Mikel Merino

[Redarmy]

THe more the media and fans go on about a new striker the more arteta will resist......hes said for over a year now hes happy with what we have and not in market for a striker

[DB10GOONER]

THe more the media and fans go on about a new striker the more arteta will resist......hes said for over a year now hes happy with what we have and not in market for a striker

And that for me is the main problem - or one of them along with his inexperience at this level. His ego is like Wenger's was, he can't be told anything and will happily cut off his own nose to spite his face.

A top pragmatic manager with years of experience at the top would admit he got something wrong and try and address it.

An egotistical manager will just plow on believing he will be proven right eventually - much like good old Hitler in the bunker in 1945!

[Retro Gunner]

The club was certainly in the market for a striker but in the end couldn’t pull it off. At this point, you either stick with what you have or purchase a dud like United have with Zirkzee.

This argument is resurrecting the old Wengerite refrain of "who else is out there?", which we normally hear from Wilson regarding Arteta. I see that Wilson has been quiet about the new managers at Chelsea and Liverpool, who both have their clubs above us in the table. In Slot's case, he's top having inherited an ageing side with plenty of bang average players and has spent nothing.

Anyway, regarding strikers, you'd find an upgrade on Havertz by having a walk over Hackney Marshes on Saturday afternoon. Many of us on here made it very clear in the summer that Arteta had no intention of buying a striker, because no way was he going to replace either of Havertz, or Jesus. That would require admitting he'd fucked up and just like his mentor, he doesn't do that. There are no excuses for not buying a goalscorer and we all knew it would come home to roost.

We have undoubtedly been in the market for the last 2years for an attacker. Chelsea hijacked the Mudryk deal 2seasons ago and there were credible links with Sesko and Gokyeres this summer so you either didn’t follow the news or simply refusing to acknowledge the realities of closing transfer deals for a position that is historically difficult to strengthen due to shortage of elite strikers and high demand

Please don’t compare us to Chelsea and their chaotic transfer approach. We will outscore and finish above them like we have done for the last 2seasons. Despite playing 3 games with 10men, we've only scored 3goals fewer.

As for Liverpool, Slott inherited a decent squad that competed for the title the year before. Where do you get this ageing squad idea from? The average age of their squad is around 26years and they have a good mix of youth and experience. It’s no where near the car crash of a squad Wenger and Fergie left behind their respective clubs. In our case, it’s needed an enormous amount of money to just arrest the decline.
United are still counting the costs and evidently money is no guarantee that you’ll stop the rot.

Are you related to Wilson and nutflush? There's some revisionist stuff going on in that post. For a start, you say that we've been trying to land a striker for the last 2 years and you then mention the Mudryk deal being hijacked. Well, for a start he's a winger and not a striker, so we can discount him. Secondly, we did buy a striker the summer before last, but unfortunately it was Kai Havertz (maybe it's you who doesn't keep up with the news, or refuses to acknowledge reality).

You'll notice that I used the term golscorer and we can't really accuse Havertz of being one of those can we? You can make as many excuses as you want about it being difficult ("historically difficult"??) to land a top striker, but I think we're entitled to expect a management team that's burned through £800 million in less than 5 years to have come up with somebody a lot more effective than Havertz and Jesus. They'll probably fail to score 20 league goals between them.

You've then misrepresented what I said. I made the point that Wilson has been quiet given the fact that Slot and Maresca have appeared in their first seasons and already have their clubs above us in the league. You've given me the average age of Liverpool's team, fair enough, but the quality players such as Salah and Van Dijk are 32 and 33 respectively. The rest of that squad is pretty average, but Slot has so far got a lot out of it. As for Chelsea, Maresca inherited a disaster zone, but has improved things quickly. Maybe we'll see how much come this weekend. I'm perfectly aware of the squad left by Wenger, but after 5 years and the amount spent, Arteta should have put things right. Also, let's not forget that he inherited Saka and Martinelli (on form back then), which Emery didn't. Forget the whataboutery with Utd, I don't give a damn about the mess they're in and I hope it continues. It's irrelevant to any judgement of Arteta.

