Arsenal hope short-term fixes can solve long-term issues

Arsenal’s aim this season is a return, after a two-year absence, to the Champions League. Unai Emery came incredibly close to achieving that objective at a first attempt last season. However, despite finishing a point shy of fourth spot, this Arsenal squad needed substantial re-shaping.

To achieve this aim, Emery was handed a transfer budget of £55 million; in 2019 money that is paltry. Manchester City (Rodri), Tottenham (Tanguy Ndombele) and Manchester United (Harry Maguire) all spent that or more on the purchase of just one player. Put simply, Arsenal handed manager Emery and Head of Football Raul Sanllehi a near-impossible task: close the gap on those above while operating in a market well below the elite.

Yet, it seems Sanllehi and Emery decided to take a risk; they have bet a lot, perhaps Emery’s future, on the short-term. They have put together a team, on a relative shoestring, that *could* return the club to the top four. At the centre of this restructure – and forming a new spine of the team - are Dani Ceballos and David Luiz.

Arsenal have, unlike Manchester United, accepted the new status quo; as hard as it is to admit, the Gunners or United are no longer one of the best four teams in the country, as such, their transfer policies had to be adjusted accordingly.

Arsenal have done so, targeting the young and hungry – Ceballos, Kieran Tierney or Nicolas Pepe – or talented but flawed – Luiz. The Gunners are in transition and as such have signed transitional players – good but not yet great. However, those sort of players cost substantial funds. Therefore, Emery and Sanllehi got creative; they signed young players with potential that were within their budget, Tierney or Pepe, and then got fixes in place on the cheap in an attempt to return to the riches of the Champions League, Ceballos or Luiz.

The acquisitions of Ceballos and Luiz to this observer represent short-term fixes to long term issues; Ceballos, unable to get much game time at Real Madrid, represents a fine foil to the tenacity of Lucas Torreira and a potentially a substantial upgrade on one of Emery’s captains, Granit Xhaka, and, despite some high-profile errors, Luiz suits the style of play that Shokdran Mustafi has often struggled with. Yet, both are not long-term solutions to long term problems – there is no option to buy on the Ceballos deal and Luiz, at 32, only has a couple of years left at the top-end of the game.

However, as stated above, the aim this season is to return to the Champions League, and, on balance, those fixes could be enough to see the Gunners finish in the top four. Once that aim is attained Emery and Sanllehi can set about the actual task of fixing the long-standing issues that have expediated Arsenal’s decline.

Emery was dealt a decided dicey hand this summer but has played it superbly. It may, of course, not bear fruit but Arsenal, for the first time in a while, appear to have a side that has balance, and it was absolutely the right decision.