The Arsenal Rebuild, Part 2

If you missed it yesterday, we posted Part 1 of the Arsenal rebuild, going over the current state of the team and how they got here. The Gunners are in an interesting position, clearly in the mix for the Premier League title, but in need of some serious upgrades to get there. This summer, they are clearly hunting for those upgrades.

Patrick and Ted talked about their rumoured transfers on the podcast yesterday, and were mostly positive on Arsenal’s business both already completed and strongly rumoured:

If you prefer your podcasts in audio-only format rather than YouTube, you can find that here.

This is going to be a lot different than the previous Parts 2 in the rebuilding series — we already have a good idea of what Arsenal are doing, so there’s not much of a point in suggesting targets. Still, we’ve got Eberechi Eze and Noni Madueke alternatives, in case those deals don’t come to fruition.

Kepa is a totally fine backup goalkeeper

A quick and easy one here. £5m for a backup goalkeeper with a lot of Premier League experience who was just about a league average starter last year is just fine. Nothing to get excited about or criticize. Kepa is a backup goalkeeper.

I’m excited about Arsenal’s midfield

With the departures of Jorginho and Thomas Partey, who had both slowed down significantly by last season, Arsenal had the opportunity to significantly upgrade their midfield this summer. We can quibble about the prices they’ve paid — £56m for Martin Zubimendi certainly isn’t cheap — but I don’t think anyone can deny that they’ve significantly upgraded their defensive capabilities.

Zubimendi and Christian Nørgaard — who arrived from Brentford for £10m — have very similar-looking statistical profiles and should make for a great rotation in the defensive midfielder spot.

Nørgaard was well-regarded as a leader for Brentford and is expected to be a great character addition to the locker room, at the kind of reasonable price where you don’t worry too much about age curves or resale value. And much more importantly, Zubimendi gives Arsenal the kind of athleticism and ground-covering defensive ability that they haven’t had from that position over the last two seasons as Partey started to decline.

These additions should free up Declan Rice and Mikel Merino to play the box-crashing 8 roles they’re best at on a full-time basis. I don’t think there’s any question that Arsenal’s midfield improved significantly this summer, even if neither of Nørgaard or Zubimendi has particularly impressive passing numbers.

I am neither excited nor disappointed by Viktor Gyökeres

In turning their attention to Gyökeres for center forward, Arsenal is betting that any lack of goal-scoring they had last season was more of a weak link problem than anything else. You’ve seen this radar before, but one last time, his Primeira Liga numbers compared to Champions League. He was very solid, not spectacular in CL. I expect his Arsenal numbers to look similar.

Gyökeres had big shot volume in Portugal and overperformed his xG, but he really farmed stats against poor opponents. The high number of blocked shots reflects an issue that I think we might see pop up in the Premier League a lot: He’s not amazing at getting shots off quickly or beating defenders in tight spaces. He gets his shots blocked pretty frequently when facing good defenders or packed penalty areas.

He’s a quality ball-striker and can place one in the corner. His off-ball movement is solid. But I think he’s a guy who scores the ones he’s supposed to and is not a ceiling-raiser. Arsenal think that this is better than the boom-or-bust potential of Benjamin Šeško or Hugo Ekitike, who have the potential to raise your ceiling or screw up the great stuff that Bukayo Saka and Martin Ødegaard create.

If you think those guys are the real stars and the best you can do in the current striker market is enhance their output, it also makes sense to sign a guy who’s pretty unselfish and willing to run the channels, then play a cutback when he gets onto the ball in a wide area of the box. Gyökeres does this a lot.

So, the summary: Gyökeres is well-rounded and a good teammate, but I question his ability to duplicate this output against top competition. I think he will be a good, not great player for Arsenal, neither a bust nor a huge success at the rumoured £60m price.

Why aren’t more teams trying to buy Noni Madueke?

Chelsea have been rumoured to have Madueke available for around £40m this summer. Then they saw that Mohamed Kudus and Anthony Elanga, who are probably inferior players, are going for prices in excess of £50m. They now, very understandably, appear to want at least £50m.

I really liked Madueke last season, and I didn’t understand why he was getting benched for Pedro Neto so often. He rocks. And between the end of the season and Club World Cup, he’s shown he can be productive on the left as well.

You should read this Scouted piece by Ashwin Raman about how he’s been trending upwards as a dribbler and shooter. Madueke also showed at the end of the season and the Club World Cup that he can be effective on the left as well. He’d be an amazing rotation piece for Arsenal. He’s probably too good for that and should be a first choice starter somewhere.

An alternative: Maghnes Akilouche

In the event Madueke realizes he should go start somewhere or Chelsea continues upping the price, may I once again present a newsletter favorite. Maghnes Akilouche was awesome for Monaco last year. There are basically no other left-footers who dribble, assist, and shoot at an above-average level in a top 5 league besides Mohamed Salah and Cole Palmer.

I also think Akilouche is solid with his ball-striking and shooting decisions, and was unlucky to underperform his xG. You’re buying low on someone who’s going to get better. The price of the brick is going up next summer.

Eberechi Eze is fine. I wouldn’t pay £68m.

I am assuming that Arsenal would only buy one of Eze or Madueke, unless they already had a very good offer in for Leandro Trossard or Gabriel Martinelli. But since they are different profiles — Madueke is a lefty and pure winger, Eze is right-footed and a winger/10 tweener — we’re going to look at both profiles.

And yeah, he’s a pretty good player. He managed to get a lot of shots on a Crystal Palace team that wasn’t good, and where opposing defenses could zero in on him. His shot selection wasn’t great, but I think that this was out of necessity, and he would not take a bunch of crappy 25-yard rips if he was on Arsenal. His pass OBV and xG assisted, for a winger on a team that wasn’t great at attacking generally, are pretty encouraging.

But you should not pay £68m for a 27-year-old who is not an obvious, nailed-on superstar. This would be a poor allocation of resources.

An alternative: Harvey Barnes??

You probably just laughed reading that, but if Arsenal are dead set on signing a player who fits this profile, here’s a guy with better numbers who will probably cost less money. I’m just saying.

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