[General]

The club was certainly in the market for a striker but in the end couldn’t pull it off. At this point, you either stick with what you have or purchase a dud like United have with Zirkzee.

This argument is resurrecting the old Wengerite refrain of "who else is out there?", which we normally hear from Wilson regarding Arteta. I see that Wilson has been quiet about the new managers at Chelsea and Liverpool, who both have their clubs above us in the table. In Slot's case, he's top having inherited an ageing side with plenty of bang average players and has spent nothing.

Anyway, regarding strikers, you'd find an upgrade on Havertz by having a walk over Hackney Marshes on Saturday afternoon. Many of us on here made it very clear in the summer that Arteta had no intention of buying a striker, because no way was he going to replace either of Havertz, or Jesus. That would require admitting he'd fucked up and just like his mentor, he doesn't do that. There are no excuses for not buying a goalscorer and we all knew it would come home to roost.

We have undoubtedly been in the market for the last 2years for an attacker. Chelsea hijacked the Mudryk deal 2seasons ago and there were credible links with Sesko and Gokyeres this summer so you either didn’t follow the news or simply refusing to acknowledge the realities of closing transfer deals for a position that is historically difficult to strengthen due to shortage of elite strikers and high demand

Please don’t compare us to Chelsea and their chaotic transfer approach. We will outscore and finish above them like we have done for the last 2seasons. Despite playing 3 games with 10men, we've only scored 3goals fewer.

As for Liverpool, Slott inherited a decent squad that competed for the title the year before. Where do you get this ageing squad idea from? The average age of their squad is around 26years and they have a good mix of youth and experience. It’s no where near the car crash of a squad Wenger and Fergie left behind their respective clubs. In our case, it’s needed an enormous amount of money to just arrest the decline.
United are still counting the costs and evidently money is no guarantee that you’ll stop the rot.

Are you related to Wilson and nutflush? There's some revisionist stuff going on in that post. For a start, you say that we've been trying to land a striker for the last 2 years and you then mention the Mudryk deal being hijacked. Well, for a start he's a winger and not a striker, so we can discount him. Secondly, we did buy a striker the summer before last, but unfortunately it was Kai Havertz (maybe it's you who doesn't keep up with the news, or refuses to acknowledge reality).

You'll notice that I used the term golscorer and we can't really accuse Havertz of being one of those can we? You can make as many excuses as you want about it being difficult ("historically difficult"??) to land a top striker, but I think we're entitled to expect a management team that's burned through £800 million in less than 5 years to have come up with somebody a lot more effective than Havertz and Jesus. They'll probably fail to score 20 league goals between them.

You've then misrepresented what I said. I made the point that Wilson has been quiet given the fact that Slot and Maresca have appeared in their first seasons and already have their clubs above us in the league. You've given me the average age of Liverpool's team, fair enough, but the quality players such as Salah and Van Dijk are 32 and 33 respectively. The rest of that squad is pretty average, but Slot has so far got a lot out of it. As for Chelsea, Maresca inherited a disaster zone, but has improved things quickly. Maybe we'll see how much come this weekend. I'm perfectly aware of the squad left by Wenger, but after 5 years and the amount spent, Arteta should have put things right. Also, let's not forget that he inherited Saka and Martinelli (on form back then), which Emery didn't. Forget the whataboutery with Utd, I don't give a damn about the mess they're in and I hope it continues. It's irrelevant to any judgement of Arteta.

You are correct when you say that Murdryk is a winger (wide player) not a striker. This is why I said we have been in the market in the last 2years for an 'attacker' (Note not a striker). Secondly even if he is deployed to lead the line , Havertz is not a traditional striker. He's an attacking midfielder and that's where he's played for the majority of his career. In fact he initially played in midfield after we acquired him. Jesus mostly occupying the bench should be a hint that Arteta no longer sees him as the solution. Trossard has also led the line ocassionally so it is clear to me we haven't found a permanent solution.

