Arsenal - We're going for it this season!

Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger with new signing Mesut Özil

May 19th 2013: Arsenal hold on to a one goal lead, courtesy Koscielny’s close range effort against Newcastle United, ensuring Champions League football for one more season. To make it even better, it was once again at the expense of Tottenham.

September 2nd 2013: Arsenal make the game-changing, superstar signing of Mesut Ozil, seemingly putting to bed once and for all the claims that Arsene Wenger is a penny pinching miser and that Arsenal are a selling club who can no longer attract the big names.

While Arsenal have undoubtedly made the most news this summer, there are many questions that still remain unanswered at London Colney.

For starters, supporters are angry at the fact that the club hasn’t spent on the more important positions that require backup, namely the defence and the forward line.

When Arsenal were going about trimming the extra fat from the squad throughout the summer, there was one player I was surprised that the club had let go on a loan – Ignasi Miquel. At 20 years of age, he is not exactly world-class but he would have provided cover for both the Centre Back and Left Back positions – areas in which Arsenal players have a penchant for getting injured multiple times during the season. True, Thomas Vermaelen can fill in at Left Back while Bacary Sagna has done brilliantly as a Centre Back in pre-season, but that once again becomes a problem if their respective natural positions require their services.

With regards to the forward position, at the beginning of the season, we had three players who could, when called upon, play as central striker – Olivier Giroud, Lukas Podolski and Theo Walcott. While Podolski and Walcott have more often than not played wide, they would not be exactly useless playing in the centre in case Giroud gets injured. Their cover would be Santi Cazorla and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, with Ryo Miyaichi being a fall back option. With all due respect to Yaya Sanogo, the few glimpses of him in an Arsenal shirt are not enough to make a judgement regarding his potential contribution to the side.

The Premier League requires teams to submit a 25 man squad, in which only 17 players can fall under the category of not satisfying the “home-grown players”. This list would not include U21 players, and therefore, first-team regulars such as Jack Wilshere and Chamberlain will not feature in the list, though they will play an important role for the club in the league.

One of the first rejections that Arsenal had to face was in the form of Lars Bender, a midfielder. The 20 million pound bid was rejected by Bayer Leverkusen, and with the player not showing any inclination towards putting in a transfer request, Arsenal did not pursue it with an improved bid. But the intentions were clear: Wenger believes he needs bodies in midfield.

Simultaneously, negotiations were taking place to sign Gonzalo Higuain. This was clearly another area that Arsenal needed to sign a player in, and it wasn’t going to be another youngster or unproven player. Arsenal was looking to sign big, and Higuain was the top target. But apparently, there arose some complications, which prompted the club to look for alternatives. Rather than looking for a cheaper option, they identified Suarez as the next target.

Clearly, the club was told that 40 million was the release clause and so that amount plus one more pound was the bid to trigger it. But as it turned out, it was not the case and Arsenal were left with egg on their faces. With Suarez not going through with his warning of putting in a transfer request and Higuain being lapped up by Napoli for a much higher price than what was agreed, Arsenal were left holding the bag.

Time was running out and in came Mathieu Flamini. And in Wenger’s own words, he was a signing of convenience. A striker was still missing and neither was a defender signed. And the clock was ticking.

The only concrete link to a defender that Arsenal had was Swansea’s Ashley Williams. And with it also came talk of us looking at Michu. But it came to nothing, and in the end, no reinforcements were made in the defensive area of the squad.

Towards the end of the transfer window, Arsenal went back to Real Madrid in search of a winger and a striker, with rumours of us making enquiries for Karim Benzema and Angel di Maria doing the rounds. With Nicklas Bendtner close to a move to Crystal Palace, landing either or both of them would have solved the crisis in the forward line. But neither came to fruition.

And then Ozil happened. With Mourinho blocking Demba Ba’s loan move to Arsenal, Wenger also pulled the plug on Bendtner’s move to Palace, to at least have a backup striker in case the need arises.

Many have said that Ivan Gazidis and Wenger have not had any plan for the summer and have gone about it in a haphazard way, trying to sign players. But when you take a deeper look at the squad, it would seem that that wasn’t really be the case, and in fact, I would say there has been a lot of strategizing when it comes to who should be signed.

Before the signings of Flamini, Emiliano Viviano and Ozil, we had four spots in the squad that we could fill with players that were not “home-grown”. In an ideal situation, one defender, one forward, one midfielder and one goal keeper is what the club would have gone for. Instead, we have two midfielders and one goal keeper, and one vacant spot in the squad.

One can imagine what the discussions might have been in the back room of Arsenal. Clearly, when Arsenal were signing Ozil, it was not the intention to sign another midfielder, as one was already signed in the form of Flamini. Benzema or Angel di Maria would have been a perfect fit for Arsenal as they would have solved the problems with the strikers and the midfield. So, dare I say that Ozil was another signing of convenience too? Certainly looks that way – not that anyone is complaining!

After the signing of Flamini, it looked as if all attempts at signing a defender would be stopped, and more focus would be on the more forward positions in the squad. And it makes perfect sense. Flamini has already shown that he is adept at playing in the full back position, with the record breaking run in the 2005/2006 Champions League campaign. So if ever Sagna was required to fill in at centre back, or if both the Left Backs got injured, Flamini could put in a good shift.

This thought certainly made the signing of Ozil all the more easy, but the forward line was still short of strikers. But like I stated above, Podolski and Walcott are more than capable of playing in the central striker position. And since Ozil would be a certain starter in the centre of midfield, Cazorla could always start on the left, which was his position before he came to Arsenal. And on the right, there was always Oxlade-Chamberlain who could cover for Walcott, along with Miyaichi. And if push comes to shove, even Ramsey could be asked to do a job on the wings, for one or two games, even though it is not his best position.

There remains the signing of Viviano and the jury is out on whether it was really necessary. While Wojciech Szczesny is the undisputed number 1, last season showed that he was more than capable of becoming complacent. And with Lukasz Fabianski being perennially injured, he wasn’t exactly always available to keep Szczesny on his toes. With Viviano, Szczesny will know that there is an experienced keeper that is ready to take his place, though it is hard not to liken Viviano to Almunia.

On the whole, when you look at Arsenal’s squad more closely, you will see that there is not much else Arsenal or Wenger could have done differently in this window. True, a striker would have meant that we could all stop worrying about when Giroud would get injured, but all is not lost. While a measure of consistency needs to yet be imbibed to win the league, this squad is certainly equipped to win the domestic trophies and go far in Europe.

I, for one, feel that this Arsenal team is going to go for it this season. The trophy drought is sure to end this time around, not just because of Ozil, but because, finally, we have a settled squad. A squad that can, and will, win games without pressing the panic button.