Mails: January transfers that would make sense

Mails: January transfers that would make sense

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Mesut is Arsenal
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. Mesut Ozil is Arsenal Football Club personified: wonderful to watch when things are going his way; falls just short when it really matters. Neither player nor club have the mentality required to make that next step up. Quote me all the assist stats, teams he’s scored against, but it’s pretty much unarguable on current evidence.
Alex G, THFC (which is nice)

The Ozil problem
I’ve got to be honest, I’ve never been excited by Ozil. I’m not a footballing philistine, I can appreciate the majesty of what he does, but he wasn’t a player I ever wanted. When the rumours were flying around a few days prior to his signing, I was hoping we’d end up with Di Maria. My issue isn’t that he isn’t good enough, it’s that while he may have had the ‘quality’ Arsene always wants from a signing, we didn’t need him.

This is an argument I had with a friend from the first season we had him. Santi Cazorla was far more effective for us in that role. Perhaps not now, but definitely when Mesut arrived. In Cazorla’s first season he racked up 12 goals and 11 assists in 37 starts. It’s easy to forget quite how good he was at a time when we didn’t have much going for us. I was against moving him for Mesut. At the end of Ozil’s first year he had 5 goals and 9 assists (admittedly playing less games).

Yet even last season, his best in an Arsenal shirt, he managed 6 goals and 19 assists. Comparing that to Cazorla’s first season in the Premier League, those aren’t great stats. The idea that Mesut adds something to our game beyond that seems a bit farfetched when he plays so high up the pitch. Cazorla had the same misfiring strike force to supply and worse support.

The issue for me is that playing Mesut behind Alexis doesn’t work. Not that they can’t interact, but that Mesut doesn’t actually play behind Alexis. He drifts around, high up the pitch and tries to find space. Do we need a player to do that? Definitely, but I can’t help wondering why that player is Mesut Ozil.

I question it because one things has become clear since Alexis moved centrally, he’s a playmaker. He isn’t a target man, he may have great finishing, but he goes to the ball. He drops deep, moves around and plays delightful passes, such as the one that unleashed Theo. I had been lead to believe that once Alexis and Theo were both fit, Mesut would be the one pulling the strings, but he isn’t. He’s scoring more this season, but that isn’t his role. If we need goals, there’s a lumbering Frenchman on the bench I think we should discuss.

Why is Alexis Sanchez not playing behind Olivier Giroud? I understand Giroud is frustrating, but he’s effective and he changes how we play football. Does he slow the game down? Yes, because he’s not blessed with pace. But can he play quick give and go football? Does he have deft flicks in his locker? Can he hold up the play while other get up the pitch? Yes, yes and yes.

Take yesterday for instance, why would you not bring Giroud on for Ozil? He’d been largely anonymous and we were relying on long balls. Giroud is more likely to grab you a goal you don’t deserve and has been treated absolutely terribly to accommodate Ozil and Sanchez. I am not saying they aren’t both better than him, but that he’s shown consistent improvement and desire.

The final straw for me is the contract saga. The idea that Sanchez and Ozil are negotiating in tandem and are BFFs off the field now. I have a rather simply solution, considering what great friends they are, let Ozil go. Offer Sanchez £250,000 p/w, but make it clear to him that the budget for both his AND Mesut’s salary is £400,000 p/w max.

From appearances, Sanchez does seem as if he wants to stay. Ozil I couldn’t say. If £250,000 p/w keeps Alexis, pay him it – but make it clear that means Mesut is on £150,000. And also make this clear to Mesut, because he actually hasn’t done anything to justify a raise on his current salary. He’s come in and done what everyone knew he could – and he’s being paid for exactly that.

Unless his good mate Alexis wants to take £200,000 p/w so Mesut can have parity, but I somehow don’t see that as likely.
BrixtonGooner (In the opening 5 minutes of the Everton match, I knew Mesut wasn’t interested)

Where would Alexis go?
Reading through this mornings mailbox i found myself wholeheartedly agreeing with the general consensus that Alexis’ is surely going to be looking at a move away from the Emirates, unless Arsenal were to offer him wages similar to those being used to tempt Oscar to China. But where would he move to if he were to go? i thought id give an attempt at profiling the clubs that could afford to sign him and that he might consider playing for….

