As the hour’s tick down towards the January transfer window (the start of which is celebrated around the world with fireworks and dancing, though I may have misunderstood this) and with no matches until Plymouth on Saturday, I thought I’d take a broad look at the transfer market and Arsenal’s position going into it.
I can’t remember a stranger market, nor one where a player’s value was so randomly ascribed. In a good deal, both parties should feel slightly uncomfortable – the buyer that he might have overpaid, and the seller that he might have undersold. What we’ve got right now is a seller’s market where nobody’s quite sure where all that money is coming from. And with Arsenal very much a buying club this January, that’s not good news. It means we’ll have to be pretty cunning to come out in February with a significantly improved squad.
Some good games for Portsmouth won Lassana Diarra a whopping £22million move to Real Madrid. Now, if you believe the Independent, Portsmouth are talking about £24 million for Jermaine Defoe, who moved in the opposite direction for £9 million not that long ago. Somehow if you throw in a goals record at Pompey which was essentially a continuation of his Spurs form when he was getting a game and add in the financial crisis, the player is valued nearly 3 times higher!
If that’s the going rate, what on earth would we need to pay for someone in the class of Ribery, or Aguero? This is only a few months after City bought Robinho for £30 million. How does Defoe plus £6million sound as a fair deal for him?
Klaas Jan-Huntelaar, a top class international striker covetted by all the major clubs in Europe and with Champions’ League experience, moves to Madrid in an initial £17m deal which could rise as high as £23million depending on performance. This seems like a fair price for such a talented player. What’s odd is that the second tier of Premiership clubs are expecting each other to outspend Real Madrid in exchange for inferior quality.
These are the sort of fees Arsene has never spent. In the past only players with international pedigree and good records at top clubs have been able to command these kinds of numbers. Now everyone’s doing it. Defoe’s a good player, but at best you’re probably signing 20 goals a season, for which you must now pay top dollar.
In one sense, I suspect the financial crisis is perversely responsible for this. You might have expected to see good players available for bargain bucks, but that simply hasn’t happened. Taking Defoe as an example, Portsmouth could flog one of their assets and they’d have a bit more money. In the past you’d just bring in a cheaper replacement and trouser the rest. The thing is that once they’ve flogged Defoe they’ve probably increased the risk of relegation quite considerably, and this is where the rub really comes. Mediocre Premiership clubs are now less interested in good deals than they are in avoiding the ruin of relegation at all costs. They are asking for such high prices exactly because they are so risk-averse right now.
This has a curious effect on the valuation of players from clubs like Everton or Villa. Say we tried to sign Arteta. You’d think about £10-£12 million would do the job, but Everton will naturally look for a replacement from a lower club, say Morten Gamst Pedersen. But when they enquire they’ll find Blackburn are charging a much higher premium than they are. So they won’t sell for anything less than a grossly inflated fee.
So where does this leave Arsenal, so evidently in need of ready-made reinforcements?
Exactly where we’ve always been with Arsene, that’s where. The best solution to such a market is simply to scout far and wide and well and early. If we get involved in rat races over average Premiership players we’re just going to end up throwing away money we don’t have, especially if we’re up against Man City (and who aren’t they interested in exactly?)
Sagna, Eduardo, Adebayor, Van Persie. All well-below £10 million and all right out of the top drawer. In the first 3 cases they came with enough experience to make a pretty immediate impact. It’s these sort of off-the-radar players that we need to be bringing in if we are to outperform the market this January and have a realistic tilt at the Champions’ League. What do I want Arsene to find up his magic sleeve? Ideally, another Vidic or Skrtel, relative unknowns bought cheaply who were ready to perform at the highest level at the heart of the defence. What price Vidic now?
Arsene’s said he wants experience and he also said he would look at loan moves. If he follows his established transfer strategy he might need to combine the two and loan in the experience. We may have to settle for someone like Olivier Dacourt. Yesterday I suggested we give Juan Sebastian Veron a six month loan contract, just in case he’s still got it in him (with apologies for all the United stuff on that clip, it made me feel sick too). I know he disappointed at United and Chelsea but they’re very different teams and he could be due a Larsson-esque swansong. Just an idea.
Intrigued, as ever, to know your thoughts on all this.
Tags: Arsenal, Arsene Wenger, Jermaine Defoe, Juan Sebastian Veron, Klaas-Jan Huntelaar, lassana diarra, Robinho
December 30th, 2008 at 11:06 am
To be honest, I can’t see Everton selling one of their best players, for any fee, when they have such a thin squad (currently 0 strikers, but that’s what they get for signing Louis “The French Rosicky” Saha). Ideally, we need a centre-half, a defensive centre-mid, and a creative player like Arshavin. Assuming we sign the latter, I really can’t see Arsene making two more. At best, I reckon he’ll bring a defender like Chiellini in and possibly loan another mid, but I suspect, realistically, he’ll probably go for just one loan deal for someone who can play in defense and mid, like, er, Song. But better. We hope. Wouldn’t say no to bringing Seb Larsson back you know…
December 30th, 2008 at 11:50 am
Its an experience knwing arsenal.but wengers mediocrity & indolence is seeing me off 2 barca.
