Recap after third week of transfer window – too much ado about nothing

…everyone with a IQ higher than room temperature in Celsius have realized that we need at least two new players, but it is highly possible that we will wake up on February 1st with exactly the same squad we have right now.

The dawn of February 1st is approaching and it seems that the of allArsenal.com on January 9th were correct. Only seven days left for our manager to finally bring out the wallet and spend some money to make our squad competitive for the final four months of the season. It’s not just the fact that we are tracking Spuds and Everton in the battle for 4th spot nor that both our captain and vice-captain are out due to injuries, but also the fact we usually melt down in the final two months of the season and one or two quality signings might change that tradition.

However, despite the fact we have been linked with more or less every player that has played football in 2012-13, we can be calm as our manager stated that he trust his “resources inside to do well”. We have seen in matches against title contenders so far that this is not true. Our squad have lacked both leadership and the edge in those kind of matches. We have only three senior center-backs with one of them (Vermaelen) being out due to injury but we didn’t go for, say, Yanga-Mbiwa who was signed by Newcastle.

Unfortunately, that sort of Wenger’s thinking was very predictable. Despite the fact Wenger has substantial amount available for transfers (35 million pounds according to Peter Hill-Wood), he has been reluctant to spend any money in the January transfer window. Senegalese duo Ba and Diame would cost us less than one third of transfer funds available but Wenger decided not to go for them which is a bit odd given that he spent a bigger amount on Gervinho 18 months ago. Maybe he confused them with notorious Senegalese duo El-Hadji Diouf and Salif Diao who were Andy Carroll and Jordan Henderson before Carroll and Henderson.

We also heard certain words from Wenger that suggest he a) thinks that Arsenal fans world-wide are idiots or b) doesn’t know UEFA rules regarding players’ registration. For those who didn’t follow his statements regarding Edinson Cavani, he claimed that it very hard to find player that is not cup-tied (for Champions’ League) that could make Arsenal stronger.

He is also cup-tied for the Champions League on top of that – all the players who can strengthen us are cup-tied in the Champions League.

This statement is, to put it mildly, utter crap. First of all, Edinson Cavani didn’t play in Champions League this season and, therefore, he isn’t cup-tied. True, he has played for Napoli in Europa League this season but, according to Article 18 of the Regulations of the Champions’ League Cycle 2012-15, if we signed Cavani, the Uruguayan striker could be registered to play for us in Knockout Stage of the Champions’ League. Second of all, both Marouane Fellaini and Leighton Baines would improve our team significantly and aren’t cup-tied given that Everton didn’t play in Champions’ League (or in any European competition this season for that matter). All aforementioned examples suggest Wenger doesn’t think any, say, Newcastle player is good enough for us (Ben Arfa, Cabaye or Tiote), not to mention Wilfried Zaha who is going to join FAnchester United in the summer. PSV midfielder Kevin Strootman would be eligible to play for us in Knockout Stage against Bayern Muenchen as well as every player from Inter Milan (e.g. Diego Milito or Wesley Sneijder that were connected with us). Speaking of which, those who hope we will sign Jovetić from Fiorentina should forget about it – the Montenegrin isn’t cup-tied but Wenger obviously thinks he wouldn’t make our squad stronger. Same goes for French defensive midfielder Capoue.

Time will tell whether Wilfried Zaha will turn out to be Wenger’s miss like Cristiano Ronaldo was or Ferguson’s expensive flop. The young English international possesses skill and pace that reminds a bit of those Cristiano Ronaldo has (except Zaha doesn’t seem to be a self-centered arrogant prick prone to diving which is logical given that he is an Arsenal fan) and we can all hope he’s going to be a flop in Premiership. It’s a bit odd Wenger decided against bidding for Crystal Palace forward given that Zaha would fit into new policy Wenger proclaimed – he is young talented British player and his transfer would be a lesser risk than expensive youngsters Walcott and Oxlade-Chamberlain were. If he is going to be as good footballer as Cristiano Ronaldo is, 20 million pounds for 20-year-old will turn out to be a bargain.

We can only hope that Wenger’s words are just smoke and mirrors while our manager is working on top-class signing or, if not, that our results won’t suffer. It is more realistic, however, that Wenger will continue to battle with phantoms who ask him to sign Messi or act like he is politician (socialistic approach to wages, suggestions regarding limitation of January transfer window, etc) instead of actually improving the Arsenal squad.