In the same week Arsene Wenger refused to rule out
signing a free agent, should his side’s injury crisis
worsen, Arsenal’s yearly financial report revealed the
club have an incredibly healthy cash reserve of
£173million.
Nine competitive fixtures into the current season and
the Gunners have already hit the bare bones of their
defensive depth – in part due to unfortunate injuries, in
part due to some unforgivably causal recruitment
during the summer.
It cost them dearly against Borussia Dortmund in the
Champions League last week as reserve defender
Hector Bellerin filled in at right-back for the injured
Mathieu Debuchy, taking on one of Europe’s most
fearsome sides in only the tenth competitive fixture of
his senior career.
And with Kieran Gibbs, Mathieu Debuchy, Nacho
Monreal, Calum Chambers and Laurent Koscielny
already undergoing spells on the sidelines this term,
Arsene Wenger was keen to avoid another casualty in
the Capital One Cup last night, calling upon a novice
back four of Bellerin, Chambers, Isaac Hayden and
Francis Coquellin amid a 2-1 defeat to Southampton.
In the context of the North London derby at the weekend,
combined with Arsenal’s injury woes already this year,
perhaps Wenger’s decision to deploy a rookie defence
is understandable; this is the Capital One Cup after all,
a competition the Arsenal boss has never won since
arriving in the Premier League almost two decades ago
and obviously holds in low regard.
But clearly, the Gunners are light on bodies at the back
and the Emirates boss allegedly plans remedy this by
signing a free agent.
At least, that’s what the papers say, as they link the
Gunners to a host of names that wouldn’t look out of
place if you were discussing a Championship side’s
potential recruitment; 34 year-old ex-Evertonian
Joseph Yobo, Uruguay international Diego Lugano, who
failed to earn a contract extension at relegation-
threatened West Brom last season, former West Ham
full-back George McCartney, and Anthony Reveillere,
the 35 year-old Lyon veteran who managed just 13
league appearances for Napoli last season.
Hardly the calibre of player you’d associate with a club
of Arsenal’s stature – a club that’s meant to be
challenging for trophies and titles this season. Even at
the heights of their careers, the majority of these
players were below the standards set in north London.
And rather worryingly, Arsene Wenger gave an
expectedly ambiguous answer on the issue during his
press conference last week. “It depends on who is
available and on the nature of the injuries of Mathieu
Debuchy and Nacho Monreal,” the Frenchman told
reporters.
I have nothing against the bosman market. I am by no
means a transfer snob. Free signings have served
Arsenal well in the past, the most recent example being
Mathieu Flamini’s return to north London in summer
2013. He’s since made 41 appearances for Arsenal and
was on the bench for their victorious FA Cup final at the
end of last season; unquestionably, pound-for-pound,
he’s proved a smart acquisition.
Yet signing a free agent now, less than a month after
the closure of the summer window, would be the
ultimate insult to Arsenal fans.
Arsenal’s defence has been crying out for added depth
since the beginning of last season, when right-back
Bacary Sagna was sporadically called upon to fill in at
centre-half, but in another raucous display of self-
imposed austerity, Wenger waits until he’s cornered by
an unavoidable problem to try and solve it, no matter
how insulting, embarrassing or inadequate the potential
solutions are.
It first surfaced in January that club captain Thomas
Vermaelen was likely to leave the club at the end of the
campaign, giving Arsene Wenger over six months to
prepare for his eventual departure to Barcelona.
Vermaelen left on the 9th of August and despite links to
a host of centre-backs, such as Winston Reid, Fabian
Schar, Federico Fazio and Kostas Manolas, all of whom
would have been decent options as understudy to Per
Mertesacker and Laurent Koscielny, Arsenal failed to
directly replace the Belgium international.
This kind of criticism regarding Wenger’s recruitment is
nothing new and excuses have been made for Le
Professeur before, particularly, but not exclusively, the
costs of building the Emirates stadium.
However, we’ve just witnessed the most lucrative
transfer window in the club’s history; £82million spent
on five first team signings, and clearly from the release
of Arsenal’s financials, that could have been
considerably more, whilst the club’s wage bill has
surpassed Chelsea’s for the first time in over a decade.
Financial prudence is no longer a justifiable – or even
accurate – excuse for the Arsenal gaffer’s refusal to
adequately strengthen his defence. If Wenger couldn’t
see this problem on his horizon, as myself and the vast
majority of Arsenal fans had, then he’s simply not fit for
the job.
That window, in combination with Wenger’s new
contract and the FA Cup haul at the end of last season,
was meant to usher in a new era at the Emirates. With
the Arsenal boss already forced into considering low-
budget stop-gap solutions to pave over integral cracks
that have been expanding for seasons, i