Arsenal currently have 27 players to fit into the 25 list. Who should we lose?

by Tony Attwood

The purchases

So, as we know, we have purchased four players.  A number of others are being discussed, but for the moment let us work with these four…

  1. Willian: Winger — from Chelsea, free
  2. Pablo Marí: Defender — from Flamengo, £14m
  3. Cédric Soares, Defender — from Southampton; free
  4. Gabriel Magalhães; Defender — from Lille £27m

All four have foreign status, meaning that they cannot be counted in our home grown list – which we shall come to in just a moment.

Who have we got

Keepers

  1. Bernd Leno
  2. Emiliano Martinez (home grown)
  3. Matt Macey (home grown)

Backs

  1. William Saliba
  2. Shkodran Mustafi
  3. Calum Chambers (home grown)
  4. Rob Holding (home grown)
  5. Sokratis
  6. David Luiz
  7. Kieran Tierney
  8. Hector Bellerin (home grown)
  9. Sead Kolasinac

Midfield

  1. Ainsley Maitland-Niles (home grown)
  2. Lucas Torreira
  3. Granit Xhaka
  4. Mohamed Elney
  5. Matteo Guendouzi
  6. Joe Willock (home grown)
  7. Mesut Ozil

Forwards

  1. Bukayo Saka (under 21)
  2. Gabriel Martinelli (under 21)
  3. Nicolas Pepe
  4. Reiss Nelson (under 21)
  5. Pierre Emerick Aubameyang
  6. Alex Lacazette
  7. Eddie Nketiah (home grown)

Other under 21s can of course be added to the squad at any time.

Just to clarify the position of Tierney, who is of course a citizen of the UK, sadly in the strange world of the FA that counts for nought – he is a foreigner, in footballing terms, as I understand the rules.  He needs to have spent three years at an English or Welsh academy before being 21.   Indeed even being born and bred in England doesn’t help a player if he has not had those three years being trained by an English or Welsh team.  And I don’t think he did.

Indeed you might recall the ludicrous case of Cohen Bramall.  He is English from head to toe, no doubt about it, but because he was not registered with a league club before the age of 21 he counted as not home grown.   Want an insane policy drawn up?  Ask the FA.

So back to the numbers…

That is a total of 30.  Take away the three under 21s, and we are down to 27.  The rule is a maximum of 25 over 21s, of whom only 17 can be non-home grown players.

Working with those 27 players for a moment we have eight home growns and 19 “non-home-grown” players.  So we need to remove two non-home grown players.  Who are they going to be?

One looks like being Matteo Guendouzi which is a great shame in my view.  But he has apparently fallen out with either the manager or his senior team colleagues so it is one.   That leaves one to go.

There has been a lot of talk about getting rid of Chambers and/or Holding, but that doesn’t help with the accounting total, because as noted above we need to lose non-home grown players before we even start thinking about the home-growns.  Chambers and Holding are HGs.  We might indeed let either or both go, but that won’t help balance the books in the strange fantasy world of the FA.

Thus we still have one non-HG gone and we need to lose one more.  Who else?

The obvious answer is Ozil, who having not played much is another possibility.  Of course he might refuse to go, but then Arsenal could simply fail to register him as one of the 25.  Would the club go that far?  Would the player simply sit it out?

Of course we can’t say, but if Mr Arteta really sees him as being of no use then Arsenal could do a deal with another club which involves one year of Arsenal paying part of Ozil’s salary and thus taking him off the books.

The alternative for our other foreign player to lose, could be Sokratis or maybe Torreira

But the main point is that simply listing more and more players (especially non-HG players) to bring in, is a fantasy, if we cannot move on those who are already at the club.  And of course moving a player on is not just a case of “getting rid of”.  A player might not be registered in the “25” but he still has to be paid.  A loan, as suggested above for Ozil, is a better way.

And finally a little note from the Guardian, whom I recently chastised for giving Arsenal a prediction of 6th place in the coming season.  Now, at the foot of the article in question this note has appeared…

“This article was amended on 1 September 2020. Owing to a calculation error an earlier version said the Guardian writers’ predicted position was 6th; in fact it was 5th.”

Pesky business adding up all these numbers and dividing the result to get an average.

10 Replies to “Arsenal currently have 27 players to fit into the 25 list. Who should we lose?”

  1. As well as Torreira and Sokratis there is a lot of speculation on Sead Kolasinac wanting a return to Germany doing the rounds at the moment.

  2. This is my list

    Keepers:
    Bernd Leno – No1 PL fixtures
    Emiliano Martinez (home grown) – No1 all cup fixtures
    Matt Macey (home grown)

    Backs:
    William Saliba
    Shkodran Mustafi
    Calum Chambers (home grown)
    Rob Holding (home grown) – loan/sell
    Sokratis – sell
    David Luiz
    Kieran Tierney
    Hector Bellerin (home grown) – KEEP
    Sead Kolasinac – sell

    Midfield:
    Ainsley Maitland-Niles (home grown) – KEEP
    Lucas Torreira – loan/sell
    Granit Xhaka
    Mohamed Elney – sell
    Matteo Guendouzi – Keep but only if he reforms a little
    Joe Willock (home grown)
    Mezil Ozil – loan/sell do whatever we can
    Emile Smith-Rowe
    Thomas Partey – BUY
    Houssem Aouar – BUY

    Forwards:
    Bukayo Saka (under 21)
    Gabriel Martinelli (under 21)
    Nicolas Pepe
    Reiss Nelson (under 21)
    Pierre Emerick Aubameyang
    Alex Lacazette
    Eddie Nketiah (home grown)

  3. I am afraid you got your numbers wrong. Guendozi and Saliba are both counted as under 21 for at least another season.

    However you have left off 2 homegrown players in Sheaf and Iliev who are not counted as under 21 anymore. Indeed Iliev is 25!!

  4. I think we need to add Willian, Gabriel and Seballos to that list. Hopefully we can sign Partey and Aouar, so tjat´s 2 more.

    So, we need to get rid of at least 7 palyers in one way or another. Plus we need 100 mils to pay for Partey and Aouar.

    Sell:

    Laca (30 mils)
    Bellerin (30 mils)
    Torreira (20 mils)
    Mustafi or Holding or Chambers (10 mils)
    Kola (5 mils)
    Sokratis (3,5 mils)
    Elneny (4 mils)

    That´s 7 palyers gone already. On top of that, get rid of Özil ( I really don´t care how…)

  5. This is my first team for the 2020/21 season:

    KEEPERS:

    Leno
    Martinez

    BACKS:

    Luiz
    Mari
    Gabriel
    Saliba
    Holding
    Chambers
    Tierney
    AMN
    Soares

    MIDFIELD:

    Xhaka
    Partey
    Ceballos
    Guendouzi
    Aouar
    Smith-Rowe
    Willock
    Willian

    FORWARDS:

    Saka
    Martinelli
    Auba
    Nketiah
    Pepe
    Nelson

  6. Saliba is U21 so he doesn’t count against the roster limit. But you left out Ceballos, which brings the total of over 21 non home grown players to 19., so two have to be offloaded before Arsenal submit their roster at the end of the transfer window. At the moment, Sokratis and Torreira appear to be on their way out. Which would bring the non homegrown players down to 17, but if they want to add Partey or Aouar, they need to offload additional foreign players.

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