December 30th, 2008 at 12:04 pm
We do need to spend money
We must have money as we have nearly alaways made a profit in the transfer market
We start off will 5 million from the diarra sell on
We could sell bentner for 8 million and Kolo for 10 million that gives us 23 plus around 37 availible in the kitty so 50 million to spend
Here is my transfers i would like to see in
1.Shay Given 8 million
2.Distan 5 Million
3.Inlar 10 million
4.ashavin 12 million
5.Fullar 10 million
Total 45 million
December 30th, 2008 at 3:04 pm
I don’t expect some mass influx of players in January but at best 2-3 players. I could stomach Almunia until the summer for a hopefully cheaper Shay Given since summer transfers are typically that way. I don’t tihnk we need any real attacking options with Eduardo coming back our frontline is full, especially if we sell Bendtner we still have Manu, RVP, Vela and Eduardo with even Jay Simpson up and coming in the ranks. We clearly need a top draw defener or for Kolo to rediscover his form. With Arshavin’s price drop from 20M to 12M he can definitely get the nod for that but I wouldn’t want Wenger to get tunnel vision on this one player because really there’s just as good if not better out there – Ribery for one is a player I sorely regret not seeing at the club. I thought Arsene would have snapped him up since he had first option on him last summer but allowed him to go to Bayern where he basically won that Bundesliga title on his own. I haven’t seen much of Matuidi since St. Etienne games are hard to come by but f he is anything like his predecessor for that club – Zokora – he’ll be a welcome shield to the back four. At most maybe 20M will be spent in January, I can’t see more than that because it’s really a few key positions we need because most of last season’s squad is still in tact and we weren’t far off from the title in 07/08.
December 30th, 2008 at 3:07 pm
Thought provoking article. Some parallel’s between some clubs spending behaviours and that of house buyers here in the USA. No market is a one way street. Player values cannot move inexorably upwards without something going “pop”. I’m very hopeful that AW will unearth a couple of great unknowns. The Gunners scouting system is just “the best”.
Keith’s proposal’s are interesting. I like the first three. We need a robust keeper to challenge the sometimes shaky Almunia. Clichy is great going forward, but increasingly prone to defensive errors. Distin is a better defender. How would Gael fare if he followed the Flamini route to DM from LB? Inler is quality. Not so sure about 4 and 5.
Proposal to sell Toure is worth considering. AW loves him like a son so I don’t think it will happen, but, over the last two season’s his errors have really cost us.
December 30th, 2008 at 4:02 pm
I think what we need at the moment is 2 or 3 players. A central defender ( provided Senderos will stay at Milan) and 2 midfielders. My choices would be…
Samba (5 Million )
Yaya Toure ( 15 Million at most)
Veloso ( 8 Million)
At most we will be spending 28 million. We have 7 million from Bentley, 5 from Diarra which adds up to 12 remaining 16 which can easily come from the transfer kitty the remainer can be spent on Arshavin but I really do not see any need for him right now as Rosicky will most likely come back as a better player plus Arshavin to me does not worth 12 million. He is simply another Milan Baros in the making.
December 30th, 2008 at 4:14 pm
Ogba u fool, pull ur head in. Are u an arsenal supporter or a little bitch??
Run off to barca, maybe you can learn to spell there… lol.
Gunners for life!
Arsene will do the right thing, u kno it
December 30th, 2008 at 9:03 pm
luxford, Arsene desperately needs to redeem himself for his summer debacle, our place in the table says it all, top four can be a real problem without significant strengthening.
Kieth, like you ideas, but now way do we spend 45 mil without selling some players, who should we offload?
wc, i too expect maybe two players in, three only if we sell. There are players i would sell but that depends on who we bring in. A wide player(ribery too bad that one got away, in retrospect he was definitely worth the 20 mil and former Arsenal players were screaming at Arsene to buy him, wow, that one really got away). If Arsene’s comments on midfielders is to be believed, I think we need more defensive minded players than creative ones though.
how’s this:
Inler and Arshavin in, Gallas(toure or bendtner) as makeweight for possible move for a big proven winger/striker.
December 30th, 2008 at 9:29 pm
@ Ogba:
Good riddance to bad rubbish. I’ll take any of my whingeing, complaining, Arsene-must-go compatriots over plastic, no-heart, yellow-bellied, lily-livered trash fans like you anyday of the week.
At least, the fans who’re saying Wenger should go aren’t saying they’re off to support other teams. They’re just expressing their frustrations at the current state of affairs.
You on the other hand, represent what every true fan hates. Well, at least you’re off to glory hunt with another club, and at least we can be glad of your departure.
So, fuck off!
December 30th, 2008 at 9:50 pm
dan:
I really don’t want to lose Gallas right now. As much drama as he’s caused he’s still a exceptional defender. He’s one of few goal scoring defenders I can remember us having. Sol got a few now and then but when he does it’s a surprise but Gallas has been scoring on set pieces for years now. Really we need a commanding defender who will bully the opposition so to speak while Gallas uses his quickness and cleans up. That is the formula that kept so many Chelsea clean sheets in the past. Terry would fight for everything and Gallas would sweep in afterwards. Bendtner I can do without, he may have potential (though I think differently), but we need polished finishing now, not 3 years from now. Eduardo is the quintessential striker for us right now because he very rarely if at all squanders an opportunity in the box. Manu and RVP are both top class but both are guilty of missing guilt edge chances though more from the former than the latter. They will score but they require too many chances some times for that to happen. We need that cutting edge where one goal is enough for 3 points and those 3 points lay in the hands of the first person that has an able striker that can put away a single chance at goal. Since Thierry left he haven’t had that one person who can turn draws into wins or losses into draws in the blink of an eye. I can see Eduardo doing that for us, but not Bendtner as we could have clearly seen with his 500 misses in that Carling Cup game a few weeks back.
December 31st, 2008 at 7:19 pm
WC, i see you point on gallas, but what if he demands a move? best that we get something exceptional for him. Bendtner, agreed our most expendable frontman. While i rate eduardo highly, he’s a bit slight and not as fast as henry, but he’s the right foil for manu and should be starting when fit.
I believe the team is short on confidence due to inexperience and lack of maturity. My hope is that we can get some midfield leadership, arteta is a possibility, but we also need a meatgrinder, perhaps inler. Whatever happens I’m pleased to see Wenger apparently seeking changes.