The 25 man squad updated, and the game against Boreham Wood

Posted on by Tony Attwood

By Bulldog Drummond

By my reckoning, and I am often wrong with this sort of thing, Arsenal have room for two more players in their 25 man squad next season.  And if the story about Joe Willock going to Newcastle today to sign another deal with them, we have three places.

Here is the squad as I make it out to be…

  1. Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang
  2. Willian
  3. Gabriel Magalhaes
  4. Mohamed Elneny
  5. Sead Kolasinac
  6. Alexandre Lacazette
  7. Bernd Leno GK
  8. Alex Runarsson GK
  9. Pablo Mari
  10. Thomas Partey
  11. Nicolas Pepe
  12. Kieran Tierney
  13. Granit Xhaka
  14. Nuno Tavares
  15. Albert Sambi Lokonga
  16. Hector Bellerin (HG)
  17. Calum Chambers (HG)
  18. Rob Holding (HG)
  19. Ainsley Maitland-Niles (HG)
  20. Joe Willock (HG) (although today’s report is that he is signing for Newcastle)
  21. Eddie Nketiah (HG)
  22. Reiss Nelson (HG)
  23. Ben White (HG)

As that list shows we have eight home grown players who have to be included in the main squad, so there is no pressure there now.  Even if Joe has gone north today, we still have our full compliment at the moment.

Which means if Joe has gone we can now sign up to three more players without asking to see details of where they lived while training.

Fortunately not everyone in our under 21 list has moved up to over 21 although if I have got my sums right this group could be on the move up in a year’s time.

  • Bukayo Saka
  • Emile Smith Rowe
  • Gabriel Martinelli
  • Folarin Balogun

but as ever with this attempted calculation I stand ready to be corrected.  (I have no idea why I always find calculating dates so difficulty – it must be a genetic problem on my part.

But of course, we have been told all the way through this pre-season that we are going to be signing six major players who will come straight into the first team, and that means we still have three more to go.

I’ve already discounted some players such as Luca Torreira who spent last season with Atletico Madrid as I can’t see him returning.  Although I noted that Football365 have run the headline “Hopefully Torreira will outlast ‘dull’ Arteta at Arsenal”

I think we also have the Africa Cup of Nations this season from 9 January to 6 February 2022.  Again I am not sure which team is going through and again you can help me perhaps, but I guess we will lose Mohamed Elneny and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.   Perhaps you can help me with any others who might have African nationality that I haven’t noticed.

The next game

Boreham Wood v Arsenal XI
Either Friday 6th August or Saturday 7th August 2021, 7.30pm, depending on which website you read
Meadow Park, Pre-Season Friendly

Boreham Wood came 14th in the National League last season (but I see they are calling it the National Premier League now, so maybe the name has changed.  I’m still seeing it called the Vanarama as well.

  GP W D L GF GA GD Pts
1 Sutton Utd 42 25 9 8 72 36 +36 84
2 Torquay Utd 42 23 11 8 68 39 +29 80
3 Stockport 42 21 14 7 69 32 +37 77
4 Hartlepool 42 22 10 10 66 43 +23 76
5 Notts County 42 20 10 12 62 41 +21 70
6 Chesterfield 42 21 6 15 60 43 +17 69
7 Bromley 42 19 12 11 63 53 +10 69
8 Wrexham 42 19 11 12 64 43 +21 68
9 Eastleigh 42 18 12 12 49 40 +9 66
10 Halifax Town 42 19 8 15 63 54 +9 65
11 Solihull Moors 42 19 7 16 58 48 +10 64
12 Dagenham & R 42 17 9 16 53 48 +5 60
13 Maidenhead U 42 15 11 16 62 60 +2 56
14 Boreham Wood 42 13 16 13 52 48 +4 55

Folarin Balogun should be playing.  He’s played a couple of under 21 games so far and scored one goal.  Martin Keown has compared Balogun to Ian Wright, due to his speed and intelligent movement.

