Originally Posted by Özim
I don't agree with Zim on everything but in total agreement on Maguire and Oblak. Pundits were raving about the former years ago and yet nobody had the balls to take the punt....till Leicester.
I would really question Keown's scouting skills on the strentgth of his report on Maguire because he looks plenty mobile to me.....and has easily been as good as any CB in the league at passing the ball out of the back line for at least 2 seasons now minimum.
If we don't get top 4.... then this stop gap strategy we have mostly employed would have been a failure.....and banking half your budget on a goalkeeper with conflicting reports when you only have 50 mill is a big gamble. Really hope he is th business else we will look silly and be no better off next summer.
Wilshere gone to West Ham
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/44766806
Good luck to them keeping him fit
Even in that photo with his shirt off he looks like he's plugged into some kind of life support
Really hard to call what the target is for the coming season? My suspicion is that Emery's brief for his first year is to conduct a thorough audit of the existing playing staff and see what he can bring up to the required standard, before the board authorise any kind of serious spend-up (probably next summer, with maybe an early move in January). The players that we've recruited so far do all fill glaring gaps in the squad, to be fair, but while a couple of them have clearly been brought in to be long-term starters, others have the definite whiff of being there primarily to aid Emery in the task of whipping Wenger's players into shape. I expect there will also be a lot of public talk of top 4 finishes and CL football being the minimum target, blah, blah, blah, but I also think that, privately, the people running the club will be playing a longer game here, and that they'll be looking more for progress across the next 2-3 years.
I really do think the '50m budget' is all bollocks though. Or, to put it another way, I don't think it's quite what is being implied? Either way, I reckon there's a lot of money sat there if/when we need it.
Someone on here described him as a 33 year old has been, yet he scored 44 goals last season.
First year: top 4
Second year: top 2
Third year: it's ours
Think your right on the budget we have we're hardly going to let clubs know that we have loads of money available it would push transfers fee's up as soon as we showed interest.
Personally speaking, I think it has more to do with us expecting the new head coach to, you know... actually do some coaching before we give him the best part of a quarter of a billion pounds to go and spend on players (players we may not even need, if we put in a bit of work on the training ground). We may very well be able to afford it, but it's still not the kind of money you chuck around lightly...
The accepted wisdom was that Wenger wasn't a good coach, didn't get the best out of his players and didn't set us up tactically differently depending on the opposition.
That suggests that this squad is capable of better given the above things being addressed.
Ergo, I'd be reticent to write off our squad and claim it needs completely rebuilding right now.
I think the squad as is is capable of pushing for the top 4, with some additions it could be challenging.
We need to manage expectations though, not being revisionist but when Wenger came in the only really good manager he had to go toe to toe with was Ferguson.
Now there are a bunch of good managers at clubs with considerable resources, a good manager isn't a guarantee of success any more.
I think the budget we have is actually in part reflected in the targets. I don't think heads will roll if it is slightly surpassed....football clubs can't be that anally rigid but I do believe there is truth to it....otherwise there's absolutely no reason not to make a stellar signing like Oblak when he would improve the first team no end. I will lend you an ear if you want to tell me Leno can improve.... but I couldn't seriously currently imagine him being a top 3 world keeper which Oblak is. Similarly we need a top Centre half and yet sign Sokratis who would need replacing in a few years himself anyway and is unlikely to get significantly better. If the budget isn't limited, the strategy would seem at odds with that.
The target will be top 4 but if we miss out on it in relatively credible fashion Emery will be persisted with....if only to save face. They also have limited the sort of hard line they can take when signings are a decision that he is only part of and not solely responsible for and the fact the budget to my mind is clearly limited.
Nobody seems to be mentioning the elephant in the room that is AMN. He seems to have been disregarded by the current regime. Torreira isn't much older than him and Gunzuelo (whatever his name is) is a similar age and there is still talk of Nzonzi. He won't fill in at full back now we have brought the Swiss captain here unless that was a pointless signing. Very concerned we won't see him progress.
Last edited by Blink 1nce Quince 2wice; 10-07-2018 at 12:48 PM.
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