The new Arsenal Club Thread - *No Spoilers & Read OP Before Posting*

Did anyone listen to the athletic podcast about Havertz? was very interesting, Jury is still out for me, but he seems to be improving and getting the better with the system every game.
main things talked about were
  • Ornstein says Arsenal scouted Havertz extensively when he was at Leverkusen.
  • Arsenal were in contact with his representatives in 2020, but were not able to pay the price Leverkusen demanded.
  • Havertz popped up on Arsenals radar again around March this year, when he was approaching final 2 years of his contract.
  • Mount, Gundogan and Kudus were looked at in the summer.
  • Arteta was the driving force behind our interest in Havertz. Edu was on board.
  • Bayern were interested in Havertz. Real Madrid wanted to wait and see how things unfolded with Harry Kane first.
  • Once Havertz learned of Arsenals interest, he had a Zoom meeting with Mikel Arteta. After this he was fully committed to Arsenal.
  • Big difference in how public sees Havertz and how the people working in football see Havertz. He is highly rated in the football world.
  • Havertz has very good attitude and is "ultra committed and dedicated" and football obsessed to get this right and work with the coaches.
  • His attitude, application and conduct on the training field is excellent. He is a very popular character with players and staff.
  • Ornstein mentions Barella as one CM option this summer, but sounds more like he mentions Barella as one of the midfielders that could have been signed this summer and not that he was somebody we specifically targeted.
  • Havertz base salary is in the region of 275k per week, almost same as at Chelsea.
  • His price/wage might make fans expect a more "glamorous" role from him when in reality his current role is a bit more subtle.
  • Marks the stats guy says: "Havertz is valued by Arteta for his work off the ball". Havertz is really intelligent with his defensive positioning and doesnt shy away from a challenge when he needs to.
  • True tackles = Tackles + challenges lost + fouls committed. A way to see a players tendency to "stick a foot in"
  • When in controlled possession, Havertz with his 6.4 true tackles ranks number 3 in the Arsenal squad. Adds a bite to the team when out of possession.
  • He has 1.4 blocked passes per 90 minutes, second highest in the Arsenal squad.
  • These are not the primary attributes Arsenal have brought him in for, but he has been in an important part in our defense being more solid this season.
 
Heard it rumoured that Arsenal could recall Tierney, which was something I thought we should do after the weekend. Even ignoring Zinchenko's injury, Tierney is a better LB who was our best performer a few seasons back, and Kiwior didn't impress me in that role.
 
HangTime said:
Heard it rumoured that Arsenal could recall Tierney, which was something I thought we should do after the weekend. Even ignoring Zinchenko's injury, Tierney is a better LB who was our best performer a few seasons back, and Kiwior didn't impress me in that role.
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One day we will find out why Arteta does not rate the likes of Tierney and Smith Rowe but will give minutes and starts to Nketiah. I'm not saying Nketiah should not get starts, just that it perplexes me that the players mentioned earlier were essentially dumped. The lack of rotation in general is a worry, so this extended break can't have come soon enough. And with Partey not going to Afcon, I'm hoping he gets back to the first team soon as we miss his progressiveness.
 
Josh said:
We've missed KT in my opinion, Zinny is great going forward and doing the things Arteta likes but sometimes we just need a simple, old school LB.
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Arteta does not favour old-school left/rightbacks, heck he dropped Magalhães at the start of the season so he could play Partey at RB! He wants overloads in midfield and seems to favour that from the left side, why Kwior and then Tomiyasu both did this in the Fulham game. I agree that we should have variety in our build-up, and would love to see a swashbuckling combo of Tierney and Martinelli zipping up and down the left, but it just ain't gonna happen.
 
eurokage said:
One day we will find out why Arteta does not rate the likes of Tierney and Smith Rowe but will give minutes and starts to Nketiah. I'm not saying Nketiah should not get starts, just that it perplexes me that the players mentioned earlier were essentially dumped. The lack of rotation in general is a worry, so this extended break can't have come soon enough. And with Partey not going to Afcon, I'm hoping he gets back to the first team soon as we miss his progressiveness.
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The problem is Jesus blows a bit hot and cold in front of goal, I think Arteta was annoyed at all the chances spurned vs West Ham, so he'll hand starts to Nketiah at times.
ESR is a player I rated very highly but the problem is he's been overlooked for so long that when he gets chances he snatches at the them. There was a game last month can't remember which where I thought he was nailed on to score and missed. I'm not sure if i'd describe it as a 'confidence issue' but it feels like he's sort of never actually restarted his career after his injury, he probably feels like he has to rip up trees off the bench every time so isn't quite in a groove atm.

Wouldn't surprise me if he ended up at Villa or something, Emery seemed to rate him. The challenge he has at Arsenal is when Arteta uses a #10 it will always be Odegaard, and he isn't going to replace Martinelli on LW. He can play False9 but I don't think Arteta is convinced / wants to do that, or if he did, he just splashed £65m on Havertz.
 
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Tierney should have been recalled as soon as timber was out for the season, kiwor is nowhere near as good at left back. Smith Rowe and Nelson might as well be sold, even when we can't score and are desperate for a goal arteta still does not use them. Waste of time even being on the bench in that case and must be demoralising.

Nelson should be playing for Martinelli at times but never does. It's like Arteta has 11 players and no plan B.

Ramsdale might as well be sold, would rather him than Raul play but not going to happen, might as well cash in.

Teams in a rut, build up play is so slow now teams have for ever to set up nicely behind the ball and wait it out.

This will be the test now for Arteta, how does he fix this, does he have the ability to change things around, if he does nt then season over.

I'm not liking our chances against Liverpool Sunday right now.
 
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