Unai Emery says that Arsenal have told him the January window is not a good time to buy players, but have promised him that there will be funds available during the summer.
The head coach is facing a defensive nightmare with Sokratis now ruled out for a month, having already lost Rob Holding and Hector Bellerin for the rest of the season.
To mitigate that, the club appear to be trying to sign Ivan Perisic and Denis Suarez on loan, but the hopes of doing any significant business in January appear to be almost zero, with summer plans in place and more cash to spend.
Speaking head of tonight’s game against Cardiff at the Emirates, Emery said of the lack of January spending and the potential loan deals, “The club is telling me that this moment is not good to buy players but the club say to me in the summer it is going to be different.
“And we are going to have chances to take and spend money to buy players.
“We are looking at two different players and the possibility they can come. If they aren’t coming to help us like we want, I prefer they don’t come.”
The Spaniard pointed out that only Chelsea have signed anyone of note during this transfer window, highlighting the difficulty of finding players of the requisite quality, and he says there are other ways for his team to improve.
“The easiest thing for me is to ask for more players but I love to work with my players,” he said.
“My challenge is to improve individually, collectively, offensively, defensively.”
Wonder if that means they’ve players identified for the summer and waiting for them to be available in instead of going for stopgap solutions?
Because Arsenal are renowned for that sort of forward planning
Mslintat is a specialist in Panic loans.
Saddle the club with unnecessary players like Mhkitaryan instead of Mahrez. That’s 120K there.
Then add Lichsteiner for 90K another over the hill player.
But he can do better, he will now loan a 29yr old who has been erratic for his club instead.
I bet had we signed Mahrez you would have moaned like fuck. Not least because we should have signed Mhkitaryan instead.
Such is the mindset of the moaning football fan.
If you were a tenth as good as Mislintat in your line of work, I doubt you’d have the time to be on here moaning about him every article. What exactly has Mahrez done at City to justify his £60M price tag?
Your relentless negativity and unnecessarily long rambling posts add nothing to the discussions.
Mkhitaryan was a swap with Sanchez, so it’s not 120k there because there wasn’t a 60m fee involved that Mahrez would have been
Santori is a consistent troll
Seriously mods, is there any possible way for us to put other users on ignore? I’ve gone past the point of caring to see Santori’s repeated rants.
Riyadh Mahrez, even if it were possible to have pinched him from the noses of Man City, is a 27 year old who cost £67million. Mkhitaryan is overpaid yes, but Mahrez is on a reported £120,000 a week. Mkhi is not on £240k, where is this £120k figure from? What’s more he hasn’t even been particularly good for Man City. I’m not saying the Mkhitaryan or Liechsteiner transfers weren’t shit. But why ignore the signings that were – Leno, Sokratis, Mavrapanos, Torreira, Guendouzi, Aubameyang? That’s a pretty good hit rate! And it’s pretty clear he’s not responsible for this Perisic… Read more »
Ignore santori, he’s just mad because Mislintat nicked his wife while he was writing one of these loooooong posts 😉
“The easiest thing for me is to ask for more players but I love to work with my players” The problem is, at the current rate, we might not have any more players left to work with. THREE season-ending injuries within January is probably the worst we’ve ever faced, and I don’t think there are many clubs in Europe that can boast of such crisis. Our defensive problems are to be blamed a lot on the fact that every time we’ve had a settled back four, someone important got injured, and we had to restart again. Any club would have… Read more »
It’s nothing to do with Kroenke.
I love the transfer spiel ‘only want players if they will improve us’
I mean generally that’s the idea, specifically in this window.
Not sure he used that old Wenger spiel. He says I prefer they not come if they are not coming. Which is pretty confusing. I think he must of meant if they dont want to join Arsenal, then I prefer they dont come here.
I wonder if maybe he was trying to infer that he only wants the club to bring in players like Suarez and Perisic on loan (maybe with the option to buy) because he’s skeptical too and doesn’t want to risk being tied down in the summer by these added long-term salaries. It would certainly be a reasonable position for the head coach to take.
