Time to leave your doubts behind, Rice has arrived.
A club record fee of £105m, a whooping 240k/week for a 24-year old who needs to take up the responsibility from one of the best in his position, Thomas Partey. A lot we are offering, a lot we are expecting and it’s the title on the line this season.
I’m excited for Declan.
He might just be 24 years old, but he brings a lot of experience. He began his professional career at West Ham, and has since developed into a world class defensive midfielder. He has been West Ham’s Young player of the year thrice in a row, and player of the year for the them for next 3 years. He was in the Europa league team of the season in 2022-23, and won Conference League for them last season. Excelling at what he does, and winning accolades at such a young age consistently confirms his winning mentality, and he is going to be a perfect addition to a team that finished second and is looking to bridge that gap against Man City.
Thomas has been immense for us. I don’t see the complaint against him personally, he has been world class and his injuries so far is more or less down to over playing. On his day, Partey controls the midfield and his very precision in passing and opening up lines is a real threat. Rice is similar in game, has the same ball carrying ability and passes in him. Partey is, no doubt, better in close spaces but Rice brings that extra athleticism.
For the season that concluded, Partey played for us 33 times while Rice was in the playing XI for hammers for 37 times. While both of them made about equal tackles on the pitch, Rice had 15 blocks compared to 5 from Partey, 63 interceptions to Partey’s 28 and 55 clearances to Partey’s 39. Rice also has almost double clearances from headers while committing only 2/3rd fouls. Those are some great stats in comparison to one of our best players in the pitch in a season when we finished second. I can only see him improving us, and I hope he lift another trophy this season in red and white.
My only concern? We don’t need to sell Partey. Hear me out.
Partey was one the reason we remained on top of the table for around 30 weeks. He got tired and fatigued eventually, was injured along with Ben White and it proved us costly. If we sell him at this stage, and Declan takes up his position, what are the chances that he remains injury free, without a drop in performance when would need him every game and even twice a week for few weeks as we are in Champions League. And that too in his first season at Arsenal when Arteta demands a lot of aggressive football compared to David Moyes’. We would have Elneny and Sambi as back up, both of them can’t do the thing. An ideal scenario in my opinion would be keep Partey and rotate him with Rice, give them proper rest and let them fight for the spot. We are left with only DM and RW where Partey (and now Rice) and Saka are not feared by the competitions they have. We can still manage Saka’s unavailability through Jesus / Nelson / Martinelli (with Trossard taking up RW) but we would be short again in the midfield.
Unless, we go on and bring another body. I don’t see it.
Yeah, I’m excited for us and Declan. I am fearful of Partey’s departure if it happens. See you in the comment.
There are nuances of harm and greed with capitalism. If you look at the UK in isolation, there is a chasm of difference between the ‘you’ve never had it so good’ bullshit expressed by McMillan in the 50s through the ideologically destructive mantra espoused by Thatcher who started privatisation and the worship if naked greed in earnest via Major, Blair and Brown who all conspired to make life more insufferable for British workers to the last 4 or 5 clowns including your idols Cameron, May, Bojo, Truss and the latest fucking idiot. You’ve had politics all your own way Marc and it’s a fucking mess. Aided and abetted by Murdoch, the BBC and all the other absolute cunts that share your views in the media. Starmer’s also your boy ideologically so ‘greed is good’ capitalism will continue, becoming even more unjust and toxic. A force of nature for fuck’s sake…
Bob
“the Havertz quote by Arteta was simply saying he is a very good player in a number of positions, not willing to reveal his hand”
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WTF kind of nonsense is that? How long will it take for the managers of the clubs that challenge us to figure out where Harvertz is playing and in what kind of role? At worst 2 to 3 games at best by half time and all Arteta’s secrecy is just for the fanboys and media hogwash.
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The competent managers have had almost 4 years to observe his managerial nous or lack there of and since he doesn’t change or learn from his mistakes it will be a doddle for them to adapt their team to Arteta’s roll for Harvertz.
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This Havertz deal will be Arteta’s limus test and for me he will go down in flames on that deal. I am glad of the other signings but they were no indications of his talent spotting, Rice was a given one and Timber was ETH’s preferred CB acquisition last season.
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By Dec 23rd the smoke will have lifted and Arteta will either be a fraud or a genius. Until then it is game on for criticizing his ludicrous spending at times, his piss poor project so far and his player management. However he is fighting for top honors as a fraudster and a snake oil salesman.
