Gary Neville has questioned why Arsenal left it so late to sign a midfielder in the summer transfer window, with the Gunners making a late push to bring Douglas Luiz to the Emirates Stadium.
Speaking on the Overlap, the Sky Sports pundit was bemused by Arsenal’s stance on signing a midfielder in the final month of the window, with Mikel Arteta having a reported three bids rejected by Aston Villa for the Brazilian, the last of which was believed to be around £25m.
Arsenal signed Fabio Vieira earlier in the window but the north London side looked set to bring in another midfielder in the summer, with Youri Tielemans reportedly on the Gunners’ radar as well as Palmeiras youngster Danilo, though just like Luiz, no move ever materialised.
With Mohamed Elneny now set for a long spell out on the injury table, the decision to not sign a midfielder could backfire massively for Arsenal should problems start to arise in the position, with Albert Sambi Lokonga having mixed performances against Villa and Manchester United since coming into the starting XI.
Indeed, with Thomas Partey returning soon, there’s a chance that Arsenal might get away with not signing a midfielder, but for Neville, he was confused why the Gunners never managed to complete a late deal to bring in a player who could have helped with the current injury problems for the north London side.
Neville said: “We asked Mikel Arteta on the first game of the season, Friday Night Football against Palace and we said to him ‘are you going to do any more business?’ He said ‘yeah’ and we said ‘what area’ and he said ‘midfield’. Why did they wait until deadline day when they bid for Luiz? Why did they wait that three or four weeks?”
Gary Neville right to criticise Arsenal for no midfield signing
Signing a midfielder might not be the end of the world for Arsenal, but with Elneny out injured and Partey’s fitness record patchy at best, not bringing in a quality replacement for the pair could prove to be a huge oversight for the north London side, especially given what happened last season in January.
As we know, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang left Arsenal with Arteta failing to sign a replacement striker, and the lack of goals arguably resulted in the Gunners missing out on top-four, and a similar outcome could befall the Premier League table-toppers in the months to come.
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