The issue here is that you are still subscribed to an outdated view on football. A lot of elite clubs are moving away from the traditonal number 9 role partly due to a shortage of elite strikers and evolving tactics with interchanging frontlines so when I say we've been in the market for an attacker, it could mean winger, traditonal striker or attacking midfielder and all the players we were strongly linked with fit this mould - Mudryk, Nico Williams, Sesko and Gyokeres and Isak. Make no mistake, we need an established elite world class goal scorer to take us to the next level. There is no more room for trial and error or potential. Liverpool won the league win Salah as their leading scorer and he is still is which once agains confirms how difficult it is to find or replace elite goal scorers. You can continue to beat your chest and cling on to the expectation that we should be able to pluck such a player from the market with relative ease but the reality is there aren't many players in the market who can come in a bang in 20goals a season let alone 30. Only Haaland, Palmer and Isak scored more than 20goals last season. None of them reached 30goals which used to be the yardstick 10years ago.

I've given you the context about Chelsea and Liverpool and what's going on at these clubs is irrelvant to my thoughts. I just find it odd that you're holding them up as some sort of shining example of where we should be when we know it's been an expensive disaster zone at Chelsea and part of the reason Slot has Liverpool performing is because his predecessor invested heavily in elite players and consistently strengthened the squad. This club on the other hand was parked a disaster zone by a dinosaur and it was always going to take years and plenty of ££ to undo the damage let alone reinstate us back amongst the elite. This at least you can acknowledge.

[DB10GOONER]

The club was certainly in the market for a striker but in the end couldn’t pull it off. At this point, you either stick with what you have or purchase a dud like United have with Zirkzee.

This argument is resurrecting the old Wengerite refrain of "who else is out there?", which we normally hear from Wilson regarding Arteta. I see that Wilson has been quiet about the new managers at Chelsea and Liverpool, who both have their clubs above us in the table. In Slot's case, he's top having inherited an ageing side with plenty of bang average players and has spent nothing.

Anyway, regarding strikers, you'd find an upgrade on Havertz by having a walk over Hackney Marshes on Saturday afternoon. Many of us on here made it very clear in the summer that Arteta had no intention of buying a striker, because no way was he going to replace either of Havertz, or Jesus. That would require admitting he'd fucked up and just like his mentor, he doesn't do that. There are no excuses for not buying a goalscorer and we all knew it would come home to roost.

We have undoubtedly been in the market for the last 2years for an attacker. Chelsea hijacked the Mudryk deal 2seasons ago and there were credible links with Sesko and Gokyeres this summer so you either didn’t follow the news or simply refusing to acknowledge the realities of closing transfer deals for a position that is historically difficult to strengthen due to shortage of elite strikers and high demand

Please don’t compare us to Chelsea and their chaotic transfer approach. We will outscore and finish above them like we have done for the last 2seasons. Despite playing 3 games with 10men, we've only scored 3goals fewer.

As for Liverpool, Slott inherited a decent squad that competed for the title the year before. Where do you get this ageing squad idea from? The average age of their squad is around 26years and they have a good mix of youth and experience. It’s no where near the car crash of a squad Wenger and Fergie left behind their respective clubs. In our case, it’s needed an enormous amount of money to just arrest the decline.
United are still counting the costs and evidently money is no guarantee that you’ll stop the rot.

Are you related to Wilson and nutflush? There's some revisionist stuff going on in that post. For a start, you say that we've been trying to land a striker for the last 2 years and you then mention the Mudryk deal being hijacked. Well, for a start he's a winger and not a striker, so we can discount him. Secondly, we did buy a striker the summer before last, but unfortunately it was Kai Havertz (maybe it's you who doesn't keep up with the news, or refuses to acknowledge reality).

You'll notice that I used the term golscorer and we can't really accuse Havertz of being one of those can we? You can make as many excuses as you want about it being difficult ("historically difficult"??) to land a top striker, but I think we're entitled to expect a management team that's burned through £800 million in less than 5 years to have come up with somebody a lot more effective than Havertz and Jesus. They'll probably fail to score 20 league goals between them.

