{"id":3781,"date":"2021-08-09T14:46:41","date_gmt":"2021-08-09T13:46:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/?p=3781"},"modified":"2021-08-12T21:14:38","modified_gmt":"2021-08-12T20:14:38","slug":"order-from-chaos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/?p=3781","title":{"rendered":"Order from Chaos"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<a id=\"6s2ldTD_S1JXDSvPGCJYWg\" class=\"gie-single\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.co.uk\/detail\/1331482008\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color:#a7a7a7;text-decoration:none;font-weight:normal !important;border:none;display:inline-block;\" rel=\"noopener\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'6s2ldTD_S1JXDSvPGCJYWg',sig:'Cws5L-wwqFEHttK0Hexwb9hB0-7_RtJedolc4Lj9mvY=',w:'594px',h:'458px',items:'1331482008',caption: true ,tld:'co.uk',is360: false })});<\/script><script src=\"\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\" async=\"\"><\/script>\n\n\n\n<p>From ancient times it has been clear that human beings have an in-built drive and need to find patterns in outcomes, in order to make sense of what can otherwise appear to be the chaos of the everyday world. Chaos &#8211; the absence of pattern and certainty &#8211; is the antithesis of what leads to development, be it cultural, social or indeed sporting. Perhaps therefore it is not a surprising anthropological phenomenon that so many of the early ancient cultures produced origin myths dealing, to a greater or lesser extent, with the creation of order from chaos \u2013 from the Judaic Genesis story, Sumerian\/Babylonian and Egyptian origin myths through to the Theogony of Hesiod and more latterly Ovid\u2019s Metamorphoses. &nbsp; Our interest, of course, is in understanding where Arsenal sit in the footballing firmament and most importantly of all whether we are on the path to developing the planned, ordered approach which will enable us to recover our former position in that world.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In this article, I will look at how we are trying to move on in terms of the transfer strategy from the antediluvian chaos of the late Wenger and Emery eras &#8211; players seemingly bought with little or no thought to the structure into which they would fit; signed or re-signed on the kinds of terms which made little or no economic let alone football sense; contracts allowed to run down to the point of valuable assets being allowed to leave for way below their value or even on free transfers.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Since arriving, Arteta has had to go through the fall of the post-Gazidis power structure with the rise and fall of Sanllehi along with the, shall we say, curious relationship between the club and Joorabchian which was allowed to develop under the watch of the current owners.&nbsp; And then very quickly having to deal with the situation while suffering further chaos in the form of Covid.&nbsp; Given this state of disorder, rather than focusing simply on the transfer activity of this season alone, I wanted to put this into the wider context of the current manager\u2019s tenure.&nbsp; At the same time, I am not looking at Arteta as having sole responsibility for transfers.&nbsp; He is, we are told, working hand in hand with Edu and has been more latterly assisted by the new Director of Football, Richard Garlick.&nbsp; As a result, I will seek to apply my analysis, such as it is, to the club\u2019s transfer performance in general, rather than Arteta in particular. I will also be conceited enough to attempt a crude scoring \u2013 my own thoughts only, no scientific method applied \u2013 against the criteria set out in the preceding paragraph, broken down into 3 areas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><em>Old Boys<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Let\u2019s start by looking at the outgoings since Arteta has arrived.&nbsp; It is fair to say that while split on many things, the Arsenal fanbase has been united in its belief that the overall issue was one of poverty of talent as opposed to paucity.&nbsp; We were very top-heavy in terms of the playing staff.&nbsp; Not only that, but the age profile of many of the players resulted in too many players with negligible sell-on value and top-drawer wages.&nbsp; A perfect recipe for the undermotivated and overly comfortable to underdeliver.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>To rectify this, the manager has shifted a veritable Who\u2019s Who of ne\u2019er do wells who now go on to become someone else\u2019s problem.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul><li>Luiz<\/li><li>Ozil<\/li><li>Guendouzi<\/li><li>Mustafi<\/li><li>Sokratis<\/li><li>Mikhitaryan<\/li><li>Martinez<\/li><li>Willock (yet to be confirmed)<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Now some of these weren\u2019t easy to shift and so the victory, whilst hardly Pyrrhic, has come at considerable financial (if not footballing) cost.&nbsp; At the same time, with the exception of Martinez, can anyone genuinely posit a case for any of this list being kept on? And Martinez wanted to go as he needed first team guarantees.&nbsp; And Guendouzi is, in the vernacular, a wrong\u2019un. Upwards of \u00a320m for Joe Willock, while not being a ludicrous sum at least reflects an attempt to extract something approaching value from a player who perhaps seems like something of a man out of his time in terms of the way Arteta talks about playing.