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Don’t allow the perfect to be the enemy of the good. A staple expression that has underpinned a lot of Arsenal’s transfer strategy in recent years. Arsenal have shown a willingness to pivot to Plan B in the market when Plan A has not materialised. For Moises Caicedo read Jorginho. For Mikhaylo Mudryk read Leandro Trossard. For Joan Garcia read Neto.
In each of these examples, the acquired players have been in their peak years and, therefore, have not proved to be a significant impediment for longer term solutions somewhere down the line. Of course, there is an element of kicking the can down the road and one cannot help but feel younger wide attackers, a younger deep lying playmaker and longer term competition for David Raya will need to be revisited pretty soon. It feels a bit like a looming credit card bill.
Which brings us onto the deadline day signing of Raheem Sterling. Chelsea started Sterling in all six of their pre-season friendlies before deciding to bomb him out totally, squad number and all, on the opening league game of the season. They are a club playing 4D chess and we are all a bit too thick to appreciate their genius.
While Todd Boehly and co are cosplaying as market disruptors, Arsenal were able to steal their lunch money and acquire Sterling (SEE WHAT I DID THERE?!) and have Chelsea partially fund the pleasure. Sterling would have been no Arsenal fan’s idea of the golden bullet solution on May 31st but the market for attackers has been notably dry this summer.
City did not manage to replace Julian Alvarez. Liverpool reluctantly took a cut price deal for the injury prone Chiesa in the final week of the window. Newcastle needed a right winger for their starting XI but didn’t find one and still have Miguel Almiron on their books. In all the other examples I cited of Arsenal pivoting to Plan B, there was a clear Plan A.
The first Arsenal target we knew about this summer was striker Benjamin Sesko, who ended up not moving at all. That tells…
Source link : https://arseblog.com/2024/09/dont-let-perfect-enemy-of-good-raheem-sterling/
Author : Tim Stillman
Publish date : 2024-09-05 12:00:24
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