You've then misrepresented what I said. I made the point that Wilson has been quiet given the fact that Slot and Maresca have appeared in their first seasons and already have their clubs above us in the league. You've given me the average age of Liverpool's team, fair enough, but the quality players such as Salah and Van Dijk are 32 and 33 respectively. The rest of that squad is pretty average, but Slot has so far got a lot out of it. As for Chelsea, Maresca inherited a disaster zone, but has improved things quickly. Maybe we'll see how much come this weekend. I'm perfectly aware of the squad left by Wenger, but after 5 years and the amount spent, Arteta should have put things right. Also, let's not forget that he inherited Saka and Martinelli (on form back then), which Emery didn't. Forget the whataboutery with Utd, I don't give a damn about the mess they're in and I hope it continues. It's irrelevant to any judgement of Arteta.

You are correct when you say that Murdryk is a winger (wide player) not a striker. This is why I said we have been in the market in the last 2years for an 'attacker' (Note not a striker). Secondly even if he is deployed to lead the line , Havertz is not a traditional striker. He's an attacking midfielder and that's where he's played for the majority of his career. In fact he initially played in midfield after we acquired him. Jesus mostly occupying the bench should be a hint that Arteta no longer sees him as the solution. Trossard has also led the line ocassionally so it is clear to me we haven't found a permanent solution.

The issue here is that you are still subscribed to an outdated view on football. A lot of elite clubs are moving away from the traditonal number 9 role partly due to a shortage of elite strikers and evolving tactics with interchanging frontlines so when I say we've been in the market for an attacker, it could mean winger, traditonal striker or attacking midfielder and all the players we were strongly linked with fit this mould - Mudryk, Nico Williams, Sesko and Gyokeres and Isak. Make no mistake, we need an established elite world class goal scorer to take us to the next level. There is no more room for trial and error or potential. Liverpool won the league win Salah as their leading scorer and he is still is which once agains confirms how difficult it is to find or replace elite goal scorers. You can continue to beat your chest and cling on to the expectation that we should be able to pluck such a player from the market with relative ease but the reality is there aren't many players in the market who can come in a bang in 20goals a season let alone 30. Only Haaland, Palmer and Isak scored more than 20goals last season. None of them reached 30goals which used to be the yardstick 10years ago.

I've given you the context about Chelsea and Liverpool and what's going on at these clubs is irrelvant to my thoughts. I just find it odd that you're holding them up as some sort of shining example of where we should be when we know it's been an expensive disaster zone at Chelsea and part of the reason Slot has Liverpool performing is because his predecessor invested heavily in elite players and consistently strengthened the squad. This club on the other hand was parked a disaster zone by a dinosaur and it was always going to take years and plenty of ££ to undo the damage let alone reinstate us back amongst the elite. This at least you can acknowledge.

First bit in red comes up every couple of years and has done since Overmars was banging in 15 goals a season in the late nineties. Its rubbish though. Almost every team that has won the league title over the last 20 years has still had a 20+ league goals a season striker.

The second bit in red: that was the yardstick, 20+. It was never 30+ and that number of league goals is very rare. The question to ask is why one of those three or Salah at his peak are/were not at Arsenal. That is the whole point. There are strikers out there. Arteta and Edu failed to sign one.

[General]

This argument is resurrecting the old Wengerite refrain of "who else is out there?", which we normally hear from Wilson regarding Arteta. I see that Wilson has been quiet about the new managers at Chelsea and Liverpool, who both have their clubs above us in the table. In Slot's case, he's top having inherited an ageing side with plenty of bang average players and has spent nothing.

Anyway, regarding strikers, you'd find an upgrade on Havertz by having a walk over Hackney Marshes on Saturday afternoon. Many of us on here made it very clear in the summer that Arteta had no intention of buying a striker, because no way was he going to replace either of Havertz, or Jesus. That would require admitting he'd fucked up and just like his mentor, he doesn't do that. There are no excuses for not buying a goalscorer and we all knew it would come home to roost.

We have undoubtedly been in the market for the last 2years for an attacker. Chelsea hijacked the Mudryk deal 2seasons ago and there were credible links with Sesko and Gokyeres this summer so you either didn’t follow the news or simply refusing to acknowledge the realities of closing transfer deals for a position that is historically difficult to strengthen due to shortage of elite strikers and high demand

Please don’t compare us to Chelsea and their chaotic transfer approach. We will outscore and finish above them like we have done for the last 2seasons. Despite playing 3 games with 10men, we've only scored 3goals fewer.

