Eddie can become a good defensive forward that presses and scores Defoe type goals but he’s never going to become elite imo unlike his lookalike Marlo on the wire
Eddie is a good presser. The thing about Eddie is that he's not good enough on the ball - his movement off the ball seems fine (I guess? haven't paid attention to him off the ball), but he seems like a really poor dribber/passer. Balogun, based on the limited highlights I've seen, looks super skilled. Generally do what you can to keep players like that, because they can slot in anywhere. Paging @The Jitty Slitter because he'll say the names we're all thinking of.
well, that's nice. https://www.thesun.co.uk/sport/12703814/arsenal-yunus-musah-valencia-wonderkid/ he can join gnabry and reine-adelaide for a nice lineup.
much like smith-rowe, magically "too important to loan out" and yet "not good enough to make the bench". well, in saliba's case, maybe make the bench. just not to play.
well, smith-rowe appears healthy enough to participate in U23 so the problem there is not injuries. https://arseblog.news/2020/11/smith-rowe-helps-arsenal-u23s-to-secure-impressive-win/
well, then. just watching this highlight, we can see clearly why nketiah gets playtime that balogun does not. narrator: we cannot see why.
Don't get me wrong, I want to see Balogun get first team minutes. But this is school boy football so it doesn't tell us much. Eddie tore it up at this level too.
oh, i absolutely agree. i'm not at all suggesting that he immediately start the rest of the season. i'm just saying that he has shown all he can at U23, there is nothing else he can do or prove at that level and he isn't likely to grow appreciably without competitive games. at this point, eddie is . . . who we thought he was. it's time to find out if balogun can be more or fit arteta's system any better. because, at this point, we also need to figure out if we fully committing to him or letting him go because he is down to 18 months.
james mcnicholas just did an article on jay emmanuel-thomas. interesting read. apparently, after bouncing around a bit, he'd end up in thailand and was enjoying his time there before the club folded - there is not a whole lot of money there - and was due to go join a club in china in february of 2020 before his flight was cancelled due to the outbreak of a little virus. so he spent 15 months out of the game and just working out before joining livingston this year. he feels like another one that wenger mismanaged the career of - having him spent time on the bench for an occasional 10 or 20 minutes outing instead of being on loan and developing. he apparently had this fun finish for livingston. Ill just leave this here, i’m proud of this 1 myself ❤️ pic.twitter.com/TFj3KFUDoS— JET ✈️ (@OfficialJET10) March 13, 2021
🤝 After months of talks & coming close to reaching a pre-contract agreement with an overseas club, 19yo striker Folarin Balogun to sign a new four-year deal at Arsenal imminently. W/ @gunnerblog for @TheAthleticUK (@AdrianJKajumba 1st on the news 👏) #AFC https://t.co/iXcHbss3fw— David Ornstein (@David_Ornstein) April 9, 2021
Or he's been told about the shit in front of him and told he's going to play more next year. I honestly think Laca and Eddie are already gone.
Perhaps its a case of thinking the player could be useful and then realizing he just isn't. It does happen every now and then. Part of the reason I'm so active today is because I think it's hilarious how everything is wrong and it's wrong because Arteta did it, so it's wrong.
Like I said earlier, I really want Arteta to succeed, but I have a huge problem with his involvement in the Willian deal and with his continued faith in Willian. I said at the time I thought Willian was a bad signing because Arsenal had paid a record transfer fee for Pepe the year before, Arteta seemed to prefer (still does) playing Aubameyang (the previous record transfer fee) on the right and I thought Willian would take playing time away from Saka and Martinelli. Saka has forced his way into the starting lineup and while Martinelli was injured at the start of the season, where would he and Arsenal be now, if he had gotten Willian’s playing time after he recovered. I cannot explain Arteta’s continued faith in Willian other than the desire to be proven right. This is a sign of inflexibility on Arteta’s part. I worry that this inflexibility will extend to other decisions. Will he extend Luiz or sign another right center back in the summer, as has been rumored, while ignoring Saliba, a young, athletic right center back, who by all accounts is good on the ball, because of a desire to be proven right when he said Saliba wasn’t ready? In addition, re Saliba, when a loan in the fall fell apart at the last minute, why wouldn’t Arteta include Saliba on the roster for the group stage of the Europa League to potentially get him some playing and development time. He might not have been ready for the Premier League, but his experience and performances in Ligue 1 would suggest he was completely capable of handling the competition in the group stage and Arteta would have gotten a good look at his form. But he wasn’t ready. Instead Arteta registered Chambers, who coming off a serious injury wouldn’t be available until the last couple of games of the group stage. I think Arteta has made some bad decisions and I’m not sure he’s learning from them.
I honestly have no clue whatsoever about Arteta's squad-building strategy. Very little of it makes sense.
Yep. This. I think he has improved our play, and I see signs of progress (for the most part) in what we're trying to do. But his squad decisions are what baffle me. Yesterday on the Arsecast, Philippe Auclair made a comment about Willian and the decisions to keep playing him, hinting at something not related to merit. But he explicitly stated that's all he'd say. Andrew seemed to know what he was referring to but wouldn't elaborate either. My guess is it's related to agent/contract shenanigans, but that's really bad if so. I dunno. I like Arteta. I don't think he should be sacked even if Prague knocks us out. But there are so many nagging questions about things preventing me from being sure about him.
https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/...l-heroics-against-oxford-united-40224936.html I never heard of him.
I really want the team cleansed of all of the shady backroom dealings. Hoping that would have been gone with Raul's sacking but if Edu & Arteta are involved still I want them gone too.
He played a few matches for us in the preseason. May have even played in one of the games that Saliba played. He looked pretty solid for a preseason match and I've heard other good reports about him on loan. Depending on what we opt to do with our CBs next season, I could see him being kept on as a HG/5th CB.
https://dailycannon.com/2020/10/kept-haaland-quiet-ballard-impresses-again-with-northern-ireland/ I’m not saying he is great but dude looks like he could make the club some cash.