Gyokeres and club-record signing among five big-money players who have whelmed the most this season

Viktor Gyokeres is now a brilliant game-changer for Arsenal, having spent the majority of the season as an expensive flop.

The truth lies somewhere in an awkward middle that admittedly makes for a less eye-catching judgement than either of those two extremes.

But he is not alone as an expensive signing who has merely whelmed this season, going neither over nor under.

Viktor Gyokeres: Whelming at Arsenal

The 20-goal striker had reached a unicorn-like status in the Arsenal panacea pantheon, alongside a midfield general replacement for Patrick Vieira and a more streetwise defensive coach to build on the woke attacking foundations of Arsene Wenger.

Rarely has a player emitted such Final Piece Of The Jigsaw energy as the solution to Arsenal’s eternal runners-up puzzle.

Yet even in scoring 21 times across his debut campaign in England – already the best goal return of any player in a full Mikel Arteta season – Gyokeres has had his limitations exposed and credentials dismissed throughout.

The flat-track bully accusations came first, fuelled by his first four Premier League goals until mid-December coming against Leeds, Nottingham Forest and Burnley.

There have also been allegations of stat-padding through penalties, with Gyokeres’ standing as a bona fide flop seemingly assured long before he was dropped in the final straight for Kai Havertz.

Yet as Arteta pointed out in April, the final assessment of Gyokeres was always “going to be defined in the last seven or eight weeks”. The Champions League semi-final second-leg performance against Atletico Madrid and Fulham display in particular has already forced quite the U-turn.

The truth is that the hot-takeification of football has made it impossible to properly appraise a player like this: one signed for a substantial fee to help drag a trophyless team over the line, whose form has naturally ebbed and flowed as he acclimatises to a new club, league and country.

Gyokeres was never as bad as his critics made out, nor as good as the recent revisionism suggests. It makes for an unsatisfying, headline-averse middle ground but him being absolutely fine might well be what Arsenal needed to make that last step.

Bryan Mbeumo: Whelming at Manchester United

The suggestion that Manchester United might already be targeting a replacement for Mbeumo is manifestly absurd, but this hasn’t been the standout first season initially teased by the Cameroon international.

Mbeumo immediately felt like a natural Manchester United player, one unencumbered by the weight of the shirt, the expectation and the levels of nonsense commensurate with moving to Old Trafford.

He and Matheus Cunha signalled a successful return to a revived transfer policy that underpinned much of the club’s previous Premier League legacy.

But 10 games without scoring, the last eight of which have come with no assist either, underlines how Mbeumo’s effectiveness has diminished significantly under Michael Carrick.

While nine goals and three assists is a decent return, it wouldn’t clear Mbeumo’s efforts in a far more limited Brentford team in 2022/23 (nine goals and eight assists) or 2023/24 (nine goals and seven assists), with last season’s 20 goals and eight assists a reminder of the numbers the forward can produce at this level.

The point here is that Mbeumo should not have just one more combined goal and assist than Casemiro. Benjamin Sesko has as many but has played far less while adapting to a new league, while Matheus Cunha has spread his contributions out to avoid any slumps in form.

Milos Kerkez: Whelming at Liverpool

“Sometimes when you watch Kerkez it’s like having Darwin Nunez at left-back,” was the damning comparison Jamie Carragher made. Gary Neville likened the left-back’s brand of “naive” defending to that of “a youth-team player”.

It was ostensibly the least risky signing of Liverpool’s record-breaking summer. Both Florian Wirtz and Hugo Ekitike needed time and patience to settle, Jeremie Frimpong was replacing a generational player in a position which had to be tactically remodelled, and Alexander Isak arrived with no pre-season.

Kerkez joined Liverpool early last summer, with two seasons of Premier League experience with Bournemouth and a clear route to a left-back spot Andy Robertson could no longer comfortably hold down.

Yet for a good few months, Kerkez drowned in the mess Liverpool’s season became. Even now he is losing the battle for a starting place against a player who was almost sold in January and will be leaving at the end of the season.

It has been a tough learning curve for Kerkez at times but the sight of him clearing up various Virgil van Dijk messes from the bench has summed things up.

Thierno Barry: Whelming at Everton

His place on the Arsenal bus parade guestlist is assured, but Gareth’s brother has not had a straightforward start to Premier League life.

Eight goals is a decent effort for a player signed on potential as much as anything. The brace against Manchester City came off the back of a seven-game run without scoring in a season in which his first goal came in December.

As David Moyes said: “We took a chance on a young up and coming striker, we tried to get him in quickly and early to see how he was going. He has not done bad. I actually think he is improving as he is going along. The first season in the Premier League, it is not that easy.”

The Everton manager also pointed out that “football supporters are not having much patience with many things” in the modern day, and that “there is a bigger emphasis on: We need things now, we are looking for that to happen quickly”.

Tony Hibbert would never have made it in this cruel world.

Dango Ouattara: Whelming at Brentford

It cost Brentford an initial £37m to sign Ouattara, with £5m in add-ons built into a club-record deal.

If they are activated based on club success, Bournemouth will likely be due a windfall soon from one of their closest rivals for European qualification.

But any clause dependent on individual performance might have to wait; while Ouattara has been good for the Bees, five goals and three assists leaves ample room for development, especially when he might be elevated to the status of a Champions League club’s most expensive ever player by the end of the month.

He also helped kill the Panenka, so there’s that.