As for Liverpool, Slott inherited a decent squad that competed for the title the year before. Where do you get this ageing squad idea from? The average age of their squad is around 26years and they have a good mix of youth and experience. It’s no where near the car crash of a squad Wenger and Fergie left behind their respective clubs. In our case, it’s needed an enormous amount of money to just arrest the decline.
United are still counting the costs and evidently money is no guarantee that you’ll stop the rot.

Are you related to Wilson and nutflush? There's some revisionist stuff going on in that post. For a start, you say that we've been trying to land a striker for the last 2 years and you then mention the Mudryk deal being hijacked. Well, for a start he's a winger and not a striker, so we can discount him. Secondly, we did buy a striker the summer before last, but unfortunately it was Kai Havertz (maybe it's you who doesn't keep up with the news, or refuses to acknowledge reality).

You'll notice that I used the term golscorer and we can't really accuse Havertz of being one of those can we? You can make as many excuses as you want about it being difficult ("historically difficult"??) to land a top striker, but I think we're entitled to expect a management team that's burned through £800 million in less than 5 years to have come up with somebody a lot more effective than Havertz and Jesus. They'll probably fail to score 20 league goals between them.

You've then misrepresented what I said. I made the point that Wilson has been quiet given the fact that Slot and Maresca have appeared in their first seasons and already have their clubs above us in the league. You've given me the average age of Liverpool's team, fair enough, but the quality players such as Salah and Van Dijk are 32 and 33 respectively. The rest of that squad is pretty average, but Slot has so far got a lot out of it. As for Chelsea, Maresca inherited a disaster zone, but has improved things quickly. Maybe we'll see how much come this weekend. I'm perfectly aware of the squad left by Wenger, but after 5 years and the amount spent, Arteta should have put things right. Also, let's not forget that he inherited Saka and Martinelli (on form back then), which Emery didn't. Forget the whataboutery with Utd, I don't give a damn about the mess they're in and I hope it continues. It's irrelevant to any judgement of Arteta.

You are correct when you say that Murdryk is a winger (wide player) not a striker. This is why I said we have been in the market in the last 2years for an 'attacker' (Note not a striker). Secondly even if he is deployed to lead the line , Havertz is not a traditional striker. He's an attacking midfielder and that's where he's played for the majority of his career. In fact he initially played in midfield after we acquired him. Jesus mostly occupying the bench should be a hint that Arteta no longer sees him as the solution. Trossard has also led the line ocassionally so it is clear to me we haven't found a permanent solution.

The issue here is that you are still subscribed to an outdated view on football. A lot of elite clubs are moving away from the traditonal number 9 role partly due to a shortage of elite strikers and evolving tactics with interchanging frontlines so when I say we've been in the market for an attacker, it could mean winger, traditonal striker or attacking midfielder and all the players we were strongly linked with fit this mould - Mudryk, Nico Williams, Sesko and Gyokeres and Isak. Make no mistake, we need an established elite world class goal scorer to take us to the next level. There is no more room for trial and error or potential. Liverpool won the league win Salah as their leading scorer and he is still is which once agains confirms how difficult it is to find or replace elite goal scorers. You can continue to beat your chest and cling on to the expectation that we should be able to pluck such a player from the market with relative ease but the reality is there aren't many players in the market who can come in a bang in 20goals a season let alone 30. Only Haaland, Palmer and Isak scored more than 20goals last season. None of them reached 30goals which used to be the yardstick 10years ago.

I've given you the context about Chelsea and Liverpool and what's going on at these clubs is irrelvant to my thoughts. I just find it odd that you're holding them up as some sort of shining example of where we should be when we know it's been an expensive disaster zone at Chelsea and part of the reason Slot has Liverpool performing is because his predecessor invested heavily in elite players and consistently strengthened the squad. This club on the other hand was parked a disaster zone by a dinosaur and it was always going to take years and plenty of ££ to undo the damage let alone reinstate us back amongst the elite. This at least you can acknowledge.

First bit in red comes up every couple of years and has done since Overmars was banging in 15 goals a season in the late nineties. Its rubbish though. Almost every team that has won the league title over the last 20 years has still had a 20+ league goals a season striker.

