Hello, everyone.
It’s January, so this is going to be a month absolutely filled with spurious stories about players, transfers and potential deals that have as much hope of happening as I have of running a four-minute mile before the 31st. Less than zero. Less infinite.
Let’s start today with something that has actually happened, or will happen, and that is the fact that Mohamed Elneny and Takehiro Tomiyasu will not be available for this weekend’s FA Cup match against Liverpool. They will travel to the African Cup of Nations and the Asian Cup respectively and, depending on how Egypt and Japan fare in those tournaments, they may not return until mid-February.
With all due respect to Elneny, it’s actually not a big loss with just 1 minute in the Premier League so far this season, but Tomi is a different matter. Given that Oleksandr Zinchenko succumbed to an inevitable calf problem due to how much he had to play without having the practical solution to a calf problem to keep him fresh, he would have been a very useful option for us.
Jakub Kiwior was a substitute against Fulham and I wonder if, with that being the only option we have, we should simplify that role a little. He has experience in midfield, playing almost half a season there for Spezia in the 2021-22 season, but there is a very significant difference between sitting in a deep midfield position in Serie A: a slower and more defensive position. league – and what Mikel Arteta asks of his left-back in the Premier League.
We will have to wait and see if Zinchenko is ready for Liverpool again. The normal course of his injury trajectory is to find out he has a minor strain and then we don’t see him for three or four weeks. If that is the case this time, and Kiwior is the only option at left back, we can all be grateful that Mohamed Salah is with Elneny in the AFCON and not available to cause us problems on that side, but I think it would be a Better idea to allow Kiwior to concentrate on the defensive end.
I know our sample size with him is relatively small, but it’s still very difficult to judge a player when asked to play outside of his comfort zone. And you might also wonder why we don’t modify our own system a little based on who’s available. Obviously, that’s the manager’s responsibility, and although Kiwior wasn’t very good against Fulham, he wasn’t alone there on a day when the performance level of all the outfield players was below his best.
I saw some comments about how we might be considering shortening Kieran Tierney’s loan with Real Sociedad to give us some cover, but I suspect that’s off the mark. I don’t know if calling up an injury-prone left-back to cover our other injury-prone options in that position is really going to work, and Tierney seems to be playing enough for Real Sociedad since returning from his hamstring injury. as to prevent it. any type of withdrawal. Normally, the club taking a player on loan would have to agree to change the parameters of the deal, and I don’t know why they would do that if they are happy to have him as a starter in La Liga. Anyway, it’s all about whether this is something we’re actually trying to do, and I highly doubt it is.
Speaking of loan players, L’Equipe reports that Nantes would like to shorten Marquinhos’ loan to Arsenal. With just 149 minutes of action in seven Ligue 1 appearances, he hasn’t been a resounding success, and also comes after a fairly indifferent loan spell at Norwich last season. He’s still young, obviously, but he feels like the modern equivalent of Amaury Bischoff or something. A bet on a young player who has a one in a hundred chance of becoming good enough to play for Arsenal, and I’d say there’s a one in a million chance of that chance being less than one in a billion. Or something.
Well, let’s leave it there for this morning. Have good people.
