We had a quite a few players leave the club during the summer, some of them were welcome to leave and were released like good old Bendtner (it was about time!), Chu-Young Park (we never gave that guy the chance to play and we basically wasted 2 years of his career - makes you wonder why we even bought him); some were sold - Djourou, Eisfeld ; some were loaned out - Jenkinson; and some left on a free transfer - Sagna and Fabianski.
Obviously Sagna is the biggest name that left the team. Unlike guys like Adebayor, Van Persie or Nasri, i will never have bad feelings towards Sagna for leaving. The guy always gave his all for the team and left his heart on the pitch every time he played!! I was really happy for him finally winning a trophy last season and wish him all the best for his future.
TEAM NEEDS:
Given our results and performances last year, i felt that this summer we really needed to buy a Right back (to replace Sagna); TOP class Defensive midfielder (Arteta and Flamini are not good enough if we want to challenge the big teams); and a TOP class Striker (Giroud is a decent player but NOT a top class striker).
PLAYERS BOUGHT:
Calum Chambers - Southampton - Very promising young player, could play as a right or left back but Wenger seems to want to play him as a central defender. I saw him play against Benfica and Monaco today and he showed good strength and athleticism. Definitely a guy who should progress and give us options anywhere in the back four.
Mathieu Debuchy - Newcastle - Sagna's replacement Debuchy is France's starting right back. He started all of their World Cup games except the one against Ecuador - where Sagna was the starter. He had a solid season with Newcastle last year and seems like an adequate replacement for Sagna. His challenge will be to keep the high standards Sagna set on the right back side for us and maybe even add an extra dimension going forward.
David Ospina - Nice - The Colombian goalkeeper also played for his National team at the World Cup and comes in to provide competition for Szczesny. After Fabianski left, Martinez was the only other goalkeeper who could back Szczesny up, so the purchase of Ospina was a good move for us. The issue will be his playing time especially if Szczesny remains the starter. Regardless, we DO need someone to push Wojciech who can get a bit cocky and careless at times.
Alexis Sanchez - Barcelona - Our biggest buy of the summer. Sanchez starred for Chile at the World Cup and has had impressive moments while at Barcelona. Very fast player who has good technical skills and is a good finisher. The purchase of Sanchez definitely shows that the club wants to compete for the Premier League title. The biggest challenge Wenger faces now is finding the right position for the Chilean.
CHALLENGES:
Even though with the players brought in, we are starting to look like a side who should be able to compete for the Premier League title, i see quite a few challenges ahead.
Defense: If Vermaelen is allowed to leave (which i strongly disagree with), we will be left with only Mertasacker and Koscielny as our main central defenders. From what i have seen so far, Ignasi Miquel still seems not good enough for a starting spot, Chambers is showing a lot of promise, but i am not sure he is 100% ready to be starting every week for Arsenal. That leaves us one injury away from having to play someone who is not ready to fill in the shoes of these two guys. I have been saying this for the whole of last season: Vermaelen has to be rotated with Koscielny and Mertesacker and be given enough game time to want to stay with us!!! Wenger has to put this in his stubborn head: ROTATION is a very important part of modern football. If you want to have strong competition for all the places on your team, you have to rotate players enough, so you have options!!! Letting Vermaelen go, would be a huge mistake and i feel this is something we don't need to do. If Wenger rotates the central defenders a bit (not every game but from time to time), this won't be an issue!
So overall, i feel our defense is not as impressive and solid as i want it to be. Left back is probably the only position where we have two guys who are close as far as their level, even though Gibbs is definitely better than Monreal. Bellerin impressed as a right back at the Emirates Cup, especially going forward, but Benfica never put us under too much pressure to see his defensive skills.
Midfield: We still don't have a TOP defensive midfielder. If we can buy Khedira from Madrid this would solve that problem immediately, but until i see it on paper, this position is an issue for me. Arteta and Flamini can do a job, but they are not the imposing, physical presence that you need in that position. Diaby might be an option, but he hasn't lasted more than a few weeks in the past 4 years, so we can't count on him staying healthy. I heard rumors that Wilshere might be put in that position, which is not a bad option, but his tackling easily gets out of control and i don't know if he has the required discipline to do the job there. That leaves us with a problem that needs to be solved if we want to tighten up our defense.
Another big issue for our midfield will be finding the right starting line up and you guessed it - the ROTATIONS - that need to be done! As of right now we have the following players listed as midfielders (without including Arteta, Flamini and Diaby): Ramsey, Ozil, Cazorla, Wilshere, Rosicky, Oxlade-Chamberlain; Sanchez; Walcott, Gnarby, Zelalem and Miyaichi! I am assuming the three players that would almost always start will be Sanchez, Ozil and Ramsey. The first two are way too expensive to sit on the bench and Ramsey was outstanding last season, so i think those three will start most games for us. When Walcott comes back he will probably be a sure starter as well. That leaves Wenger with the headache to find the right positions for everyone without losing the defensive balance that we need as well. Ozil and Cazorla have never impressed with their defensive work and that can be a big problem against the very organized teams. Finding the right balance on the pitch will be Wenger's biggest challenge.
On the brighter side, the fact that we have so many talented and proven players in our midfield will be a huge help when we are competing for the Champions League, FA Cup; Premier League and Capital One Cups. I just hope Wenger finds the right balance and does enough rotations to keep this team healthy and motivated!
Attack: Another area where there are question marks is our attack. Giroud has never been and will never be a striker of the quality of Suarez or Van Persie. He is a solid player, but that's it. We still don't have that top quality striker needed to make the difference in close matches. Even though both Walcott and Sanchez could probably play upfront, they don't have the size needed and if the delivery of passes to them is poor, they will struggle up front.
Which leads us to the next three guys that we have as an option: Yaya Sanogo was always a bit of the mark last season, he played a few games and showed a lot of desire and fight, but didn't provide the quality finishing expected up front. Yesterday against Benfica, he all of a sudden scored 4 goals and made us think that he might be an option if given the chance.
Joel Campbell had a good year on loan and then played very well for Costa Rica at the World Cup. He has said that he is ready to fight for his place and wants to play in the Premier League. He definitely has good qualities, but is he the finished product?
Then you have Lukas Podolski who is a great player and a good finisher, but at times his work rate is not what it needs to be. He gets lost on the wing sometimes and then kind of shuts off and doesn't do enough to get involved. He needs to step up his game if he wants to see game time this season.
So far this summer has been better than other because we did some business early and we can integrate the new faces more easily than in years past. There are still positions with big question marks around them and until i see a balanced team in all areas i won't say that we will be favorites to win the Premier League. If we don't fix the problem areas mentioned above, a more realistic target is another top 4 finish which we are all sick of by now, but the Premier League is getting stronger every year and we can't take anything for granted these days.
Let's hope we start the season with Community Shield trophy and many more after! C'mon You Gunners!!!