– Barcelona: One of the obvious teams that every top player wishes to go to, but he’s already been there & done that, and there’s no way he’d play in front of MSN.

– Madrid: Again, one of the teams that most players would dream to play for, but would he really play in front of any of Bale, Ronaldo or Benzema? Perhaps if James Rodriguez leaves he’ll take his spot on the bench.

– Juventus: Would guarantee himself a title for every year he was there, but having just splashed out for Higuain and already struggling to fit both him and Dybala in the team, again i just dont see the space in the team for him. Besides, Juve much prefer to poach the best players from teams in their own league.

– PSG: Most plausible suitor so far, have obviously got the money and although Cavani is obviously a good player he’s not the same level of superstar that Zlatan had been for them, and so are looking for a new talisman to maintain their domestic superiority and more continental success. Beautiful city to walk his dogs in too.

– PL Rivals..: City, United and Chelsea are the teams that he’d probably see as being a step up from Arsenal and all 3 could afford to sign him & pay his wages.

Chelsea: Not sure if he would fit into Chelsea’s system as he wouldn’t replace Costa or Hazard (If he did, Hazard Costa and Sanchez would be f@£%ing frightening).

United:Would love to see him at United. depending on whether Mourinho could fit him in to whatever system he settles upon. Ibra up top, and a 3 behind him of Martial Mkhitaryan and Sanchez again would be amazing to see. Plus, Arsenal do have recent history of selling their best player to United (OOOHHH ROBIN VAN PERSIE).

City: Obviously have unlimited funds, but already have a lot of wide players who are finding it hard to fit into the team, as there is a limit to how many of Sane, Nolito, Navas, Sterling and both KDB and Silva are often used out wide. Although if Pep really is not overly happt with Agueros work ethic, could Sanchez be the perfect replacement?

I really think it would be damning if Arsenal were to sell their best player(s) to a premier league rival again and will show that nothing really ever changes, and i haven’t even started on Ozil!
Felix

Still here?
Hi. I first wrote in around 2006 to state that Arsene Wenger was a tactical imbecile, who has abysmal in-game management, is mentally frail, accepts defeat too easily, shocking training methods leading to injury, useless in the transfer window and buys loyalty by overpaying mediocre dross – which ends up alienating the only class players he does have, and they leave. Pretty sure I also said Arsenal would be consigned to PL and CL irrelevance so long as they failed to replace Henry and Vieira.

My reasons for this were rooted in the fact that Arsenal finished 24 points behind Chelsea that season, an unacceptable state of affairs.

The warning signs were there about the kind of Losers who follow Arsenal these days as they gladly ignored this as “we beat Spurs to 4th”. What an appalling benchmark for any “big club”.

His saving grace in 2006 (CL final) was blighted by his tactical stupidity when he removed Pires and subbed on Almunia, whilst keeping Alex Bread on. His reasons?
“I wanted more control”

That’s right. He wanted to “control” all-conquering Xavi, Iniesta and Ronaldinho with just 10 men. Instead of accepting getting swarmed and using eg Pires to hit them on the break. His breathtaking arrogance on full display.

So 10 years later: Bow to Lord Stewie!
Stewie Griffin (Part of me badly wants him to get a new deal just to see how long he can continue to fail in the exact same manner. It’s fascinating to see someone so dedicated to systematic failure!)

Sensible transfers
There’s usually a discussion on this every transfer window so let’s kick this one off early: Transfers that make sense.

For Liverpool:
Van Aanholt: Milner has been great but having a true left back gives more flexibility to use him around the pitch. Would be keen to move up the table and has a great attacking outlet. Young enough to be interesting for FSG.

Demerai Gray: cover for Mane during the ACoN, and a similar player. Young, hungry and home-grown, makes a great “next-best” alternative to the wide positions for Liverpool when Origi/Sturridge play as a nominal striker. Likely to get as much football as he does at Leicester, for more money and higher up the table. Would probably propel him into England contention (whatever you think of that). Not a key player for Leicester so likely available.

