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Arsenal’s transfer business may have come to a very definitive hiatus with the arrival of COVID-19, but the Gunners squad is still plagued by players who know that they have a long way to go to ensure a long-term place in the plans. Mikel Arteta.
For example, prior to the coronavirus pandemic, there were certainly questions to be answered about the future of almost every member of the Gunners’ midfield. Arsenal would like to add a new midfielder to their squad, Dani Ceballos will need to be replaced when he returns to Real Madrid, and is said to be considering whether to move on some of the players already in London Colney.
That may still change in a market where Arsenal, like other clubs, does not expect a surge of activity or big business. The fees that Lucas Torreira and Granit Xhaka could ever have paid are out of reach for all but a select few clubs.
Similarly, Arsenal remains open to any party that is willing to make a deal for Mesut Ozil. The simple reality remains that the World Cup winner has continually insisted that he will see his contract, which runs until the summer of 2021. There are very few clubs in the world that can change their minds, maybe none, and they don’t. They are in need of a 31 year old game maker.
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However, there are at least four players whose future is up in the air in the final weeks of the campaign, provided they can take place.
Sokratis Papastathopoulos
The Greece center-back, like Ozil, doesn’t have a contract in the summer of 2021, but it may not last as long after he indicated in March that he wouldn’t stay if that meant being on the sidelines for Arsenal.
“I have one more year here, but I never sit on my contract,” he said after a victory over Portsmouth, where he was asked to complete on the right-back.
“I don’t care. If I’m not happy, I don’t play enough or the coach doesn’t like me, I don’t care about the contract.”
“For me, money is not important, it is important, I feel good, I feel happy and the team is happy with me. If not, I take the road and finish.”
The reality is that if he wants a regular starting role, there probably isn’t one for him at Arsenal. Before the pandemic David Luiz, Pablo Mari and Shkodran Mustafi sat in front of Sokratis in the hierarchical order: next season will bring William Saliba to the Emirates at least.
Sokratis has previously expressed an interest in going to China and the United States after his time at Arsenal ends, and they both have clubs that could match their salary expectations and at the same time give it a slightly more comfortable ending to an excellent career.
Shkodran Mustafi
Arsenal certainly have numbers in central defense, the question is if they have quality. Mustafi is central to that; For all that it has enjoyed a renaissance under Arteta, a series of good performances can only do so much to eradicate several years in which it did not live up to expectations.
During all that time, Arsenal tried to sell it to no avail, but they will hope that its rise will bring suitors for a player who is still only 28 years old and who could, in the right environment, rediscover the way a place in Germany earned him. Winning team of the 2014 World Cup.
(Image: David Price / Arsenal FC photo via Getty Images)
Sead Kolasinac
Kolasinac is one of Arsenal’s top winners after signing a £ 100,000 per week deal when he joined Schalke on a free transfer in the summer of 2017. At the time Arsene Wenger seemed to be gravitating towards a third party where the Bosnian international, a natural side wing, seemed a cunning presence on the left flank.
In that position, Kolasinac has enjoyed some success for the Gunners, the problem is that Arteta prefers a lap four in which the 26-year-old has not always impressed. There have certainly been moments, notably his swashbuckling performance after surprisingly brushing off an injury to come up against Manchester United in January, but not consistently.
Arsenal’s plans for the left-back position became apparent when they opened talks with Paris Saint-Germain about a deal for Layvin Kurzawa, without a contract this summer, in January. Kieran Tierney’s troubled injury history doesn’t change the fact that Arteta considers him a valuable cog in the long run, but it makes it even more important that he can have faith in his backup left-back.
Already in the beginning of Unai Emery’s tenure, Arsenal was pondering whether to go ahead with Kolasinac. He did enough in the 2018/19 season to earn the club’s trust that season – there’s a chance he could do it again in the race, but with two seasons left before his contract expires, now is the time to Raul Sanllehi, Edu and Arteta decide whether to offer him a new deal or to follow it.
Ainsley Maitland-Niles
Maitland-Niles’ future should not be seen as set in stone, but his attitude problems before the COVID-19 outbreak mean he has a lot of work to do to convince Arteta of his long-term worth.
football.london He understands that Maitland-Niles was late for training on more than one occasion, causing Arteta to throw the young man out of his squad. That doesn’t necessarily mean the end of the 22-year-old’s time in North London; like Dani Ceballos and Matteo Guendouzi can attest that the Arsenal coach is not holding a grudge.
The difference from Maitland-Niles is that there are obvious roles for Ceballos and Guendouzi.
For Maitland-Niles? Third option, right back or sixth in the hierarchical order of the midfield. His chances at Arsenal may be limited, but in a typical summer, a young and versatile English prospect would generate a healthy return for the Gunners, just as Alex Iwobi did before the start of the season.
That is unlikely to be the case, but Maitland-Niles could demonstrate that it is worth more to Arsenal through the funds its sale could generate than its exploits on the field.
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