The "next season" mentality

Hello folks! It's going to be a short post today. I didn't have a post in mind, but the transfer window that closed without any signings for Arsenal was really devastating for me. Personally, I think this is a big mistake done by the club.

I know that many Arsenal fans explain that it's a part of the long-term strategy and if you don't find anyone that you want to spend large chunks of money on and give a long term contract to, then you defer the business in summer. Which essentially means “next season”.

There were some insights about the Arsenal transfer window approach. One of the things that Ornstein told in the podcast is that Mikel Arteta didn't go for Mathys Tel, because he didn’t want to “just sign a body ”. Well, I'd say that our current squad is in the state, where it needs a body. What is Arteta’ plan if Kai gets an injury? What is the plan to go through April-May where we have to play again every 3 days?

In general, between the 1st of April and 10th of May, there are 8 Premier League games, two CL quarter finals and two semi-finals. All in all, up to 12 games in that period. I don't buy the argument that no one could be brought in the squad. There were loans this window with no obligation to buy and those are, by any means, not endangering the summer plans for the club.  The loan fee is a couple of million and the salary… one anyway has to pay salary for a new long-term striker.

Rashford moved on loan, Morata moved on loan, Asensio from PSG moved on loan. They were all loans without an obligation to buy, so I can’t figure out why we didn't try and get them. Even getting somebody from the Premier League on loan would be possible. Neto’s contract could be terminated (If it couldn't then we should seriously question the people in charge of these contracts) and we could loan another 36-year-old goalkeeper from Europe. I'm pretty sure there are plenty of them sitting on the bench and ready to join Arsenal and sit on our bench. Neto had a single game for us this season and not a good one, so by any means he’s not a game changer.

I know players like Rashford are a flight risk. But if there's no obligation, why not bring him in the team for half a year? We're now relying on Kai Havertz playing 4 months as our single striker in all competitions. I still can't understand what our plan is if he gets injured. We haven't really tried anybody to play in his position so far. Maybe Sterling would be pushed there, or maybe Gabriel Martinelli. But Martinelli was not really tried there by Arteta  and Sterling has literally zero goal contributions this season.

In my opinion, this decision throws a towel on our Champions hopes. We will not be able to sustain both tournaments in April. We won’t just have enough freshness in our legs. Since we can not give up competing in the Premier League, because we need to get into the top four, it means that our Champions League chances are minimal. And our Premier League chances are at Liverpool's mercy - if they don't crumble in March, then it's “next season”.

Arsenal fans say that the club will do great transfers in summer. Listen, the club went into the season with Jesus and Havertz as strikers and they considered it to be fine. Saka got a long term injury in December and they considered it to be alright. Jesus got out for more than 6 months, the club tried something, but did not really push too hard and they considered it would be acceptable to continue like this. It does form a pattern, doesn’t it?  And judging by this pattern I don't have a huge belief in our desire to win big titles at all costs.

At the start of the season we had no cover for Odegaard and he got injured. We had no real cover for Bukayo, because in no way Nwaneri was planned to be the one. We were just so lucky that he developed to be the one, that he has the mentality and skill to play on this level.  Now Jesus got injured and Havertz is the only option for the rest of the year and, of course, the club is betting on him not getting injured. This is not a strategy; it's either foolish or deliberately jeopardising the chance to win the title.

With regards to Ollie Watkins - all sources have confirmed that Villa approached us about him. Shouldn't our club try to pull all the strings and investigate all possible options on the market? Shouldn't they have some information, and collect some intelligence on the situation in other clubs?  If Aston Villa needed some cash, it was not too far-fetched to guess that they have two #9 worth of money. The rumors are we offered 40 million, while they demanded 60. It would make so much sense to offer 45 million + 15 in bonuses if we win major titles. Because if we do land them, this 15 million would be totally worth it  and it would show our clear ambitions to go all in now.

This year's Champions League doesn't have a clear favourite, but, of course, we will wait for “next season” and then say "well, you can't compete with Real Madrid,  they have Mbappe, Vinicius, Bellingham, so what can we do?".

But will Saliba and Gabriel be here when this “next season” arrives?