Friday, September 11, 2020 at 2:07PM

The Premier League 20/21 season kicks off tomorrow. Are you excited? Tumbleweed. Okay, are you optimistic? Shrug.

That’s me.

Arsenal’s summer has been the usual drag fest - lots spoken, but the outcome underwhelming. Obviously it’s been more difficult this summer with Covid-19 decimating clubs’ finances on a global scale. Although we might expect a flurry of movement leading up to the October 5th deadline, only nine players have so far been sold by Premier League clubs.



Clearly, Arsenal is not alone in being unable to shift players. Of the £627m so far spent by PL clubs, half of that money has been spent by four of the richest. The Premier League is where Europe’s money is most concentrated and the wealthiest clubs can still afford to spend without consequence. However, few clubs outside of England can afford the transfers fees or wages commanded by PL clubs and the big clubs here aren’t remotely interested in Arsenal’s cast offs.

The bottom line is that there are few outlets in Europe with the financial clout to sell to right now. As I said many months ago, Arsenal’s window will be driven by swaps, loans and freebies, but the club needs cold hard cash to move forward. Two signings have come in – Chelsea reject Willian (Free) and Lille centre-back Gabriel Magalhaes (£27m), but in my opinion that’s unlikely to be enough to move the club forward in a meaningful way.

Meanwhile, there was a lot of talk coming out of the club yesterday due to yet another restructuring at boardroom level. Vinai Venkatesham’s role of football administrator has been upgraded to CEO. Edu has been somewhat demoted and Arteta promoted to manager – the two now working hand-in-hand on technical decisions as opposed to Arteta merely being the coach.

For me, this raises lots of questions. Clearly, Arteta has come into the club and got his hands dirty, involving himself in activities that were not initially within his remit. However, the appointment smacks of a club that lacks hands-on expertise in key areas and is therefore shoehorning Arteta into a more responsible role.



First, Arteta already has enough on his plate turning this club around without being given extra responsibility. Second, there’s not enough evidence to suggest that Arteta’s the real deal as a coach let alone be given a broader managerial role. I agree that managers should play an integral role in signings, when they often don’t, but there’s evidence he already did that.

If this tactic is to merely persuade Arteta he is wanted and needed in order to ward off future interest from other clubs, it’s not likely to work. Wenger tried the emotional blackmail tactic of constantly giving key players the captain’s armband - they all wanted to leave regardless.

You also have to question the people behind the decision to enable Arteta this all-encompassing role. Namely, Venkatesham and Edu. The pair already lack experience in their roles, which only makes me question this decision. For example, is it based on Arteta’s expertise or their lack of expertise?

If you’re asking me why I don’t trust them yet, it’s simply because they haven’t given me a reason to. Since Venkatesham was appointed, player contracts are still a mess, he oversaw all of the decisions that led to Raul Sanllehi’s sacking, and club communications, particularly around player wage cuts and the reasoning behind its recent redundancy policy, have been farcical.

Since Edu joined, he’s been in bed with Kia Joorabchian, signing Soares, Willian, Gabriel, Luiz and Martinelli. Whatever you think of those signings, it can’t have escaped your notice that four of them are Brazilian. This is clearly a continuation of Arsenal’s contacts-led approach, which begs further questions relating to Arsenal’s current scouting model and his role in its deconstruction.

Regarding Arteta as a coach, early signs have been promising and give room for optimism. However, his approach has actually been very similar to Unai Emery, based on work ethic, unity and defensive solidity, primarily because both inherited defensive garbage.

Implementing a defensive tactical structure is not difficult. Indeed, Emery did the same and started his tenure better than Arteta, winning 17 of his first 22 games, drawing three and losing 2. Arteta’s first 22 games recorded 12 wins 6 draws and 4 defeats.

The problem for Emery was transitioning out of a defensive system into a more attacking style of play, something we’re yet to see Arteta fully attempt. Indeed, when Arteta did move to a 4-3-3 system at home to Watford in July, despite winning the game 3-2, Arsenal looked a complete mess and immediately conceded 19 attempts on goal.

Arteta was strongly reliant on keepers Leno and Martinez last season – few would disagree that both players were in their top two. If one leaves, that potentially leaves us more vulnerable. Meanwhile, Arsenal’s overreliance on Aubameyang is painstakingly obvious. While there’s no such thing as a ‘one-man team’, you could remove any player from Arsenal’s first team and the outcome would be much the same, remove Aubameyang, however, and Arsenal would collapse. A long-term injury and we’d be nearer bottom four than top four.

This transitional/tactical component is the real key to how Arteta should and will be measured as a coach. Playing tawdry defensive football and winning matches on the counter-attack is far easier to implement than instilling a fluid attacking philosophy that balances defence and attack and wins games consistently.

You may be optimistic that Arteta can deliver this, but like everything else the club and its supporters talk about, it’s all noise with no evidence yet. Managers can talk about values, philosophies and ethics until the cows come home, the proof of the pudding is in the eating and Arsenal fans are eating stale bread at the moment.

Although Arsenal performed well towards the end of last season and winning the FA Cup was a nice surprise, it doesn’t necessarily equate to tangible progress. After all, in his later years Wenger won a hat trick of FA Cups while Arsenal forever slipped backwards. At present, with Arsenal hampered in the transfer market for the reasons expressed above, our rivals still seem better-equipped to move forward.

For me, Champions League qualification remains a pipe dream unless Arteta can transition Arsenal to a more progressive style of play. The only caveat lies in him being a far more capable coach than I’ve so far given him credit for and/or the rapid evolution of the club’s young players. However, in my world, optimism comes from what people do, not what they say.