In all he played 19 times for the under 18s last season

Pos Team P W D L GF GA +/- Pts
1
Fulham U18
 24 18 2 4 78 25 53 56
2
Crystal Palace FC Under 18
 24 18 2 4 67 32 35 56
3
Brighton & Hove Albion U18
 24 14 3 7 63 40 23 45
4
Arsenal
 24 12 4 8 52 45 7 40

He is reputed to have scored 25 goals last season, although since some of the information I have picked up on him does not seem to be true, I’m starting to lose faith in some of the stats that are being bandied around.

It appears he gained a profession contract in February 2019 and we know he popped up in a couple of Europa games last season.   Tickets are available for the game.

TO BUY YOUR MATCH TICKET – CLICK HERE

Boreham Wood are also stating that “We will also be streaming the game on our BWFCtv Match Pass, for both home and away fans for just £7.99 which will include a pre-match show, a digital programme and the stream of the game. 

TO BUY YOUR MATCH PASS – CLICK HERE

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5 Replies to “The 25 man squad updated, and the game against Boreham Wood”

  3. BW 4 AFCU23 0 – i couldn’t watch, but jeorge bird, who did watch, doesn’t sound that worried about the performance, and i, for one, trust jeorge’s assessments of our youngsters completely
    cloud, silver lining and all sorts of things, then …

  4. I would want to know if Arsenal will sign the now a free agent Lionel Messi 34 this summer reansfer window? Or they are not interested to sign the world class Messi?

    Arsenal should for the love of angel Michael seize this golden opportunity to sign Lionel Messi on the free this summer that is flying before their face. But they shouldn’t allow the opportunity to fly past them to thus miss out on signing him.

    With Man City ruling themselves out of signing Messi this summer after they have splashed the cash heavily on signing Jack Greanlish this summer. And are looking they could splash the cash again this time more heavier on Harry Kane. And I think Chelsea, Liverpool, Man Utd and Tottenham Hs are looking not positioned to bid for Messi signing this summer. And I think the chance to sign Lionel Messi this summer by Arsenal can’t be brighter than it’s has ever been bright.

    Therefore, Arsenal should with immediate effect open negotiations with Messi and his agent who I think is his father making it known to them they want him-Messi to star for the Gunners next season in all competitions.

    Should Arsenal sign Messi this summer who has the capacity in himself to guarantee scoring not less than 30 PL goals or more for Arsenal next season?.

    And also Arsenal can go ahead to sign James Maddison this summer too but if they want to sign him and have the required financial muscle to sign both Messi and Maddison this summer. But Messi’s signing will be on the free. No transfer fee will be required from Arsenal to pay his erstwhile club side Barcelona for his transferring to us. For, only his personal terms will be negotiated and agreed with him to join us. Yes, Arsenal have the financial muscle to sign both Messi and Greanlish this summer window.

    But if Arsenal sell the English Premium player Joe Willock for only £25m to Newcastle this summer likely to help fund James Maddison transferring to Arsenal this summer is too cheap a transfer fee. Newcastle will feel it’s a steal they’ve done.

  5. Samuel

    Any thoughts you might have about signing Messi I suggest you consign to the bin. It just ain’t going to happen. Had you qualified for the CL then maybe but as we know that wasn’t the case

    Ok he is unlikely to be getting the sort of money he was on at Barca but he will still be wanting around £20 million per season and at his age almost certainly be going to a club that has the extra £70-100 million that playing in the CL brings

    I doubt he will be coming to an English but I wouldn’t dismiss it 100%. With no transfer fee to factor in then £20 million pa for a marketing gold mine or say £60 million over three years isn’t that unrealistic particularly if you can say to your shirt sponsors that sales of replica shirts would increase by virtue of the association with the name Messi.

    Joe Willock is an interesting one but irrespective of the player the suggestion is that Newcastle have at most a £10 million budget and that initially it was thought that Willock would return to Newcastle but on a 12 month loan but that all changed when the Xhaka deal didn’t happen as Arsenal are now looking to get some money in from sales.

    I hope you do sell him because if he leaves you that will weaken you in the long term. There is a decent player in there.

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