What you said. People need to remember this guy has been used to working with Neymar and Mbappe not to mention some of the great players he had at Sevilla who went on to bigger and better things.
He actually did use it a week or two ago about only wanting players that improve on what we already have. But it’s hardly a ‘Wengerism’. I think about every manager in the league has said it sat one time or another. It’s just a true statement.
As far as sussing out the meaning, I thought it could possibly mean he doesn’t want some other new player ‘if they’re not good enough to improve us’ or if ‘they don’t fit the role I need’.
So no point in a trolley dash.
Well said.
That translates to ‘top top quality’
WAR CHEST
Scrap the winter transfer & make it out of season only
Like a new signing, in the long hot summer…
We don’t do Panic buys anymore. That was when Wenger and Dick were around.
We now only do Panic loans.
Somehow people are more willing to wait to end of window because they suddenly understand that we haven’t done this to ourselves instead it is the market that has conspired against us.
Apparently the old regime was responsible for extending Ozil at 350K.
Wenger is the one to blame for getting Lichsteiner and wasting 90K on a position we already have cover with Chambers and AMN.
Go figure.
Santori constantly complains about Arsenal playing people out of position…but yet the same santori complains that we got Lich because we already had AMN & Chambers available at right back. Goodbye Logic my old friend.
The worst thing about Santori is that he almost behaves like a bot; he shows now awareness or interest in others responses to his arguments, he simply ignores and just repeats the same comments in every new story post, over and over again, regardless of the truth or what anyone says to him.
He has no intention of actually conversing with anyone. I am convinced he is in fact a bot that has escaped into the real world ala Agent Smith from The Matrix.
This is so accurate it is almost scary. It might also happen to be very true. Santori does in fact appear to lack any sort of cognizance or perception of how others feel about his posts. *shudders*
Try saying “Freeze all motor functions”.
The other thing that annoys me so much about the Lichsteiner complaints is the fact that people can’t see that he was bought for what he brings off the field too. We were mentally so, so weak in Arsène’s last few seasons & far too easily bullied. That is definitely something that has improved & I think it would be daft to suggest Lich wasn’t part of the reason why it has improved.
Problem is, “he is not Mahrez”, so for a certain long time worshiper, he’ll never be good enough!
Go figure…
People have forgotten in their eagerness to criticise everything. There were reports of Ivan telling Orny I think, that “Men” were being signed to help with the mentality issue.
What are you on about with wenger and lich? Wha..I mean how…wha?
As disappointing as it may be its definitely better that we don’t just purchase on a whim and rather get better players in the summer.. Even though we really could do with a few ?
Height of hysteria. Just listened to podcast. Complaining about Mustafi for third goal. Where the ef was Torreira? He was left behind like a little school boy by Pogba that’s where. Again criticism on Mustafi but he wasn’t featured when we lost points to BHA, Soton and the great west Ham. Where was Sokratis and his great organization then???? Where was Torreira? In those 3 games and against Liverpool he was poor losing the ball in midfield (either by poor passes or being robbed) at least 5 times 3 of which led directly to goals. Imagine if that was Granit?… Read more »
We didn’t ‘complain’ about just Mustafi. We pointed to a series of defensive issues, including him, the full backs being nowhere, Guendouzi not reacting quickly enough to stop Pogba charging forward, and Cech’s poor save.
In those circumstances though, he (Mustafi) had to do more than just back off.
So, if anything, I’d say your analysis of our analysis was POOR as you attempt once again to convince people that Mustafi isn’t that bad when almost everyone with eyes can see he’s a very average defender who badly needs to be replaced.
Mustafi is awful. He was equally bad for the first goal. Ran away from Alexis and let him in behind. I’m still trying to work out what he was trying to do. A Sunday morning player has better concentration.
My least favourite Arsenal player ever. Not necessarily the worst, but what really grinds my gears is that he’s always flapping his fucking arms when we concede and pointing the finger at the nearest teammate. When more often than not, the fault is actually his. Really hope Mavrapanos has shown enough in training to get a shot in the team- I won’t say I hope he plays as obviously we have no idea really whether he’s any good!
