Timber injury will hurt Arsenal more than De Bruyne absence impacts Man City

Editor F365
Arsenal defender Jurrien Timber sits on the turf after sustaining a knee injury.
Jurrien Timber was injured on his Arsenal debut.

An Arsenal fan in the Mailbox needs you to know just how big a blow losing Jurrien Timber really is. Also: Harry Maguire is right to sit tight; Liverpool’s transfer committee; and more…

Get your views in to theeditor@football365.com

Maguire’s right
To all those United fans gnashing their teeth because one of the players the club gave a massive contract to is asking the club to abide by the massive contract they gave him, can I ask a question?

If said player had turned out to be the second coming of France Beckenbauer and Barcelona had come in for him. His dream is to play at the Camp Nou, but their finances just wouldn’t stretch to such a magnificent athlete – would you be happy to let him go for less than his value, so he could go off and achieve his sporting dreams? Or would you demand reasonable compensation, commensurate with his value to offset the loss of such a wonderful player?

If you answer the latter, then how can you ask Mr Maguire to tear up a completely legitimate contract and claim to personal wealth, for the good of the club just because that same club has now decided he isn’t good enough? And if you answer the former then you can’t object to any player leaving for under their perceived value when they turn into a world beater. Rashford to Bayern for £10m – it’s fine, he wants to win the UCL. Martinez to Madrid for £5 and a packet of Chewitts – No worries it’s his dream.

Why should any player show you loyalty when they are performing, if you don’t show them any loyalty when you perceive they aren’t?

In the words of everyone’s mum “you made your bed, now lie in it. And stop touching yourself down there, you’ll go blind.”
Welsh Londoner (Born in Wrexham 42 years ago, before it was cool)

Read more: In defence of Harry Maguire: His Man United dreams may be delusions, but he’s entitled to them

…First and foremost, I’m pretty ticked off the Harry/West Ham deal didn’t work out. It seemed like a good live for everybody involved, except Harry evidently. He said he never agreed to, and some say it was a dispute over his wages.

When a player is sold to another team, they don’t have to cover the remainder of their contract. That shouldn’t have to be said but I guess it did. Harry is on £10M/ year, and one could assume West Ham would have offered £5-6M. That would leave Harry down £8M over two years. Yes, sometimes players need to be paid out of bigger contracts just for them to leave.

United have allegedly offered £6M, which was refused. So potentially, Harry is rolling the dice on 3/4 of Varane, Martinez, Lindelof & Shaw playing terrible and/or being injured for him to have any real chance at starting consistently, to make the England squad next year.

Not going to happen. He’s throwing away his remaking prime years with England and club football to be a substitute who’ll pocket an extra £2-4M. Baffling. But come January, 2 errors in three league cup games and one champions league dead rubber, with no England call ups, and he’ll be requesting a transfer to try salvage his career, and West Ham will be long gone by then.

Now, was Harry truly terrible, inconsistent? I’d have to argue no.

Yes, his past 2&1/2 years haven’t been great, but that was a United skydiving under Ole, and skydiving with bricks under Rangnik, before he was then forced to play a system that highlights his weaknesses, and out of position under 10H (With all that, he did make only two mistakes leading to a goal during his United years oddly enough).

He was also excellent for England when he played during that period. Before United’s terrible run, he was arguably the Mr consistent. He rarely missed games and was often an 7/10 player. Pretty sure he had played the most minutes of any player in Europe one year. His injury before the Europa League final was seen as a travesty and it ultimately was.

People will hate this, but from 2016-2021 in the PL, Harry Maguire was only second to VVD in terms of ratings and consistency.

Will he turn it around at United? Will he F***. Not unless 10H plays an Ole/Southgate style system, with him in his favored position.

Harry should do him and everyone a favor and go, but if he stays, there are far far worse back ups.
Calvino (Must have been something in the drinks in Greece)

 

Edwards over Klopp
Interesting question about Michael Edwards leaving over disagreements of transfer policy, and renewing the contracts of aging stars Henderson and Milner.

Edwards wanted to let them leave, and renew the midfield with Bruno Guimares and Enzo Fernandez.

Surely there can’t be anyone that thinks these wouldn’t have been fantastic purchases. 40 mil for Bruno, 15 (at the time) for Enzo. The cost of one whole Naby Keita and your midfield is set for the next 5 years at least.

“But what about Henderson and Milner’s leadership????” This was in 2022. Liverpool had already won the league, and Europe.

All they won after that was the FA cup and League Cup, and Henderson would’ve still been there to help win those anyway – Edwards didn’t want to sell him, just not renew and let him leave on a free at the start of last season, (which was a shit show he didn’t do much to help out with anyway)

And is anyone seriously saying that Liverpool with the EXACT same team but Milner out and Enzo + Guimares in, doesn’t still win those cups?

Even if it meant Klopp leaving, in 2022 Liverpool were on top of the world and could’ve taken their choice of manager. Surely Poch or even Tuchel once he was sacked would’ve jumped at the idea.

So basically, Klopp + 1 extra season of Hendo + the 15 mil from selling him now + midfield sh*tshow, VERSUS Edwards + Tuchel + 2 of the best midfielders in the world bought for approx 1/2 a Caicedo.
Josh, Sydney

 

…I’m not a fan of a premier league team so have no dog in the fight.. but if what I read on the earlier article about the history of Liverpool transfers is correct, then
it sounds like Mr Klopp should be kept well away from their transfer dealings.

Does anyone think they would have won the league with Gotze instead of Sane and Brandt or Pulisic instead of Salah.

I think if Liverpool have gone wrong on recruitment terms recently it’s keeping Klopp instead of their transfer team.

