According to the reports in the media Alexis and Ozil’s future will be decided in January, while Arsene Wenger’s future will be be decided in the summer.
The people who write these reports are quite certain that Alexis will go to Manchester City.
Mind you they were equally certain that Alexis would leave in last summer’s transfer window, and once again Manchester City was the club to which he was going. Indeed the media had a fair go at blaming Arsenal for their prediction not coming true with tales of last minute attempts at deals which went wrong.
In fact, reading the media’s predictions about transfers it is becoming quite clear that the journalists are always right, and it is only the stupidity of the club’s negotiators that stops what should be happening – what the media has said will happen – from actually coming to pass.
Leaving all the rumours aside there are a couple of things that we do know. First, Arsenal have the money to buy players, and the regular income to be able to pay the salaries. What they don’t have however is the money of Manchester City, who seem to be able to keep on increasing salaries in their squad without it having any impact on the salary cap rules, because of the way these rules don’t incorporate money donated by owners and sponsors.
What is often ignored is the fact that the benefit of having players on the final year of their contract in an era of rapidly escalating salaries is that the players are now relatively low cost compared with what they would earn if recently brought in. In fact running a player’s contract down, actually looks like a good deal – provides he plays well in the last year of his contract.
Also although it is regularly said that the players are worth astronomical amounts of money, both were purchased at a time when their cost was far lower. And there is that worrying thought that both players might already be entering a period of decline. Both will be 29 by January, which means a new four year contract would take them to the age of 33 – at which stage they would still be earning their top salaries, without necessarily making quite such a fulsome contribution to the team. In fact I wouldn’t be surprised if both are seeking five year contracts, because whatever they get after this next deal, it is going to be a lot less than they earned before.
Second Arsenal do have a rich vein of youth talent emerging. Indeed the number of players in the first team squad who have emerged via the club’s youth system looks rather promising when compared to most teams: Bellerin, Coquelin, Iwobi, Walcott, Wilshere, Ramsey, Reine-Adelaide, Nelson, Maitland-Niles and of course most recently Eddie… all joined the club either as youth players or in the early days of their development.
But losing Alexis and Ozil and not replacing either with big money transfers would probably be seen very negatively by the media who, despite the fact that the vast majority of their transfer predictions each window are simply makebelieve, do seem to be able to influence the mood around the club. Indeed even if both left and the results of the team improved there would be such an outcry that the club would probably be forced to make a big money signing to alleviate the negativity.
Which raises the question, would Arsenal miss Alexis and Ozil if they left?
For many people the forward line of Ozil, Lacazette and Alexis looks like a dream lineup – one that ought to be scoring goals at the level that Manchester City are currently reaching. And yet it doesn’t seem to be delivering – although to be fair they have hardly had the chance to play together that often.
But if there is an upsurge of opinion against the players by pundits, then that will almost certainly harm the chances of Arsenal recruiting really good replacements. I mean, if you were an up and coming footballer, and you watched Ozil being taunted by people who call themselves Arsenal supporters, would you feel like coming to Arsenal? Especially when so many other clubs are knocking on the door.
It was also interesting that Arsene Wenger made a comment about his contract recently.
“I said I sit down with the board every end of season and see where we go from there. That’s what I said – I have a two-year contract, I will always try to go to the end of my contract but always have the honesty to sit down with the board and see where we go from there. So that’s quite simple.”
Which by and large sounds like he is staying.
Of course it is possible that Arsenal will make that forward line of Alexis, Lacazette and Ozil work, and start knocking in the goals as we have all hoped they would, and then everyone would be happy – until one of the three decides to leave.
But if that threesome really doesn’t work (with the variant possibility of Ozil playing behind the others, and having Iwobi on the wing) then yes I guess they will go, and there will be a big money replacement at the same time. The name being bandied about everywhere is Nabil Fekir. He plays for Lyon however Barcelona and Real Madrid want him, but he likes the idea of Mr Wenger as manager.
Maybe Ozil stays and Alexis goes, being replaced by a forward who really does make it all click into place. That’s my best guess for now – but unlike those guys in the newspapers, I don’t have any level of certainty over that.