&nbsp; At 22 years of age, and with 40 appearances in the first team to date, it is hard to say that he has made the kind of impact required to force his way into the manager\u2019s thinking in terms of a first team starter, as some younger players have done over the last 2 seasons.&nbsp; That it is Newcastle who have come in for him probably tells us everything we need to know.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Of the remainder, Luiz is 34 and unreliable; Ozil is 33 in October and had increasingly become peripheral where it matters, on the pitch, to the point that he was an irrelevance for far too many games to be justifying the ludicrous salary on which he was renewed under Wenger. &nbsp; Now the salary is not his fault. But it does come at a price.&nbsp; Minimal effort and marginal efficacy do not meet the criteria to avoid rightful fan criticism.&nbsp; Sokratis is 33 and Mikhitaryan 32.&nbsp; Neither of them was ever convincing in the Premier League.&nbsp; The same can be said for Mustafi despite the fact that he had the benefit of age on his side coming in at a sprightly 29 years of age.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Now I think we can agree that there is some more deadweight to go but I think that the above does represent a considerable attempt to move on a very good proportion of the sick, lame and lazy.&nbsp; The decisions taken prior to Arteta\u2019s joining meant that a significant number of these were effectively without sell-on value. Arteta will still have had to make the persuasive case to the board for ridding the club of certain turbulent players for the greater benefit of the club.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-right\"><strong>Grading- B+<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><em>New Boys<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul><li>Cedric<\/li><li>Runarsson<\/li><li>Mari<\/li><li>Willian<\/li><li>Gabriel<\/li><li>Partey<\/li><li>Lokonga<\/li><li>Tavares<\/li><li>White<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>The first transfer window in January 2020 saw the arrival of the first 4 of the names above.&nbsp; Given that Arteta had only been in situ for around a month, I would like to think that these deals were already fairly well progressed.&nbsp; Given the cosy Edu-Sanllehi-Joorabchian troika, I may have some support there.&nbsp; Cedric at least had decent premiership experience and could stand in at right back, a position which had been and continues to give us problems.&nbsp; Mari was somewhat left field but given that we were desperately trying to lose Mustafi and Sokratis, there was at least some method in the madness in terms of providing an additional centre half who could come in and perform the task of defending more ably than the two players let go as well as not being tainted by the curse of advanced years.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In the next window, we made 4 further signings, 2 of which have turned out to be very poor decisions. &nbsp; Let\u2019s start with the utter mess which is Willian. To date he has played perhaps 3 good games in total while at least for the first half of the season he seemed to take on Ozil\u2019s mantle of being the highest paid stand in for the Invisible Man in history.&nbsp; Runarsson seems to have been recommended by the new goalkeeping coach.&nbsp; Perhaps he was recommended for his ability to make tea and a mean bacon sandwich.&nbsp; It can\u2019t possibly have been on the basis of his goalkeeping.&nbsp; If this coach is still at the club, he ought to be given the loaded pistol and time on his own to take the decent way out. &nbsp; The best signing of the summer was the central defender, Gabriel. He started very well but had some Luiz-esque moments.&nbsp; He at least has the benefit of youth to provide cover for the occasional error.&nbsp; Overall though he has been a valued addition.&nbsp; Thomas Partey was the final newcomer and came in for a fair cost and with quite a bit of acclaim. In truth his first season was somewhat underwhelming. Again, this may have been due to the lack of creative options elsewhere in the midfield but to be honest for much of last season it was unclear to this viewer exactly what Arteta had sent the team out to do. I think we have seen enough to have higher hopes for this season from Partey.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>By this point, Arteta had won the FA Cup and Charity Shield so firmly had the owners onside. Owners who, in fairness, stumped up a fair amount of cash, especially since we had once again failed to qualify for the Champions League and were condemned to take part in football\u2019s financial equivalent of the village fete tombola, the Europa League again. Overall, and let us put to one side the egregious signing of Willian for a second, the signings represented a further move towards lowering the age of the squad while adding some much-needed midfield steel in the form of Partey.&nbsp; The fullness of time will tell whether the signing of Willian (14<sup>th<\/sup> August 2020) and the departure of Sanllehi (15<sup>th<\/sup> August 2020) were in any way linked.&nbsp; As the lugubrious Francis Urquhart would certainly have said. You might well think that. I couldn\u2019t possibly comment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This season so far we have added Lokonga, Tavares and White.