Wenger's Transfer Targets: Summer 2017

[2Smokeyy]

https://www.express.co.uk/sport/foo...d-Marco-Asensio-Shkodran-Mustafi-Kieron-Gibbs

We're being linked with Asensio. I can't see it happening.

 

[Ceballinhos]

https://www.express.co.uk/sport/foo...d-Marco-Asensio-Shkodran-Mustafi-Kieron-Gibbs

We're being linked with Asensio. I can't see it happening.

 

[Mo Britain]

If we are to continue playing three at the back the bare minimum required is four specialist centre-backs. Mustafi leaves and thatleaves us with the bare minimum - if you include Chambers who we were trying to get rid of a few weeks ago. So our "upgrade" turns out to be to keep a player who wasn't considered good enough only a few weeks ago.

Incidentally, I think Chambers is worth a shot. But, if so, he should have been playing pre-season games not sent to Siberia.

 

[Don D]

How come no one has mentioned chambers plus money for vvd? And as for the three at the back well that won't work until we have a top class pacey cdm. So if we don't buy one we revert to four at the back, Özil rw ( like his Madrid days) Ramsey playin the deli Ali role, and elneny shielding the back four beside xhaka. I still haven't forgiven coq whos suppose to be our toughest midfielder for getting babied by Chelsea's smallest player

 

[AVENTUS]

I honestly can't see Mustafi being sold, my would we we've only just bought him

 

[RoadrunnerReloaded]

The proper comparison, as I pointed out, would be between Walmart and Millhouse Capital (Abramovich's company). Except that Arsenal isn't subsidized by Walmart, so they can claim a bit of a moral high ground there. Arsenal continues to be run closer to the way all football clubs should be run. Whether or not that's feasible in these times is another matter. But the sport would be better off if all clubs were run that way rather than as extensions of billionaires' egos, despite the dubious nature of pretty much any ownership or sponsorship (since few billionaires have gotten to be billionaires through benevolent means).

I disagree about Arsenal having any moral high ground. Sports or rather victory in sport have very often derived from rich/powerful bloke's egos. We are no different, simply older.

Was a diamond merchant injecting 50 mil into our club to stabilize our wages okay? That allowed us to sign Dennis Bergkamp when Rioch was our manager and financed the stable wages for all Wenger's initial signings like Vieira. George Graham was famous for jerking our players around with wages. Doubtful we ever would have had Bergkamp or the Wenger era without that injection of cash.

Then you can go even further back to how we became a big club in England originally. Sir Henry Norris. Rich guy made us his plaything. Check out the Arsenal history in 1919. Bribed (or 'influenced' if you prefer) our way into the first division, bought out the best manager in Chapman, bought the best players from rivals (David Jack, Alex James and Cliff Bastin) and were famously called the Bank of England team.

So yeah, we don't have any moral high ground. Its a slippery slope. IMO, you either support your local lower division club or you just appreciate the sport on the pitch without getting overly focused on the morality of the movers and shakers. FIFA itself is corrupt af, but I will still watch the World Cup.

 

[Slartibartfast]

I disagree about Arsenal having any moral high ground. Sports or rather victory in sport have very often derived from rich/powerful bloke's egos. We are no different, simply older.

Was a diamond merchant injecting 50 mil into our club to stabilize our wages okay? That allowed us to sign Dennis Bergkamp when Rioch was our manager and financed the stable wages for all Wenger's initial signings like Vieira. George Graham was famous for jerking our players around with wages. Doubtful we ever would have had Bergkamp or the Wenger era without that injection of cash.

Then you can go even further back to how we became a big club in England originally. Sir Henry Norris. Rich guy made us his plaything. Check out the Arsenal history in 1919. Bribed (or 'influenced' if you prefer) our way into the first division, bought out the best manager in Chapman, bought the best players from rivals (David Jack, Alex James and Cliff Bastin) and were famously called the Bank of England team.

So yeah, we don't have any moral high ground. Its a slippery slope. IMO, you either support your local lower division club or you just appreciate the sport on the pitch without getting overly focused on the morality of the movers and shakers. FIFA itself is corrupt af, but I will still watch the World Cup.

