Birmingham City have confirmed the loan signing of Auston Trusty.
The 23-year-old defender was signed by Arsenal for £1.8 million in January from Colorado Rapids but was immediately loaned back to KSE’s MLS franchise for six months.
The club said at the time of his signing that the intention was to loan him to a side in Europe for the 2022/23 season to further progress his development.
.@austheboss3 checks in at St. Andrew's. 💪
The American defender joins on a season-long loan.
— Birmingham City FC (@BCFC) July 15, 2022
On his unveiling, Auston said: “It feels great! I am honoured, I am blessed, I am excited for the new chapter and the new challenges. I am just really really happy to be here.
“I am a centre-back. I am willing to run, to get stuck into challenges and willing to sacrifice for my teammates. That is the kind of player you are getting from me and are getting for the team.
“I know it is going to be a challenge, I know the intensity is going to be tough. I am just really looking forward to it.”
We’re assuming his future at the Emirates will be closely tied to his fortunes at St Andrew’s. If he can’t cut the mustard in the Championship, it could prove difficult to persuade Mikel Arteta to take a punt on him this time next year.
Let’s see how Auston gets on. Best of luck to him.
Weird. Why did they take such a convoluted way of doing things. They could have loaned him to Birmingham directly.
Makes sense to me. It was a mid-season buy, so we just let him stay where he was for the rest of the season then loaned him out to an english/european team this season for him to adapt to european football.
Remains to be seen if he does adapt but seems fairly straightforward.
of course from our perspective a young player would benefit from time to adjust.
But for the Rapids owned by Stan, they would have made more by loaning him directly. And doing it halfway through their season would weaken the Rapids squad.
Unless the rapids season ended when he transferred
It just feels like we pumped in 1.8m into Rapids from our budget. For a 23yo player who will be 24 by the time he has adapted to the championship and 25 by the time he has adapted to the premiership.
We wouldn’t be able to use that player. And in all honesty if there are no reports of any outstanding attributes or international appearances, would he really get into our team?
Probably not, but let’s see how he does. If he turns out to be serviceable and we can flip him for 5M that’s not bad.
They seem to be trusty Birmingham with this.
… get my coat…
Having watched him a bit in the MLS this season, his mustard-cutting ability is very much to be determined. Positives: He’s a bit like a left-footed Ben White in that he’s good (enough) on the ball and good in distribution. (On the latter point, think White’s ball behind the left fullback for Saka.) And he’s tall at 6 feet, 4 inches. Negatives: He’s not a natural defender and he’ll probably need to add quite a bit of muscle to be successful in the Championship. Left-footed center backs who can pass seem to be in high demand these days. From that… Read more »
Why did we sign a player that’s never going to play? Mad.
I’m guessing all the downvotes think he’s a good signing? Yet Arsemouth has put virtually put the same comment and has 100% upvotes. We all support the same team and want the same thing, yet this comments section is so toxic sometimes.
Here’s an upvote for you sir. Enjoy 🙂
ball playing left footed centre back. even if he can’t cut it for us could flip him for around £5mil. also perhaps a way to establish connections with a MLS team for the future.
Oh and the Colorado Rapids are owned by Stan. so could just be some tricky tax work lmao
I don’t get the signing at all. Maybe they see him as a cheap punt.
Probably some sort of tax break for Stan 🤷🏻♂️
genuine question, what percentage of arsenal fans do you think are completely unaware we even have a player called Auston Trusty? my guess is 32%.
no shade to trusty here, this is just a very under the radar transfer (that tbh i still can’t quite understand? are we trying to expand our US fanbase? or is he just a very exciting talent) that barely.got any coverage from arsenal wrt tweets, announcement videos, interviews, pre season etc. Slightly rude tbh 😂 imagine telling your mates you’ve signed for arsenal and they ask for proof and you’ve got to dig into the depths of the internet to find it…
I imagine he has a contract to show them.
A centre back; at 23; going on loan to the Championship, when we have Saliba, 21; White, 23; Gabriel, 24, there is more hope for AMN in Arsenal first team than him.
Auston Trusty will languish in the Championship or go back to the US.
Or he could do well? Weird to be totally writing him off, no?
He could do a Vardy, no doubt, but the probability of that happening, for me, is between slim and none.
To be honest – the structure of youth sports in the US lends itself to late bloomers; nearly all athletes are in amateur sports until 21 years old, bar the absolute prodigies.
I suspect we’ll know if he’s Premier League material by the end of the season, but coming from the Rapids (Stan’s MLS side), I’m thinking there is something to that also.
if he has a good spell at birmingham AND if holding leaves arsenal at roughly the same time, he could end up getting first team minutes
Only if it’s a full moon and a cool north westerly breeze
Is he a left footed CB? If yes, there might be a flicker of hope.
if Mari leaves
Maybe, maybe not. Never seen him play myself so I’ve got no sense of how good he is.
Seems a bit premature to write off a 23 year old though, especially at CB. Could come good & play for us in some capacity. Could come good but we sell him off at a profit or could be a disaster &, at worst, we lose the million or so we signed him for. Seems pretty low risk to me.
Am I the only one who previously thought Auston Trusty was an Arseblog joke name to lampoon silly season?
Sounds more like a 1950s family car.
now available with a more powerful 2.4L engine and air con
Trusty the process
Trusty the process
good luck to the young man
should do him good 🙂
hopefully he will be a success, we are rooting for you !
Maybe I am missing something, but don’t the Colorado Rapids and Arsenal have the same owner? While they may run as separate organizations, I don’t see how Arsenal “lose” any money on this. If we get his salary covered as part of the loan(s) in his time under contract this seems like a free punt at determining if there is a working model for the Rapids to provide another developmental pool for Arsenal. I see this as a test for new ways to develop American talent. I don’t think this will amount to much personally, but I’m sure it will… Read more »