Get Instant News Updates
Enable
x
Notification Settings X
Time Settings
Done
Clear Notification X
Do you want to clear all the notifications from your inbox?
Settings X
For Quick Alerts
ALLOW NOTIFICATIONS  
For Daily Alerts

Why Arsenal should turn back to their former target

Arsenal is not particularly well-placed financially and the club is also looking set to miss out on Champions League qualification. The Arsenal squad right now lacks creativity and with the future of Mesut Ozil up in the air.

Why Arsenal should turn back to their former target

Bengaluru, May 28: This will be an incredibly difficult summer transfer window for Mikel Arteta as the Gunners' boss looks to start his first full season as a full-time manager. With the club not particularly well-placed financially and also looking set to miss out on Champions League qualification, it will indeed be a big test for the Spanish manager to make the right transfers to revamp the squad at his disposal.

It is pretty much evident that the squad he inherited from Unai Emery is not particularly top-notch and needs some big additions in order to compete with the likes of Liverpool or Manchester City. The Arsenal squad right now lacks creativity and with the future of Mesut Ozil up in the air, they desperately need a new player who can become their creative lynchpin.

Ozil has anyway become a shadow of his former self and this should make Arteta look for a long-term replacement of the World Cup winner with Germany in 2014. A player they should turn to at the moment is one of their former targets, Thomas Lemar.

The Frenchman has not particularly impressed since he made his big-money move to Atletico Madrid back in the summer of 2018 and Diego Simeone's side could be more than happy to include him in a potential swap deal for Alexander Lacazette who is himself a long-term target of Los Rojiblancos.

Arsenal fans are no strangers to Lemar. Back in August 2017, they were linked with an audacious £92 million bid from the Gunners for the then Monaco star and once again were linked in January 2018 but their attempts ended in failure both times.

With Arsenal not having the financial prowess to conduct deals like Philippe Coutinho or Kai Havertz, Lemar could prove to be a brilliant option for the Gunners. Still only 24, the Frenchman certainly deserves a second chance to prove himself after failing to make much of impression at Wanda Metropolitano.

His poor showings under the tutelage of Simeone can be attributed to the system of the Argentine boss which is not favourable for a player like Lemar. He has also his fair share of struggle with injuries but his problems at the Spanish capital club is much deeper than his struggle for fitness.

In 67 appearances for Atletico Madrid so far, the Frenchman has only found the back of the net thrice while producing just six assists. His figures are really underwhelming when compared to how influential he used to be for Monaco in the final third but that is largely the reason how Simeone has used him.

The Frenchman has never been played to his strengths for the La Liga giants but could certainly revive his career at a club like Arsenal if given the creative freedom he likes to enjoy. In his first season at Atletico, with his compatriot Antoine Griezmann enjoying the freedom to roam the final third in Diego Simeone’s 4-4-2, Lemar was shunted out to the left-wing.

And, in Simeone's system, the wingers need to do a lot of defensive work and that is not Lemar's game. At Monaco under Leonardo Jardim, he was also used on the left flank in a 4-2-2-2 system but there he had the licence to drift inward and link up with the likes of Kylian Mbappe and Radamel Falcao.

Simeone has used such an incredibly gifted creative player in a more typical winger role and that has had a major impact on Lemar's game seeing his stock fall. With Griezmann moving to Barcelona last summer, Lemar's fortunes could have changed if Simeone had opted to relocate the Frenchman to replace his compatriot. But the Argentine manager brought in wonderkid Joao Felix as a direct replacement to his star forward. Lemar's numbers have been even worse this campaign with the 24-year-old yet to produce a single goal or assist so far.

Arsenal and Lemar would be the perfect match for each other and with Lacazette also being a target of Atletico Madrid, the Gunners should use this situation in their favour to bring the Frenchman at the Emirates and transform their attack. It's certainly a risk worth taking for Arteta as the Gunners are definitely not in a place to sanction moves for the likes of Havertz or Coutinho.

Story first published: Thursday, May 28, 2020, 17:19 [IST]
Other articles published on May 28, 2020