&nbsp; Lokonga seems to have come with the approbation of some pretty high calibre people. Only time will tell but from the small amount seen so far he does seem to be a player blessed with the gifts of touch, calmness and foot speed over 5-10 yards to enable a burst through the lines. The latter was signally absent from the team during last season and will continue to be absent as long as Xhaka is allowed to roam the midfield like some anachronistic woolly mammoth attempting vainly to compete with cheetah and hyena for the pickings on the high veldt.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Tavares is somewhat left field, literally and metaphorically, as he didn\u2019t manage to hold down a first team place at his former club and there are stories of immaturity in approach not a little reminiscent of the above mentioned Guendouzi.&nbsp; Again, from the little we have seen, he does seem to bring pace, drive and energy, three qualities which the human boomerang that is Kolasinac could in truth never be accused of possessing.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Finally, to date, White has been signed as our most expensive defender by a distance.&nbsp; Now undoubtedly he has performed extremely well both at Leeds and Brighton, to the extent that he made the England squad for the Euros and there was clearly other interest in him this summer.&nbsp; For me, he has to prove himself as superior to Holding and to a lesser extent Chambers in order to help understand why the money hasn\u2019t been spent elsewhere in the squad, most notably in the areas of creative midfielder and goalscorer.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The most obvious characteristic shared by the incoming group of players, one player apart, is that of youth.&nbsp; Arteta has clearly focused on bringing down the average age of the squad and is not afraid to request the funds to bring it about.&nbsp; Questions however do still exist around the creativity gap which does not at time of writing seem to have been closed through external means. All in all, I will give a fairly parsimonious mark to the club in this area.&nbsp; I think I can see a pattern forming which may in time be proved correct but to date the incoming players haven\u2019t been of the expected level to provide me with confidence that the target of getting into the Champions League will be hit this season.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-right\"><strong>Grading: C-&nbsp; (excluding Willian)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-right\"><strong>Grading: D-&nbsp; (including Willian)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><em>Re-signings\/Promotions \u2013 To First Team Only<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul><li>Saka<\/li><li>Martinelli<\/li><li>Balogun<\/li><li>Smith Rowe<\/li><li>Aubameyang<\/li><li>Holding<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Work in this area has been unequivocally excellent.&nbsp; Modern young players have come through a grinding process to make it anywhere near the first team.&nbsp; Over the time they develop at the club, they will have seen hundreds of teammates let go with almost certainly a number of very close friends among them.&nbsp; This hardens them to the nature of life and the football industry to the extent that they are quite able to mentally compartmentalise their own interests from those of the club.&nbsp; This is shown in the wider footballing tendency for players to jump clubs at a young age (examples being Sancho and Bellingham) rather than stay at their alma mater. It can also result in the playing-off of the current club of residence against potential future employers. See the likes of Pogba and Neymar who seem no sooner to have moved club than the whole transfer merry-go-round starts again with comments leaked via favoured and favourable media outlets. &nbsp; As a result, it is hugely to Arsenal\u2019s credit that we have tied up the futures of Saka, Martinelli, Balogun, Smith-Rowe and Holding since last summer.&nbsp; The ability to re-sign these undoubted talents may not be unlinked to the jettisoning of the deadweight already covered above and the manager and youth setup hierarchy being able to convince talented young players that there is a path to the first team based on meritocracy rather than gerontocracy. The one partial fly in the ointment here has been the signing of Aubameyang who has really struggled for form since signing the new contract.&nbsp; Having said that, we were not to know of his illness and family issues at that point. And there we return to Theogony \u2013 The Fates dispensing the thread of life and cutting it where they will.&nbsp; Some things are just beyond our control. Chaos from order.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-right\"><strong>Grading: A+<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Embed from Getty Images From ancient times it has been clear that human beings have an in-built drive and need to find patterns in outcomes, in order to make sense of what can otherwise appear to be the chaos of the everyday world. Chaos &#8211; the absence of pattern and certainty &#8211; is the antithesis [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3781"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3781"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3781\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3796,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3781\/revisions\/3796"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3781"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3781"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3781"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}