Morning. It’s a fairly quiet begin to the week.
Throughout the Atlantic, Matt Turner has been as much as goalkeeping goodness, saving two penalties in a shootout to ship the US into the semi-finals of the Gold Cup. They’ll play Panama on Thursday, with the ultimate going down on July seventeenth.
After that, it’ll be attention-grabbing to see what he does. As the person captaining the USMNT, he’d be an apparent draw when Arsenal play on the market in a few weeks time. Will he take some holidays, or simply hook up with the squad so he can characteristic within the pre-season video games? You would perceive the necessity for a break, but additionally the will to be concerned in Arsenal’s journey to the USA.
Turner’s penalty statistics are very spectacular too. He’s confronted 24 in his profession, and saved 11 of them – that’s a forty five.83% success fee. Aaron Ramsdale, by comparability, has saved 9 of 33 throughout his profession, which is successful fee of 27.27%. None of which implies a lot on the subject of who performs for Arsenal, however it’s mildly attention-grabbing on a day when there’s not a lot else taking place.
Talking of goalkeepers, I used to be a bit unhappy to see David de Gea go away Man Utd. They look like on the verge of signing Andre Onana, a participant we had been strongly linked with, however whose state of affairs – a doping ban – roughly precluded any type of switch on the time. He’s a way more trendy keeper, good with the ball at his toes, however all we are able to do is hope that any profit to United from his arrival is straight away offset by their want, as a consequence of a horrible harm disaster, to play Harry Maguire all season.
Again to us, and I assumed this was an attention-grabbing snippet from Nick Ames in The Guardian, in a bit about our summer time enterprise and what we nonetheless wish to do:
Arsenal’s enterprise isn’t full. They wish to deliver Roméo Lavia in from Southampton so as to add youth, depth and drive to the reconfigured engine room however a £50m asking worth seems to be wealthy. Despite the fact that Reiss Nelson has signed a brand new deal, high quality cowl for Saka stays a stay subject. Up entrance, at the least one in all Folarin Balogun and Eddie Nketiah is more likely to depart. Whoever stays have to be adequate to maintain Gabriel Jesus on his toes.
The second striker factor goes to be very attention-grabbing. We all know that Folarin Balogun has made it clear he doesn’t wish to go on mortgage once more, and that after a profitable season at Reims, he’s hungry for extra first workforce soccer. Eddie Nketiah is a participant that Mikel Arteta charges, however as we get to know him higher, we are able to see that he’s a participant who can rating objectives for you when he will get a run of begins, however who very not often will get on the scoresheet when he comes off the bench. For a participant along with his squad standing, that’s a little bit of a difficulty.
Balogun will probably be on the US tour, not simply to make up the numbers, however so the supervisor can assess him and see how he performs. Not solely within the video games, however throughout coaching, to see if the dedication he calls for from each participant is there. The elephant within the room, so to talk, is the truth that we’re on the cusp of spending £200m, we wish to spend extra, and to be able to try this, some gamers are going to need to be offered.
Proper now, while you take a look at the potential departures, there’s one participant who stands out as a type of ‘scorching property’, and that’s Balogun. I feel you may make a compelling sporting case for us to carry onto him, to provide us extra depth at centre-forward, however an equally compelling monetary one to money in off the again of his goalscoring exploits in France (assuming you do cope with the correct of clauses in it too).
Nick’s piece raises the chance that each of them would possibly find yourself elsewhere, which might then go away room – and finance – for one more arrival within the ahead space. Clearly Balogun, Eddie and Gabriel Jesus are all distinct as gamers with their very own skillsets, however bodily they’re in the identical type of ballpark. Would there be room for someone a bit totally different? Let’s see. The tour, and the video games we play, would possibly give us a greater thought of how Arteta is considering, and what would possibly occur. This case is particularly attention-grabbing as a result of each gamers have the identical agent, so the conversations that occur about every of them should be had with that in thoughts.
Proper, let’s go away it there for now.James and I will probably be recording an Arsecast Further for you just a little afterward this morning. Preserve a watch out for the decision for questions on Twitter @gunnerblog and @arseblog on Twitter with the hashtag #arsecastextra – or when you’re on Arseblog Member on Patreon, go away your query within the #arsecast-extra-questions channel on our Discord server.
For now, have one.