Everything isn't black and white in this world. There are millions of shades of gray. This isn't 1919. It's a century later and a whole different world. Also, you're far overstating the case. Arsenal bought Cliff Bastin from Exeter City, a club then in the Third Division South, for whom he had played 17 games. He was 17 years old. While Arsenal paid a record fee for David Jack (about £10k or about £400k in today's currency), it was considered a bargain at the time and was possible because Bolton was in serious financial difficulty. Alex James was bought from Preston North End, which was then in the Second Division (so, again, not a rival). And Arsenal didn't target Herbert Chapman to steal him from Huddersfield Town. They placed an ad in the Athletic News and Chapman responded and applied for the position. Were they supposed to turn him down? As for Henry Norris, he took over a nearly bankrupt Woolrich Arsenal in 1910 and wasn't even around when the club became top dog. There is no actual evidence that he bribed anyone to get Arsenal promoted. Only speculation. May have happened. But maybe not.

It also isn't 1995. Rob Holding and Hector Bellerin were born that year. And there's a vast difference between a man who was a lifelong Arsenal supporter -- who stood at the Clock End as a child when his family had enough money -- buying 10,000 shares of stock in the club that was his passion and a Russian oligarch or Middle Eastern oil sheik buying a club they probably had never heard of as a child, then spending a billion pounds to artificially prop up the club's fortunes. Comparing Arsenal's history to what is going on at those clubs or others such as PSG right now is not only disingenuous, but dishonest and an insult to Arsenal Football Club.

As I said previously, billionaires didn't get to be billionaires by benevolent means, so all owners of larger clubs are likely to have skeletons in their closets. And corporations large enough to sponsor professional football clubs are hardly benevolent entities either (do you really think Emirates is any dirtier than Etihad, City's sponsor?). So you can call the ownership and sponsorship a wash across the board. The difference is in how they choose to run the club.

Most clubs are self-sustaining. Some are just playthings. It's the plaything clubs who are ruining the game, not the self-sustaining clubs. But as pressure mounts to keep up, more and more clubs are going to be forced into becoming playthings. I would prefer that never happen to Arsenal. I'm perfectly able to support the club because it's Arsenal, not because of a need to wave a bigger Willie around and show it off to my friends. I love the club. I cheer for the club. I feel good when the club wins and disappointed when it loses. But I don't live my life vicariously through it. And I don't need it to be perfect. My support is not conditional.

 

[celestis]

"">

Doesn't sound like we are going after VVD , my bet is Jonny Evans .

 

[Aevi]

"">

Doesn't sound like we are going after VVD , my bet is Jonny Evans .

Going by last year's targets and recent talks of Evans leaving WBA, that's likely. Only other target left would be Manolas (Toprak and Kjaer have already made moves this window), though I doubt he'll come cheap.

 

[al-Ustaadh]

Is VVD injured right now?

 

[Rex Stone]

Is VVD injured right now?

He's transfer window "injured"

 

[Sanchez11]

When is deadline day? Please dont say tues!

 

[SingmeasongSong]

When is deadline day? Please dont say tues!

Pretty sure we have D-day today

 

[samshere]

https://www.express.co.uk/sport/foo...d-Marco-Asensio-Shkodran-Mustafi-Kieron-Gibbs

We're being linked with Asensio. I can't see it happening.

We've got a better chance of getting Ronaldo than Asensio. Hope Wenger has better targets than that.

 

[krackpot]

Dam this transfer window system.

Every club should get one day to trade their players, and they keep them for the rest of the season.

 

[scytheavatar]

Everything isn't black and white in this world. There are millions of shades of gray. This isn't 1919. It's a century later and a whole different world. Also, you're far overstating the case. Arsenal bought Cliff Bastin from Exeter City, a club then in the Third Division South, for whom he had played 17 games. He was 17 years old. While Arsenal paid a record fee for David Jack (about £10k or about £400k in today's currency), it was considered a bargain at the time and was possible because Bolton was in serious financial difficulty. Alex James was bought from Preston North End, which was then in the Second Division (so, again, not a rival). And Arsenal didn't target Herbert Chapman to steal him from Huddersfield Town. They placed an ad in the Athletic News and Chapman responded and applied for the position. Were they supposed to turn him down? As for Henry Norris, he took over a nearly bankrupt Woolrich Arsenal in 1910 and wasn't even around when the club became top dog. There is no actual evidence that he bribed anyone to get Arsenal promoted. Only speculation. May have happened. But maybe not.

