Originally Posted by
I am invisible
Pound for pound, yes. Ramsey’s the only real miss out of those 3 for me though (and even he came with his own set of headaches in terms of form, fitness and who you could partner him with).
In some ways I think we might actually have a better spread of options now, even if most of the players we’ve promoted to the first team are very raw still? Two of them are natural wingers (as is our only modest signing) and the other 3 look like they could fill in several areas across the attack and midfield. (Obviously I’m not expecting any of those guys to hit consistent, top-level form every week, but if we play the numbers game with them then we only really need one or two of them to be fired up and in the zone each week.)
Plus there’s the knock-on effect to consider. If we have proper wingers in the side, even if they’re inexperienced, then maybe (hopefully!) we won’t have to suffer Özil and Mkhi on the wings ever again! Maybe we can move Iwobi central, or possibly even push him into a 3-man midfield (he’s not really got the consistent end product to be a top winger or a no.10, but as a ball-carrier from midfield I think he could be more useful)? And of course playing with wingers means we can rest / rotate Auba and Laca, and keep them fresh across a long season.
Player-for-player you have to say we’re a weaker squad right now... but I can actually see a few more options when I look at this current group, which is something.