outside of the top 6 3 times, with an average finish of 8th. Last season the Europa League victory massively papered over the cracks of finishing 17th.

Thomas Frank becomes the 5th man to manage Tottenham since Pochettino left (excluding caretaker managers):

Mauricio Pochettino – 54.27% win ratio
Antonio Conte – 53.95%
Jose Mourinho – 51.16%
Nuno Espírito Santo – 47.06%
Ange Postecoglou – 46.53%

There is no debate that Tottenham have been a worse team since Pochettino left. And what he was doing at Tottenham was overachieving.

The best comparator to establish what a teams “par finish” should be in the league is the wage bill. It is a fairly simple equation that the more you spend on salaries, the higher up in the league you tend to finish. Wage bill is a much bigger factor than transfer spend (net or otherwise).

Pochettino took Tottenham, who consistently had the 6th highest wage bill in the league to finishing top 3 and challenging for the biggest honours domestically and in Europe. When he left, Tottenham “returned to par” after nearly half a decade of overachieving in the league based on wage bill.

And Mikel Arteta is doing the same at Arsenal. Throughout his time so far, the Spanaird has overachieved with Arsenal.

Whilst some look back on 3 top 2 finishes as a failure, we did this whilst having the 4th or 5th highest wage bill in the league.

What Arteta has done is spend wisely, recruit well, and coach lesser players to be better and compete with teams who are spending £100m+ a year on wages more than us. To bring that into perspective, a £100m difference is basically £2m a week. That is an extra 10 players earning £200k.

Now give Arteta 10 new signings who are in that category of player to justify earning £200k+ and we win the league.

So Arteta is being painted as a man under pressure, when quite frankly, us finishing consistently above Manchester United and Chelsea, above Liverpool twice and Man City once is an achievement.

And if you are wanting Arteta out, just look at Tottenham for what could happen.

Arteta, like Pochettino, is overachieving at Arsenal. There is no guarantee that a replacement manager will also overachieve and the evidence is there that a new manager will actually take the club back to its par position, which right now is 4th.

Yes, Slott has come in for Liverpool. But he has essentially taken the team with the 2nd highest wage bill to 1st. A 1 place overachievement. Arteta is overachieving by 3 or 4 positions.

So before you start calling for Arteta’s head, look at Tottenham since Pochettino left. At Manchester United since Sir Alex Ferguson left. Both clubs have gone massively backwards and look no where near ending their negative spiral.

I remember during the Wenger days “be careful what you wish for” was often seen online. And I feel the same with Arteta.

Want him out? Be careful what you wish for. Arsenal will likely go backwards and he will likely join Manchester City where, with the biggest budget in world football, he will clean up.

Keenos

It was always going to happen, wasn’t it? The second it was announced that Alexander Isak was looking to jump ship at Newcastle, some Arsenal fans were going to cry that “if we were a serious club, we would drop our interest in Gyorekes and go for Isak”. But Arsenal are right not to pivot.

Too late in the day

A lot of fans often forget that football is not a computer game. It is simply too late in the day to drop our interest in Gyroekes. Contracts have been signed, paperwork swapped. It would be like to deciding to pull out of a house the day before completion because another property has come onto the market.

The same fans saying that we should pivot are also those that have complained daily that we have “not yet signed a striker”.

So what they now want is for us to drop the deal which is due to complete in the next 2-3 days, and beginning negotiating with Newcastle United for Isak.

No one knows how long those negotiations would take, and even whether they would be successful. Meanwhile, Gyorekes would quickly move on if if changed plans at this last minute (likely to Manchester United), and we could be left with no one.

Back to the house analogy, you pull out a of a deal the day before completion, and then have to start the process again for the new house you have seen on Right Move. That adds another 3 months (at least) before you can move, and there is no guarantee that the seller will want to sell to you.

And again, the same fans who demand we go for Isak would then moan we do not have a new striker come 1 September as we could not get Isak offer the line.

Isak is younger by age, but not by milage

This blog is going to be filled with analogies.

So I have an 8-year-old Ford Sierra I am selling (I will not need it at my new house). It has 40,000 miles on the clock. My missus has a 6-year-old Ford Sierra. It has 60,000 miles on the clock. Which one are you buying?

Being younger in age does not always mean younger in body, if you have more miles on the clock.

For a start, Isak is just 15-months younger than Gyorekes. It really is not a factor. But in “football years”, they are the same age.

Isak has played 364 senior games for club and country, Gyorekes has played 359. In terms of playing time, they are nearly identical.