It also isn't 1995. Rob Holding and Hector Bellerin were born that year. And there's a vast difference between a man who was a lifelong Arsenal supporter -- who stood at the Clock End as a child when his family had enough money -- buying 10,000 shares of stock in the club that was his passion and a Russian oligarch or Middle Eastern oil sheik buying a club they probably had never heard of as a child, then spending a billion pounds to artificially prop up the club's fortunes. Comparing Arsenal's history to what is going on at those clubs or others such as PSG right now is not only disingenuous, but dishonest and an insult to Arsenal Football Club.

As I said previously, billionaires didn't get to be billionaires by benevolent means, so all owners of larger clubs are likely to have skeletons in their closets. And corporations large enough to sponsor professional football clubs are hardly benevolent entities either (do you really think Emirates is any dirtier than Etihad, City's sponsor?). So you can call the ownership and sponsorship a wash across the board. The difference is in how they choose to run the club.

Most clubs are self-sustaining. Some are just playthings. It's the plaything clubs who are ruining the game, not the self-sustaining clubs. But as pressure mounts to keep up, more and more clubs are going to be forced into becoming playthings. I would prefer that never happen to Arsenal. I'm perfectly able to support the club because it's Arsenal, not because of a need to wave a bigger Willie around and show it off to my friends. I love the club. I cheer for the club. I feel good when the club wins and disappointed when it loses. But I don't live my life vicariously through it. And I don't need it to be perfect. My support is not conditional.

Chelsea's net spending so far this transfer window is £19,2M, ours is £40.7m. That is almost certain to change soon but fact is the days of Chelsea being sugar daddied is ancient history. What they are doing in the transfer market is everything WE should be doing, particularly how much money they are making from selling their players and how ruthless they are in doing it. And not a single player they have brought since Torres is out of our reach if we had been determined to compete for them.

 

[YeahBee]

If we are to continue playing three at the back the bare minimum required is four specialist centre-backs. Mustafi leaves and thatleaves us with the bare minimum - if you include Chambers who we were trying to get rid of a few weeks ago. So our "upgrade" turns out to be to keep a player who wasn't considered good enough only a few weeks ago.

Incidentally, I think Chambers is worth a shot. But, if so, he should have been playing pre-season games not sent to Siberia.

If we are to play with three at the back we need 3 senior CBs, three given starters

Now we have
Kos
Mustafi (selling him would be insanity
So we lack one here, preferably two


Cover
Per: is too old and slow and coming back from injury
to count on

Holding: is young and promising but should not be counted as a given starter same with chamber

Kola and Monreal are LBs

 

[SA Gunner]

It's not even about what and when we buy for me, although that does play a huge part.

I think someone mentioned here that if we picked up Kolisinac and Lacazette in this final week or day or the window, combined with an unbeaten start to the league, many of us would be duped and signing a different song. Myself included.

No, I feel it's key positions that need to be filled that matter most. We have done well with Lacazette, despite it being early and views from certain quarters. We have also done well to probably retain Alexis and Özil, and Ox to an extent. The key now is to keep our defense and replace Ramsey, Wilshere, Xhaka and Cazorla, with a player who is experienced, quality and reliable.

We've needed a playe like that Spud Dembele for years now. Someone like Goretzka, Nzonzi right now would give me something to smile anout

 

[Furious]

Chelsea's net spending so far this transfer window is £19,2M, ours is £40.7m. That is almost certain to change soon but fact is the days of Chelsea being sugar daddied is ancient history. What they are doing in the transfer market is everything WE should be doing, particularly how much money they are making from selling their players and how ruthless they are in doing it. And not a single player they have brought since Torres is out of our reach if we had been determined to compete for them.

Complete rubbish.

Chelsea's net spend is a product of their Russian money - they buy big, and sell big. Their starting point is much higher than ours and the average club. A guy with a higher wealth is obviously able to generate more money and profit than a guy with less wealth. Common sense.

 

[JHusMan]

I could see Asensio on deadline day ala Özil deadline day for some reason.

Purely because he still hasn't signed a new deal and has a release clause of 72m euro which is actually very cheap.

I'm guessing the two more if Mustafi goes is related to a CB signing and the 'one we're after' is a more attacking minded player. Mahrez and Draxler the obvious choices.