Let’s have it from your club.
KC (would take Gray for £15-20m)

Salvaging the press
I was going to write in on the match against West Bromwich but then I read Johnny Nic’s piece and it’s far more interesting.

I find the lauding of stupidity deeply troubling. Whenever I see and advert for “Educating Joey Essex” or that ilk, I weep. What is the appeal of stupidity and why are we advertising it as “cool”? In a world where the gap between the wealthiest and the poorest in our society is growing at an alarming rate, the best way a child born into poverty can bridge that gap is through education, and yet the next generation are subject to the rhetoric that in order to fit and and get ahead they need to dumb down.

The line about mob rules at the end of the article is particularly poignant since it touches on the reason this is happening. We are hard wired by evolution to attempt to fit in at all costs, because not fitting in used to mean death. That’s not the case anymore and to paraphrase another wonderful site, we all need to find our “social survivability mammoth” and tell it to shut the f**k up. But we’re working against thousands of years of conditioning which can seem depressingly futile.

If I’m interpreting Mr Nicholson correctly, his problem is not that this kind of news exists, just that the volume is drowning out any other kind. I would echo that, and I was glad to see that you listed some authors providing refuge for those of us who value higher quality content. I read very few other sites and plan to use that as a road map for more reading, because unless we all look to cut through the bulls**t and keep reading the good stuff, there won’t be any left.
Dave, MUFC, Manchester

I just read the excellent article regarding the press: “Is it too late to salvage vacuous, dishonest press?”

I think there are 2 important points to consider:

1) This is symptomatic of a wider problem (this point you touched upon) whereby the pursuit of knowledge and truth with a balanced argument has been superseded by gossip, speed and sensationalism.  Nowhere is this better exemplified than the recent US Presidential election and the Brexit vote before that. The next leader of the free world continues to create policy on the hoof and attack people through a Twitter account.  Baseless, completely exaggerated or utterly false claims are made to the public with no accountability whatsoever.

Twitter embodies everything wrong that you have highlighted.  Forget detail, forget analysis and forget facts; keep it short, make it bold, get everyone’s attention and get it out QUICKLY.  The problem is: everyone is responsible yet nobody is doing anything about it. Why isn’t every media outlet slamming Trump on the head for every ridiculous thing he has said.  We have him on record flat out lying yet no one does anything.  With Brexit, what happened to the £350m claim that was so well documented?  Why haven’t those people been exposed?

The media has a duty (for football, Mediawatch is excellent yet this needs to be mainstream). Free press is not to be taken for granted. Free press is a privilege.  Unfortunately, the free press is not free but owned and each owner has an agenda and in any case the public are not interested so why bother?

2) This leads me to the second point.  The media, sports or otherwise, is owned.  Ultimately, the press as a whole can only be incentivised to act responsibly and improve quality if it is the more attractive option financially.  Why are there so many misleading or untrue headlines out there? Because clicks equals money. If the media were incentivised differently they would not hire so many people to just post as much crap out there as possible.

On the flip side, negative enforcement is also an option.  This would require regulation of some sort (which would require the government to take quite a risk) but at the end of the day in my opinion when someone clicks on a bogus headline, money is being transferred from advertisers to the media, the cost of which is probably finally being passed on to the consumer.  In my mind this is fraud and this could be punishable.  Either way, there needs to be a collective effort to expose and fine the offenders and change the way the media is paid to incentivise them to improve standards.

The internet is a wonderful thing. The amount of information at our fingertips is overwhelming. The potential to improve vastly the general level of education, knowledge and understanding is enormous. The more we know and understand, the more tolerant we should be to all people and the closer we all should become as a people.   However, ironically the opposite is happening and people are dividing.

There is too much information out there and the only way for content providers to get noticed is to either be: 1) sensational; or 2) first.  Nothing else matters.  If the article is too long then that might turn off readers.  So keep it short. Be quick. Worry about accuracy later.   Be POLARISING, because nothing makes money more even if you said the opposite thing a week ago (see Stan Collymore or Robbie Savage in sports “journalism”).  However, try to be on the side of the masses since you get paid by the number of clicks (the masses, during tough times especially, are generally nostalgic people, so anything old school is good and “them foreigns” are bad).