Whilst Isak has greater higher-level experience, you also then need to factor in that he has spent longer at the highest level in terms of keeping his body at peak condition. Gyorekes, meanwhile, has just two season of top flight conditioning under him. That means he is less likely to have the long term wear and tear that comes with top flight fitness work.

I would not be surprised if Gyorekes is still performing in the top flight (somewhere) into his mid-30s. Whilst Isak looks like one of those that come 31, he will be done. And a lot of that is down to their respective injury records.

Injury record

Three years ago, the choice for Arsenal was between Gabriel Jesus and Alexander Isak.

One was Premier League proven, the other had just a single high-performing season in La Liga under his belt. For me, and the club, it was a no brainer.

Factored into the decision-making was Isak’s injury record. The Swede, despite being just 21, had already begun picking up lots of niggling injuries. And that has continued at Newcastle.

Mikel Arteta has spoken recently about signing more players who can influence a game over 90 minutes. And whilst Isak’s natural talent is not in doubt, his fitness is.

Isak is almost guaranteed to miss half a dozen league games a season. And when he does play, he struggles to complete 90 minutes.

In the 42 games across all competitions last season, Isak completed just 16.

If the niggling injuries continue, there will become a point in the next year or two where Isak’s time needs to be managed. Where training needs to become less intense. And they are huge caveats for a man that will come with such a big fee and wage.

Meanwhile, Goyerekes is a fitness freak. He played 52 games for Sporting last season, including 33 out of their 34 Liga Portugal games. Of those 52 games, he completed 90 minutes in 41 of them.

So on one hand, we have a player that rarely misses a game. On the other, you have someone who will likely miss 10-20% of your season. And that is a huge factor when talking about the money.

Isak’s huge cost

I never have an issue with what we spend, as long as what a player costs does not impact other business we need to do.

Newcastle will likely demand in excess of £120m for Isak. That is almost twice as much as what Gyorekes is costing. Meanwhile, Isak himself will likely look for wages around the £300k mark. Again, nearly twice the £150k we are expected to get Gyorekes for.

Taking into account that they have the same miles on the clock, Isak’s injury record and their comparable scoring record for country and in Europe, is Isak worth twice as much as Gyorekes? I do not think so.

Granted, I think Isak is the better player. And most importantly, he is Premier League proven. But I do not think those factors justify an extra £60m in transfer fee and £150k a week.

Were we to sign Isak rather than Gyorekes, we would have to make a saving elsewhere in the transfer window. And put simply, signing Isak would result in us signing one less player elsewhere.

Now some of you will say “we should not have signed Madueke, and put that money towards Isak”. And I get this simplistic thinking.

Not signing Madueke would have still left us relying on just Ethan Nwaneri to cover Bukayo Saka. The teenager is also the cover for Martin Odegaard. I do not think not signing some cover for Saka was an option this season.

And then likewise, we should not have sacrificed Martin Zubimendi, Christian Norgaard, Kepa or Cristhian Mosquera to free up the money for Isak. All were positions that it was essential we made signings in.

It would be a different story if we did not have the money for Gyorekes. Then ys, we would need to sacrifice one or two squad signings to free up the money. But we do have that money so we have been able to raise both the ceiling and floor of our squad this season.

We are also still in the market for a left-winger. Moving for Isak now, having completed other business, would shelve that idea.

Signing Isak would basically be sacrificing strengthening elsewhere in the team. And I do not think Isak ability over Gyorekes is worth sacrificing a new left winger or cover for Saka for.

For me, I would rather Gyorekes and Madueke over Isak. Especially (again), when you factor in that Isak will miss 10-20% of the season. That will just put more strain on the likes of Saka who can then not be rested as we have no cover.

Moving on with Gyorekes

We have done some tremendous business this summer and strengthened across the park.

Once Gyorekes is in the bag, it is only the left wing that we need to look at.

It makes zero sense to pivot to Isak this late in the game. Especially considering there is no guarantee he will get him and no guarantee Gyorekes will stay on the hook for another 2-3 weeks whilst we negotiate. We could end up with none.

I also would not want to sacrifice strengthening elsewhere to go big for Isak. Unless, of course, the plan will be to have both Gyorekes and Isak, with one playing wider like they do for Sweden.

Isak is a huge risk with his injury record and pricetag. We are right not to drop Gyorekes and move for his national team mate.

Keenos

Seems apt to share these beauties from @KOMerchants https://t.co/jzNSiHttB4 pic.twitter.com/WphQdPhJ3H

— Carl Bourke Art (@CarlBourkeArt) July 22, 2025