The second bit in red: that was the yardstick, 20+. It was never 30+ and that number of league goals is very rare. The question to ask is why one of those three or Salah at his peak are/were not at Arsenal. That is the whole point. There are strikers out there. Arteta and Edu failed to sign one.

I don't disagree that it is impossible to win the league without a proven goal scorer but my point is that player doesn't have to be striker. Bobby Pires used to chip in around 15 crucial goals from midfield and it made a huge difference. This is what we are lacking - that truly elite goal scorer who can make a difference when the margins are fine. There were times when I thought even Henry was profligate and Pires would step up out of nowhere. We struggled when he got that bad injury which Martin Tyler thought was a dive until he realised it was serious.
Anyway, we've gone past the stage of just chancing it in the market and this is something the fans making noises about buying a striker fail to understand. We scored more goals in the last 2 seasons than the Liverpool side that got 99points and won the league in 2020. The difference is they had Salah at his peak scoring crucial goals when it mattered. His actual tally at the end of the season was 19, 3more than Saka scored last season.

Agreed that 30goals hard to score now but that used to be the benchmark and every single elite goal scorer that's played in the PL has had 30 at some point. Salah was discarded by Chelsea and Klopp saw his potential so not much we could do, Palmer was attainable but plays in similar position to Saka. Isak more realistic but has injury issues. There are elite goal scorers out there but most of them are at top clubs already. You either waste money like Manure or pay silly money.

[Retro Gunner]

The club was certainly in the market for a striker but in the end couldn’t pull it off. At this point, you either stick with what you have or purchase a dud like United have with Zirkzee.

This argument is resurrecting the old Wengerite refrain of "who else is out there?", which we normally hear from Wilson regarding Arteta. I see that Wilson has been quiet about the new managers at Chelsea and Liverpool, who both have their clubs above us in the table. In Slot's case, he's top having inherited an ageing side with plenty of bang average players and has spent nothing.

Anyway, regarding strikers, you'd find an upgrade on Havertz by having a walk over Hackney Marshes on Saturday afternoon. Many of us on here made it very clear in the summer that Arteta had no intention of buying a striker, because no way was he going to replace either of Havertz, or Jesus. That would require admitting he'd fucked up and just like his mentor, he doesn't do that. There are no excuses for not buying a goalscorer and we all knew it would come home to roost.

We have undoubtedly been in the market for the last 2years for an attacker. Chelsea hijacked the Mudryk deal 2seasons ago and there were credible links with Sesko and Gokyeres this summer so you either didn’t follow the news or simply refusing to acknowledge the realities of closing transfer deals for a position that is historically difficult to strengthen due to shortage of elite strikers and high demand

Please don’t compare us to Chelsea and their chaotic transfer approach. We will outscore and finish above them like we have done for the last 2seasons. Despite playing 3 games with 10men, we've only scored 3goals fewer.

As for Liverpool, Slott inherited a decent squad that competed for the title the year before. Where do you get this ageing squad idea from? The average age of their squad is around 26years and they have a good mix of youth and experience. It’s no where near the car crash of a squad Wenger and Fergie left behind their respective clubs. In our case, it’s needed an enormous amount of money to just arrest the decline.
United are still counting the costs and evidently money is no guarantee that you’ll stop the rot.

Are you related to Wilson and nutflush? There's some revisionist stuff going on in that post. For a start, you say that we've been trying to land a striker for the last 2 years and you then mention the Mudryk deal being hijacked. Well, for a start he's a winger and not a striker, so we can discount him. Secondly, we did buy a striker the summer before last, but unfortunately it was Kai Havertz (maybe it's you who doesn't keep up with the news, or refuses to acknowledge reality).

You'll notice that I used the term golscorer and we can't really accuse Havertz of being one of those can we? You can make as many excuses as you want about it being difficult ("historically difficult"??) to land a top striker, but I think we're entitled to expect a management team that's burned through £800 million in less than 5 years to have come up with somebody a lot more effective than Havertz and Jesus. They'll probably fail to score 20 league goals between them.