Ta,
Dave PVFC

 

Fallen Timber
Revised predictions. Sort of…

As an Arsenal fan, Timber has been the signing of the summer. Except, that’s now “was” the signing of the summer. As messianic as KDB is for City, Timber being out for the season is a huge gut punch for gooners. I’d already predicted Arsenal would finish 2nd or 3rd (because of less rotation due to the Champion’s League), but, now I think that’s confirmed. KDB will be back by new year, and City will sign Paquetá. They’ll be fine. I think Arsenal will still be competitive this season. In fact, I think the only teams that can eliminate Arsenal from the Champion’s League are City, Real, or Napoli. Feel free to laugh, but, I think Arsenal will get to the quarters or the semis. But, we’ll likely end the season empty-handed. No shame in that, necessarily. I’m just trying to get across how significant Timber “going down…” is for us.
Simon, Norf London Gooner
P.S. I normally complain about 90’s footballers as TV co-commentators. But, can we take a moment to appreciate how entertaining Ally McCoist is?

 

Reece in pieces
Just a quick word on Reece James. He’s comfortably the most talented of all the recent cobham alumni and probably the best player we’ve had at Chelsea since Eden Hazard was slaloming his way through defences.

His Achilles heel is, well.. What a shame to see that he’s facing another lengthy spell on the sidelines due to injury. I can only hope Malo Gusto lives up to the hype and proves a worthy stand-in.

Feeling positive about this season nonetheless, get well soon RJ.
JT, not 26.

Chelsea captain Reece James after a friendly match.

No fear of Saudi power
A reply to Jon, Cape Town and others about the so-called threat posed by the Saudi pro-League. Now I should state clearly from the outset that, when it comes to business, never mind complicated international finance, I couldn’t find my arse with my own hands. Even so, I don’t ‘get’ where this threat is coming from. We all know that there are those on here who, on the other hand, are eminently qualified to comment on such matters and I hope they can write in and put me straight.
In essence, my TLDR point from the start is this. How is the Saudis buying Neymar, Ronaldo, Benzema, and Kante etc, any different to what the Yanks tried to do back in the day when they bought the likes of Rodney Marsh, Pele, and George Best? More importantly, why does anybody think the outcome will be any different to what happened in America or, much more recently, China? That is to say nowhere near the financial success/sportswashing they had hoped would follow. Quite the reverse.
I suggest that it doesn’t matter how many elite players they (the Saudis) sign. Because, and despite what SM follows/likes and consequent shirt sales would suggest, we don’t follow the players. We follow ‘our’ team. Not to say we don’t take a keen interest in those that used to play for us, but that is very far from me, for instance, now wanting to follow Barcelona because they bought Gundogan from City.
So, regardless of how many top players from around the world they enlist, what is the ‘hook’ that is going to mean that we all want to watch the Saudi pro-league rather than, for example, the PL?
I’ve read about the theory that the Saudis will, by fair means or foul, get themselves included in the CL. So what? Let’s take that further and assuming they are admitted, all the non-Saudi players bought in the last ten months (or even the next 12) are, shockingly, suddenly all bought by the Saudi equivalent of Fulchester Rovers and Lo! You now have a Saudi super team of super talent. Oh, and they pay Pep 427 Squillion quid a week to manage said team.
Again. So what?
There are, I would respectfully suggest, two outcomes. The first being that Fulchester Rovers smashes every game they play in. Who will be tuning in/paying to watch the football equivalent of the Globetrotters? The second is that Fulchester Rovers end up playing a tiny number of competitive games each season and everybody else delights in kicking their billionaire arses both on the pitch, and literally, every chance they get.
What am I missing? Is my tin-foil hat not twisted on tight enough perhaps? Am I grossly underestimating the greed of western football leagues that could be ‘persuaded’ to ‘inject’ a completely new Saudi team into their country’s top league in 2024 or 2025?
Help me out.
Mark (Oh, and Chelsea are properly f*cked and will be ‘doing a Leeds’ within the next five years. Will be very happy to be proven wrong given that The Boss supports ‘em). MCFC

 

Zero consequences
As Chelsea continue to flout whatever rules are in place for FFP with 8 year contracts, watching Man City use their infinite wealth to delay any repercussions from their 115 breaches, I am beginning to realise that UEFA, the FA, FIFA et al have no appetite, or even want to stop this kind of reckless spending and cheating. The huge numbers bandied about infers prestige to them, and makes their power even more apparent. They rule over these oligarchs in a way. And they’re not gonna bite the hand that feeds them.

Imagine that, the custodians of our game, don’t care if clubs break the rules. They turn a blind eye to any infraction, and so don’t be surprised if petro-states buy up the remaining big clubs and then force a Global Super League because they have a sword of damacles hanging over the governing bodies.

Sorry to be fatalist, but I just kind feel like a bell is being rung that can’t be unrung
John Matrix AFC

 

Where are the mavericks?
Garey Vance, I share your frustration. And I am willing to bet a decent sum of money that the reason that players shoot early in one-on-ones is that they are coached to do exactly that. Because somebody crunched the numbers and discovered that, statically, it’s the most likely way of scoring. Less variables than rounding the keeper. Less margin for error than the chip. Or something along
those lines.

I won’t get bogged down with the question of whether this is a good thing or not. In fairness, the Cantona chip you referenced is memorable for it’s rarity and the fact that few players could pull it off the way Eric did. The only player I can think of recently who regularly chipped the keeper in those situations was Messi. But he was an alien who could chip the keeper in a one-on-one in a phone box.

That said, I think I enjoyed football when it was bit more…. Instinctive? Stats have had a lot of positive impacts on the game but it has cost us some magic. Look at Villa Grealish vs City Grealish. He is probably a better player who makes better decisions now. But I feel like he was a more memorable player for Villa. But he’s a treble winner so you can’t really ignore that.
Kev, Dublin (bring back the Mavericks and mercurial players)