One by one, the glamorous signings recruited amid much fanfare during the final throes of the Arsene Wenger era at Arsenal have quietly made their exits.
Mesut Ozil, a £42.5m signing from Real Madrid, left on a free. Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, a £56m signing from Borussia Dortmund, left on a free. And now Alexandre Lacazette, a £46.5m from Lyon, has left on a free. Each were bought for club-record fees.
To say that any of them were poor signings would be categorically false: Ozil was one away from equalling Thierry Henry’s Premier League assists record in a single season; Aubameyang won a Golden Boot and almost single-handedly dragged his team to the FA Cup in 2020; Lacazette hit double figures for goals in all but his final campaign.
But those three departures were each accompanied by a sense that Arsenal hadn’t quite maximised their talents. Or at least, not done so consistently enough. Arsenal’s gradual slide down the league table and out of the Champions League is proof of that. Aubameyang and Lacazette didn’t play a single minute in Europe’s top-tier competition. Neither was signed for fifth-place finishes or Europa League nights.
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The club’s regression is not necessarily down to individual players failing to live up to their hype, but more so patchy squad-building and muddled strategising in the boardroom. The club spent big money on high-profile stars without necessarily having the right composite parts to allow them to thrive and players have been bought by different directors to suit the needs of different managers.
Consider the club’s transfer business during the underwhelming and short-lived Unai Emery era. During the Spaniard’s 18-month spell in north London, Arsenal signed: Nicolas Pepe, William Saliba, Kieran Tierney, David Luiz, Gabriel Martinelli, Dani Ceballos (loan), Lucas Torreira, Bernd Leno, Sokratis Papastathopolous, Matteo Guendouzi, Denis Suarez (loan) and Stephan Lichsteiner.
Of that dozen, only Tierney and Martinelli can be classed as outright successes, while only four were part of Mikel Arteta’s first-team squad last summer. Pepe – a club-record signing that most certainly has not worked out – and Leno were the other two, making a combined nine Premier League starts in 2021-22.
Arsenal came close to scratching their Champions League itch at the end of last season, but a fifth-place finish instead means that 2022-23 will signal their sixth consecutive campaign outside of European football’s elite competition; prior to that sequence, Arsenal had qualified 19 years running. Whatever Arsenal’s transfer strategy was during that period – and at times it has been difficult to tell – it clearly did not work.
Over the past few transfer windows, though, it has seemed as though Arsenal have learnt harsh lessons from the messy squad rebuild that took place towards the end of Wenger’s tenure and the start of Emery’s. There has been a clear strategic shift from acquiring big names with big reputations like Ozil, Aubameyang and Lacazette, to investing in younger players with the potential to grow and develop.
Of Arsenal’s eight signings from last season, seven – Ben White, Martin Odegaard, Aaron Ramsdale, Takehiro Tomiyasu, Albert Sambi Lokonga, Nuno Tavares and Auston Trusty (in January) – were aged 23 or under when they joined; Gabriel Magalhaes was 22 when he signed the summer before. Arteta picked the 20 youngest starting line-ups in the Premier League last season.
This summer marks another pivotal point in Arsenal’s latest renovation project as they seek to build upon a promising campaign that ultimately ended in crushing disappointment. The departures of Aubameyang and Lacazette over the past six months have created a sizeable void in Arteta’s frontline, regardless of their dwindling returns by the end of their Arsenal careers. Eddie Nketiah’s contract U-turn is timely, but adding a high class No 9 in the Tammy Abraham or Gabriel Jesus mould is the top priority.
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While major surgery isn’t required for other key positions, Arsenal’s end-of-season slump was in no small part attributable to a lack of squad depth. Long-term injuries for Tierney, Tomiyasu and Thomas Partey exposed the significant drop off in quality from starters to backups, while the central defensive pair White and Gabriel were also hampered by hamstring issues.
Buying the calibre of players capable of improving the squad is invariably trickier without being able to dangle the Champions League carrot in front of top targets. But on the flip side, Arsenal’s clear, youth-orientated approach under Arteta is an appealing prospect for up-and-coming prospects seeking consistent game-time at a top-four challenging club. Odegaard is a perfect example, joining Arsenal after – understandably – struggling to force his way past Luka Modric and Toni Kroos at Real Madrid.
As recent history shows, one unsuccessful transfer window can end up hampering a club for a number of years. Get this one right, though, and Arsenal’s new crop will be on track to succeed where their predecessors failed.
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