You've then misrepresented what I said. I made the point that Wilson has been quiet given the fact that Slot and Maresca have appeared in their first seasons and already have their clubs above us in the league. You've given me the average age of Liverpool's team, fair enough, but the quality players such as Salah and Van Dijk are 32 and 33 respectively. The rest of that squad is pretty average, but Slot has so far got a lot out of it. As for Chelsea, Maresca inherited a disaster zone, but has improved things quickly. Maybe we'll see how much come this weekend. I'm perfectly aware of the squad left by Wenger, but after 5 years and the amount spent, Arteta should have put things right. Also, let's not forget that he inherited Saka and Martinelli (on form back then), which Emery didn't. Forget the whataboutery with Utd, I don't give a damn about the mess they're in and I hope it continues. It's irrelevant to any judgement of Arteta.

You are correct when you say that Murdryk is a winger (wide player) not a striker. This is why I said we have been in the market in the last 2years for an 'attacker' (Note not a striker). Secondly even if he is deployed to lead the line , Havertz is not a traditional striker. He's an attacking midfielder and that's where he's played for the majority of his career. In fact he initially played in midfield after we acquired him. Jesus mostly occupying the bench should be a hint that Arteta no longer sees him as the solution. Trossard has also led the line ocassionally so it is clear to me we haven't found a permanent solution.

The issue here is that you are still subscribed to an outdated view on football. A lot of elite clubs are moving away from the traditonal number 9 role partly due to a shortage of elite strikers and evolving tactics with interchanging frontlines so when I say we've been in the market for an attacker, it could mean winger, traditonal striker or attacking midfielder and all the players we were strongly linked with fit this mould - Mudryk, Nico Williams, Sesko and Gyokeres and Isak. Make no mistake, we need an established elite world class goal scorer to take us to the next level. There is no more room for trial and error or potential. Liverpool won the league win Salah as their leading scorer and he is still is which once agains confirms how difficult it is to find or replace elite goal scorers. You can continue to beat your chest and cling on to the expectation that we should be able to pluck such a player from the market with relative ease but the reality is there aren't many players in the market who can come in a bang in 20goals a season let alone 30. Only Haaland, Palmer and Isak scored more than 20goals last season. None of them reached 30goals which used to be the yardstick 10years ago.

I've given you the context about Chelsea and Liverpool and what's going on at these clubs is irrelvant to my thoughts. I just find it odd that you're holding them up as some sort of shining example of where we should be when we know it's been an expensive disaster zone at Chelsea and part of the reason Slot has Liverpool performing is because his predecessor invested heavily in elite players and consistently strengthened the squad. This club on the other hand was parked a disaster zone by a dinosaur and it was always going to take years and plenty of ££ to undo the damage let alone reinstate us back amongst the elite. This at least you can acknowledge.

I don't want to fall out with you General, but I can't keep getting into these circuitous, repetitive, long winded arguments, where you get hung up on semantics, twist and turn and tend to at best misunderstand, or at worst misrepresent. I've got neither the time, nor inclination to keep getting involved in forensic, court room style arguments about straightforward football matters and it's not fair to other forum members who must find these long exchanges a total bore. The game is simple and it's those that bang on about formations and daft complexities that usually have never kicked a ball and actually understand fuck all. Not implicating you in that. Anyway, this is my final response on this discussion.

Your initial post said "striker"....that you then used the term "attacker" made no difference to me and the terms are, I'm sure, synonymous for most members on here. We needed a goalscorer and whether you call Mudryk an attacker or a striker (I'd call him a winger), he wasn't the goalscorer we need. I'd agree that Havertz isn't a traditional striker...I'm not sure what he is to be honest, but again, he definitely isn't the goalscorer we needed and was, in my opinion, a ridiculous and expensive acquisition. If Arteta no longer sees Jesus as the solution, then he should have sold him in the summer, as many of us were saying. In fact, many of us were saying he wasn't the answer when the fool bought him. So we're left with two sub-optimal, largely non scoring forwards.

You think I'm subscribing to an out-dated view of football? Would that be the view that I'd like us to have a top quality striker (goalscorer) in the side? If that's outdated, then just call me old fashioned. You're also right about no more room for trial or error, but would you do us all a favour and tell that to Arteta!