It is no wonder that we have seen this global rise in populism, where the intelligent and even moderately well off are now elite and out of touch, where facts are dismissed as “just facts”, where two sides of an argument are almost never debated (certainly not on any detail that matters), where almost everything is now down to “us” vs. “them”, where you are only ever “with us” or “against us” and where there is never a grey area.  I think all I have point at is the Daily Mail’s headline “Enemies of the People” which was perhaps the most shocking and disgraceful thing I ever read and completely and utterly irresponsible.  If we want to change it, we have to attack it where it matters, which is financially. We can’t allow them to hide behind the freedom of press. It has to be free but it has to be responsible too.

Regards
K

Unfair on the fans
Does anyone else feel the fixtures for the Christmas period looks extremely unfair to fans?

If you look at the boxing day fixtures and the New years Eve fixtures, the majority of teams are playing both games home or away. Great if you support Chelsea, Liverpool or Man Utd ad you get 2 games at home. But spare a thought for West Ham, West Brom and Bournemouth all who have long journeys to other grounds twice at a time of the year when money for match tickets and additional expenditures plus travelling away is hard to come by for many.

If you support one of the ‘big’ clubs, chances are you are a season ticket holder so the biggest charge is already accounted for plus no travelling lots of miles ( OK Man Utd & Liverpool are probably flying in from other places anyway) but the point is, its a bit shit nearly half the league teams have to find money to travel twice in a week at the least affordable time of the year. On the flip side, other regular home fans may be cursing the fact they have two expensive days out in the same period especially if they are family trips.

I think in future the Premier league should consider this as it’s showing zero regard for the fans.
Steve Hislop

Oh when the Saints…go floundering on
I was pretty pleased with the march of the Saints on Sunday vs Bournemouth. A good performance, heightened to an excellent result through the introduction of a superb Steven Davis for the second half and Jay Rodders finding some confidence.

Overall the season has fluctuated between being on point (games like yesterday) and maddeningly frustrating (dumped out of a below average Europa League group). Granted we have played a load more games than usual and as a club we are just getting used to it. However, our lack of creativity led me to recently promising my housemate that the next game he illegally streams, I will spend the time more enjoyably with my curtains closed, lights off, rocking back and forth in a corner.

Despite hardly scoring any goals, we are seventh in the league. For me, it really highlights, that despite all the hype, the quality of the Premier League is not actually very high. If the Liebherr’s had put their hands in THEIR pockets this summer rather than just using some of the proceeds from our latest crop sell to the highest bidder, I believe we could be challenging the top four.

I will not deny that the club have come a long, long way from those days of administration and that the Liebherr’s have played a key part in this. However, why couldn’t we have signed (or at least tried) to sign Benteke or equivalent? (Yes I know there is no equivalent to the Bentekesauras)
The Liebherr’s are multi-billionaires and our record signing is £16 million. Saints fans happily sing about the “Liebherr wonderland” and how they saved the club. In reality, they were shrewd capitalists and made a sound business investment in a club with a lot of assets, bought at a rock-bottom price. They have made a lot of money out of this club, much of it through the high ticket prices charged.

If the plan is for Saints to move on to the “next level”, then money will have to be spent, Liebherr money, on better players and their higher wages. This doesn’t mean the academy gets tossed to the side, it can work side-by-side if managed right.

Anywho, up the Saints. Looking forward to hopefully Liverpool taking their eye of the League Cup ball and making our way to Wembley.
Jon, Southampton
There is a no more chuckling-inducing sight in the Premier League than a disgruntled Arsene Wenger, with his arms stretched out wide, baffled.

The good, the bad and the forgotten
I’m not sure whether Daniel Storey not using my beloved Boro as an example of Palaces relegation rivals is a sign that he thinks we’re going to be ok, he thinks we’re so nailed on to be relegated that it’s not worth mentioning, or we’re so forgettable that we just didn’t spring to mind.

Either way, happy Christmas!
Matt, Middlesbrough