I can’t see Emery selling Ozil because to replace him, as well as Ramsey, with even similar standard players, would be more than we could afford.
Any club that constantly sells their best players, like we do, shows no ambition at all.
It also sends out the wrong signal to our very few remaining decent players that we are heading in the wrong direction.
Ozil might not be having his best season but he is still easily our best midfielder, and we need more quality and experience to play alongside him, not less
Arsenal are understood to be disappointed but relaxed about his decision, chiefly because they feel their summer transfer plans are already well advanced.
Interestingly, one source claimed this was a reason why Monchi turned the Gunners down.
No quotes, so probably just speculation a bit. Will be interesting with what they have come up with.
It was more a tongue-in-cheek response. The likelihood of us even being on Havertz’ radar are probably low.
Ramsey leaving does make me wonder if Emery wants another CM. There was a lot of Banega smoke afterall.
Emery has also shown this season that he doesn’t prefer one constant in any position. He always seems to shuffle the midfield and I believe this is down to his tactical approach. So any players we are potentially bringing in would be to benefit the system wholly rather than being an individual performer.
With that in mind, I feel he won’t want to spend masses amounts of cash (I’m assuming Havertz is bracketed as a £40M-£50M player now) on another CM and would, hopefully, lean to bringing in a quality winger instead.
I think he has been rather consistent in the usage of Guendouzi, Xhaka and Torreira when it comes to the two centre midfielders positions in his set ups. It’s rather the advanced midfielder position in front of those two he has rotated with between Ozil and Ramsey or that position was ‘absent’ when playing 3-4-3.
Yeah does seem like Emery is increasingly comfortable with that 3… if we play with all 3 frequently, then we will certainly need more depth, but if it becomes a mix of 2/3 then perhaps we get away with AMN or Joe Willock slotting in the odd game here and there.
I am still not convinced with Xhaka long-term, but if we purchased a top class CB, a WC wide attacker, and perhaps a left back, plus a youngster or two, It would be hard to complain too much with that.
Havertz is about the perfect signing in FM terms though… can play for another 12 years and already is awesome and could help provide foundation for decade at CM with Guen, Torr, and Kai.
I think people need to make peace with the fact that Xhaka is here for the long term. I think he started every match under Emery when available. The two centre midfielder position are pretty much set in stone for that reason I think (Guendouzi, Torreira and Xhaka).
With Ramsey leaving I’d like to see what they will do with that attacking midfielder position. If we sign a proper winger they might get away with using Ozil and Iwobi for that spot. But I’m not the biggest Iwobi fan.
You might have an slim argument in terms of individual talent/potential but there’s no way Klopp sees our midfield options and feels as if it’s as good or better than the his.
Liverpool have a much better collective midfield with personnel who a versatile, technically adept and combative.
Arsenal’s midfield is a mismash that’s severely lacking in top talent
Its not about a tittle challenge. Chelsea and United won’t have seasons like this one next year, I’d put my house on it. We’re ahead of United because they had half a season with that cancerous fuck Mourinho and Chelsea always come back strong after one of these really shite seasons.
We need to improve a lot to compete for top four next year, and whether we get improvements in the centre or not remains to be seen, I think @sevchenko is right to describe those central midfield options as not being good enough for what we want to do next season.
Look at the difference in our defensive style after Kos came back and partnered with Papa compared to when Giggles started every game for us. We still have structural problems to solve but better players helps.
And look at what difference it made when Micky found form (And to some degree when Özil came back) for a change and we at least had one competent wide attacking midfielder/winger as opposed to watching Iwobi with his unfortunate form spear-heading our attacking midfield.
Since they’re not reliable long term (for different reasons), and we could always do with depth there due to injuries anyway I completely agree with what we should focus on. I think our FBs are alright going forward but we have poor depth as Monorail and crazy Stephan have an age thing going movement-wise.
Our GK situation and striker situation are definitely low prio I think most would agree.
I agree with most of what you’re saying, but I just want to point out one thing you said regarding Chelsea, didn’t they finish a disappointing 5th last season with around 70 points ? They haven’t bounced back this season at all really, so I’m not sure if they will next campaign.
. That kid is still extremely raw.