I really couldn't give a toss about the systems that you're getting hung up over (you should remember that apart from Salah, Liverpool also had Mane banging another 20 goals in and Firminho probably contributing 12 or so), but the fact remains, regardless of systems, that we STILL need a top quality striker who we can rely on for 20 league goals. I'm not interested in how tough the market is, because when you've had 5 years and £800 million to spend we're entitled to expect the manager to come up with better options than Havertz and Jesus. No one is deluded enough to think we can easily magic up a Van Basten, a Lewandowski, an Henry, or a Van Persie, but fuck me, we're entitled to expect better than Havertz and Jesus. You can fog it as much as you want, but Arteta didn't buy these guys as second best options, he seems convinced that they were just what he wanted.

As for Liverpool and Chelsea, you're typically misrepresenting what I said. Forget notions of "shining examples", my point was clearly aimed at Wilson and his endless refrain that there's no better option than Arteta. Well, both Slot and Maresca walked into tough jobs this summer and both currently have their sides above us....that following 2 seasons where we've finished comfortably ahead of both those clubs. The only conclusion to draw from that is that, so far, we've regressed. I wouldn't get carried away about Klopp's investment and the squad he left behind. Take a look at his spend versus Arteta's in his first 5 years. Also, the squad that's there isn't top quality at all....it's just that Slot is getting a lot out of it. Other than Salah and maybe Van Dijk, who else would you want to replace members of our team?

That's it from me on this. Thank you and goodnight.

[Arsenal Till I Die]

Poor all control, piss poor passing and runs with the ball as if he’s shat himself.

Brilliant signing,

[IW8Goalmachine]

Watching him run around in a circle while looking up at the ball was a real treat to be had

[falkirk goon]

We've been sold a lemon here unfortunately He's shite.

[OneBardGooner]

Okay so he scored an excellent header the other week and has a decent Shot on him... But other than that he has yet to convince me he's any good.

Maybe he's one of those players who needs to be playing all the time, if so he won't work out.


Maybe if he learns to point and act the Hard Man he can be our new Clive!


Sorry DB, I didn't mean to make your Blood Pressure Go Up but I see him head that way.

[Thynker]

I don't actually know what his position is

[Retro Gunner]

He's always played as a centre mid, but has had a very ordinary career and "ordinary" is probably generous. He's a nothing player, typical of the 2nd half of Wenger's reign and pretty typical of many of Arteta's signings. Failed to make the grade at Dortmund and Newcastle and bang average back in Spain. Still, a couple of sub appearance for Spain at the Euros and I think a goal and one or two on here (well, one really) described him as a top quality player.

As I've said before, a 28 year old who is the quality we need in centre mid, would not be going through the motions at Real Sociedad. He's played about 290 games in his club career and scored a total of 27 goals. That's an average of one every 10 games, or less than 4 per league season. Doesn't quite justify the idea some had, that he'd be a useful advanced centre mid while Rice could sit deeper.

Tells you all you need to know that Partey, who should have been sold 18 months ago, seems to be ahead of Merino in the pecking order. Can't work out why Arteta wanted him. Oh yes, he's Basque of course.

[the playing mantis]

Was that me?!

I though I said he must have something to get in the Spain team, albeit as 1st sub...and hoped he would be good so we shouldn't write him off before signing.

The fact is as I said inmmatch threads he looks a bit cack and nothing playing. Albeit will give him chance till up to speed. Early signs not good but then lots of our greats have taken a while to acclimatise....straw clutching maybe!

As for sterling f off back to chavs.

[OneBardGooner]

Was that me?!

I though I said he must have something to get in the Spain team, albeit as 1st sub...and hoped he would be good so we shouldn't write him off before signing.

The fact is as I said inmmatch threads he looks a bit cack and nothing playing. Albeit will give him chance till up to speed. Early signs not good but then lots of our greats have taken a while to acclimatise....straw clutching maybe!

As for sterling f off back to chavs.

100%... It makes my piss boil every time I see the lazy fatcunt dawdling around like a bowling ball with stumpy legs in our Beloved shirt