I often wonder if Mustafi is the German word for “hot garbage.”
He slides more than an American baseball player and not always well.
Please blogs, give us the option to mute other users, I beg of you.
I think Santori is Blogs ?
How much time do you think I have?!
Well I mean, you just sit around tapping at the computer, right?
“mute” other users?
Come on, dude. Is it really that hard to ignore stupidity? Just don’t respond. The thumbs down option is really quite nice for this very purpose.
Lol @blogs ✌️
Blogs there’s a great video by Tifo finances on YT that shows it’s the wage structure that’s holding the club back at the moment. Would love you to have a look at it.
Sorry the channel is The Football Terrace
https://youtu.be/TZGylBqnmyQ
Shkodran sliding into the comment section like…
Swap deal Perisic for Ozil. One 29year old for another. just depends on how much money. The ‘loans only’ status could also be a bargain chip with Inter and any club who may want us to pay a percentage of Ozils wage if we get rid.
So a swap deal sounds ideal to me.
Any idea of what the main person (Özil) thinks of it? This is not FIFA here, it’s real life.
Plenty bang average, Ill-disciplined defenders to feed off there. More than in the pre league. I would recommend a move for him
This is suitable solution. We might be required to pay extra 5-10 million atop Ozil. Of course footballing-wise we receive a good player who the coach wants to play, his salary would be reasonable (say 100-150k), and we offload a player with an insane contract.
If there’s a chance for this, then we should take it.
You leave a guy who is best creator in Europe for another who goals 3 in 24 games as a winger? Or don’t you just wish another toy to play with unless you’re tired of it?
His days are numbered mate. Enjoy watching him play the odd match from now till end of season.
Won’t be popular with the Ozil lobby but it makes some sense, swap a player that’s not suited to Emery’s style for one that is and is on less money. But I can’t see Inter stumping up for Ozil’s wages, and Ozil is happy enough here apparently, so a permanent deal would probably be a non-starter.
I wager even the loan is a non-starter.
We’ve lost a massive amount of penetration on the right side with Bellerin out. Perisic is two footed and can provide that pace and width that Emery’s favoured systems require.
Sorry to upset you but Perisic doesn’t have Pace.
And 90% of the time he plays on the left. Like our entire squad.
Hahahahaha
I think when Emery said “if they aren’t coming to help us like we want, I prefer they don’t come.” – he means he wants these players to come on our terms (option to buy at the end of the season) and not being forced into buying them (obligation to buy clauses demanded by Barca and Inter). I think they have already identified long term targets who we are going to go after during the summer
Try-before-you-buy – I like it. Loans with an option to buy seem to be the new groove with top clubs.
So i assume we have set aside budget for verane and kimpembe?
The club’s position makes absolutely no sense. A top-four finish is essential and still possible but could be stymied by this injury crisis. If we don’t qualify for the Champions’ League then it could cost us £40 million and make it harder for us to sign top stars in the summer. Nobody’s talking about spending £70 million on one player; two £15 million defensive players could make a huge difference right now.
Like I’ve said before, we seem to have a leadership crisis at the club. Nobody’s thinking straight.
Didn’t we ‘push the boat out’ last winter. Shipping out what 4/5 players to bring in Aubameyang & Mhiki to try for a top 4 place & failed.
If I was Emery I would be doing everything to protect my reputation of someone who gets results where ever he goes. Also a statement to ensure he really does get what he wants in the summer I like this because Wenger was too much of a company man to kick up a fuss if he didn’t get anything all transfer window and leave it until very last minute when we dredging the leftovers at a high price. Wenger probably tore his hair out. And if the same situation happens then either a massive finger will be pointed at Raul… Read more »
I’m pretty sure we all know the common denominator in our decline.
Agree – I like that Emery isn’t playing human shield for the board. That is the kind of bits of transparency we’ve always hoped for.
I think Josh Kroenke is the influence point in the organization. Stan has been giving him an incrementally increasing role for some time now, and he’s more directly involved. He’s the one we hope to see the need and recommend direction.