If I had to make an educated guess, taking into account both incoming and potential outgoing players, MA is far more concerned about our tactical shortcomings than our rotational ones…in fact, if seems to me that his selection process will be even easier this season than last, which could be both positive and negative, depending on the ability of his preferred 11 to remain healthy…as such, I would suspect that the following 12 or maybe 13 players will see the bulk of the playing time: Ramsdale, Timber/White, Saliba, Gabs, Zinchenko/Tierney, Rice, Havertz, Ode, Saka, Marts and Jesus…when we’re facing deeper-lying opponents Timber will play tucked inside and Rice will be activated into more advanced spaces, whereas when we’re facing more forward-thinking opposition, White will reclaim his RB spot and Rice will be deployed in a more traditional DM role and act as the gatekeeper in front of our CBs
as we’ve witnessed during MA’s tenure here change happens slowly over time and is never revelatory in nature…two seasons ago when we were still deploying a two pivot system, with Xhaka and Partey, we relied heavily on TIerney pushing up the field…of course, Tierney was shelved with injuries far too often, which dramatically impacted our tactical pursuits…so in the off-season MA acquired Zinchenko, knowing full-well that he wanted desperately to come inside and act as more of a DM-like pivot…as a result of this change, Xhaka was pushed up the pitch, which left Marts in charge of providing our width with little to no help…so functionally our adjustments were rather minor from one season to the next, as we very rarely deviated from MA’s base formation, even though we had the personnel required to be far more experimental with our tactical approach
as I stated above, I believe that this season MA will employ 2 formational/tactical plans, depending on the opponent, and although they won’t be vastly different from a selection standpoint, minus maybe at the RB and LB positions, it should help us against the bus-sitters, as it will allow us to commit more men in and around the box…as for our matches against the top 6 or 7, he will undoubtedly be relying on his chosen “upgrades”, Rice and Havertz, to get the job done
on the positive side of things, it could help us in the following ways: (1) it should add some much-needed directness to our attack, (2) it should make it more difficult for teams to constantly double-team our wide-side forwards and (3) we should be more effective when it comes to crosses into the box and set pieces, as we’ve added 2 players with substantially more height than what was on offer last season…on the negative side of the ledger, it’s all a little too Pep-lite, in that he likewise deploys these tactical tweaks on occasion, especially when they’re in the latter stages of the CL…with this in mind, it will be interesting to see how we fare against opponents they’ve struggled against, like BHA, Spurs and Brentford, and I’m likewise still not sure that we have the horses, at least not yet, to beat City at their own game…Cheers
TRVL
Thanks for the Kool-Aid enlightening.
Ambarish
Good thoughts and I too at first subscribed to your Partey thinking.
However, as has been alluded to, Partey allegedly has issues hanging in the balance that could embarrass Arsenal and be toxic for our women teams. The potential stigma is well and truly welded to Mendy, which he’ll never escape.
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If Partey is the PL player in question currently bailed, then Saudi Arabia is probably the best destination for him. Whether he would be allowed out of the country is another matter. It will depend on his bail conditions.
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Suspect to injury and probably not suited to more than 30 games a season is not what we want from such an important part of our spine.
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We are actually entering the season of real fine margins – not the ones Pedro used to lament on about but, as I said a while ago; 8 into 4 do not go. The teams achieving 4th or higher will have been able to take advantage of the ‘fine margins’ this season; be it a dodgy penalty for us we put away or VAR deciding against a perfectly good goal City goal that affords us a win at the Etihad.
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My point is we need more than Partey to mount a serious challenge on the Title and CL. Adding Caidedo now would really be making a statement putting City and Pool on notice. Also, adding Lavia is still announcing our intentions clear enough.
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Again, and with the risk of sounding boring the left side concerns me, as does not having a guaranteed 20+ goal a season striker. We have enough MF bodies even letting Partey go:
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Rice
Trossard
Havertz
ESR
Ode
Jorginho
Viera
Kiwior (6)
Hales Enders?
with inverts Zinchenko and Timber.
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With that many of 9 for 3 positions do we really need Partey? We are well stocked in defense and midfield now, where the missing ST is glaringly obvious.
Is Bolagun currently the next Rashford?
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If the answer is no, then he should be sold, if yes has the potential, then he should be kept and an older, taller and prolific ST should be brought in for Bolagun to be understudy to with the structured path to the starting 11 there for him to attain.
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At the moment and through this TW Bolagun is doing the Hokey Cokey staying, going staying , going knees bent…………..
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This is a critical Arteta decision he needs to make purely on football decisions. There is enough interest in Bolagun with AC Milan the latest. Arteta should definitely ship Eddie out but whether to stick or twist on Bolagun should be a no brainer if there are no funds left for a quality ST that isn’t vertically challenged.
Question for you all.
Why isn’t Rice, our most expensive player, as he’s expected to be captain and the team built around his strengths, our top earner?
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£250K a week verses Harvetz £338K a week. I imagine both are geared to bonuses.
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Am I missing something as I understand Arteta currently is not sure how to employ our top earner and yet…………………..
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At least that proves Rice isn’t mercenary in the mercurial way Havertz displayed at Chelsea.
Tony, one of my best mates, who I go to the football with, calls me ‘The Accountant’ as a slight piss take as he believes I worry too much about the financials around Arsenal. I would suggest you take a leaf out of his book and not over concern yourself about the relative wages of these players who are on £10m pa. The fact is the information we read and are quoted is unsubstantiated.
I fear that Havertz is going to be the potential poster boy of the ‘discontented’ and any discussion of his comparative wages to others will be jumped on. Whether its his wages or his best position or his transfer fee, Havertz better perform otherwise he and indirectly Arteta will get pelters from those who like to pile on.
Tony,
I rest my case!
‘Jamie O’Hara has claimed that Kai Havertz will be a ‘flop’ at Arsenal and he is someone that ‘wasn’t good enough’ for Chelsea.
The outspoken pundit isn’t impressed with Arsenal’s transfer call to sign the German international, as he suggested that Mikel Arteta has made a big mistake.’
New post.
With that amount of money, we must get friend rice 😅