Arsenal Transfer Window Preview Part 2- January 2009

Morning all. Last day of 2008 has come and I'm still alive and if you're reading this so are you so congratulations on making it through another year. Yesterday I ran down the first half of our January transfer preview for Arsenal and today I'm going to finish that off with the second half of who we should buy and maybe even a little who we should sell. We did central defenders and central midfielders yesterday, so that leaves us our wide and attacking players for today.

Let's look at what we have so far out wide. We have Nasri, who is certainly a quality player as long as he can stay healthy, which hasn't been as much as you'd like. There is Eboue, who is really a right back and has been forced onto the wing and really isn't very effective out there. Rosicky is ALWAYS hurt and probably won't play for us anymore barring a miraculous recovery from his injury that has kept him out for a year. And of course we have Theo, who is out for a couple more months but he really looked great at the start of this year until the time of his injury. Diaby is also used out wide occasionally but he is a central midfielder and we really shouldn't accept having to play someone out of position so much.


So it is clear that we really could use a wide player, at least to add some depth while Theo is out and hopefully to create some competition for places with say, Eboue. There has been a ton of talk about Andrei Arshavin ever since Russia's run at Euro 2008. He was good at the Euro's, yes I'll give you that, but do we really know how he would adapt to the Premiership? He's 27 years old and would command a huge fee, yet he hasn't been tested in a top flight league. I'm going to come right out and say that I don't want Arsenal to buy Arshavin. Sp*rs bought Pavlyuchenko because of his performances in the Euro's alongside Arshavin and he hasn't worked out great for them. I just don't see him as the best option and I hope we look somewhere else. That somewhere else could be Mikel Arteta of Everton. Reports are in already that we will make a 12 million pound bid for him, which could be enough to get him from Everton. He's a huge player for them who they won't want to part with but for the right price they would have to accept, especially since the player would most likely want to come play for Arsenal. He's been playing in the Premiership for a long time so he has that needed experience which would hopefully mean he could make an immeadiate impact. He is very versatile as well meaning that he could play in Cesc's role while he is injured and move out wide or alongside him when Cesc returns. He's also good on set pieces and he really just looks like a better option to me. Another option I could think of hasn't had as much talk as the other two but as I said yesterday, Valencia are strapped for cash and a very good player on their team just happens to play on the wing. I'm talking about Silva, who plays with Cesc for Spain. I have no idea what kind of fee he would command but he is a great player and would surely benefit any team he was in.

Moving on to the strikers and you'd have to say that if we were totally set for players in a posititon then it would be at striker. We have two good strikers in RvP and Adebayor who can get the job done at the top flight as well as Eduardo, plus some youngsters like Carlos Vela and Nicklas Bendtner in waiting. I'll admit though that I'm not a big Bendtner fan. I think he gives off the impression that he is not trying hard a lot of times when he is on the pitch and it really bothers me. A lot of times when he plays it is up front by himself and when you're up top by yourself it really requires a lot of movement from you, which he doesn't seem to have. Sure he scores the odd good goal sometimes but I think his attitude of entitlement is a problem and if we received a decent offer for him I suggest we take it. If we were to bring in a striker, which we won't, then my personal choice would be Sergio "Kun" Aguero.

Last but not least we need to talk about which players we want leaving if we had our choice. Players that are not Arsenal calibre who are playing for Arsenal and should not be. Alex Song immeadiately springs to mind. He's not good enough in midfield or in defense to ever be a first eleven player and really makes me nervous even when he comes on in reserve or as a sub. When you look at other top clubs do you see players of Alex Song's skill level? Not really, and if there is one, then they don't play nearly as much as Song does for us. I also think Eboue would do well with a change of scenery. He hasn't really improved on the wing ever since he was moved there and he certainly won't ever be better than Sagna at right back. He's decent cover but even when Sagna has been out the boss has chosen to use other people instead of him at right back, which should tell you something. As I mentioned, I don't think Bendtner has much of a future here at Arsenal and I think an offer for him would see him gone.

Now by point behind this is that we can't afford to sell ANY players without having signed or having every intention of signing quality replacements for them. Our squad has shown that it is too then and we really need to grow it not sell more. We sold Hleb, Gilberto, and Flamini (I know, he left, he wasn't sold) without really bringing in any replacements and we can't have that again.


So that's about it. The transfer window opens in 12 hours, while we'll all be ringing in the New Year. I hope all of you have a fantastic 2009 and that Arsenal do as well. Everyone drink up, hook up, do drugs if that is your thing, just make it a great start to the New Year! Make sure you check out the forums if you never have or leave a comment and let me know what your thoughts are! Cheers! I'll leave you with this video to go into the New Year. Warning: Semi-offensive and also hilarious material.