Pre-season round-up: Azeezy does it as Gunners beat Watford

Morning all.

There was more behind closed doors action yesterday with a 4-1 win over Watford. The goals came from Eddie Nketiah, Alexandre Lacazette, Kieran Tierney, and Miguel Azeez. The young midfielder’s curling strike was the pick of the bunch and it’s nice to see him make a little bit of an impact during pre-season.

.@MiguelAzeez makes it 4-1 to Arsenal. What a hit! pic.twitter.com/zSD9BCakGP

— TheAFCnewsroom (@TheAFCnewsroom) July 28, 2021

It’ll be interesting to see what happens with him this season. Everyone is clamouring – and rightly so – for a stellar midfield signing, but at the same time, there’d be a cohort who would advocate for the 18 year old to be given minutes ahead of someone like Mohamed Elneny, for example, who was caught on the ball for the Watford goal yesterday. I can see that point of view, but I suspect a loan move might well be the right thing for him at this stage of his development.

There’s a similar kind of situation with Folarin Balogun. It’s easy to get invested in the idea of a young striker making his breakthrough, scoring goals, adding something to an attack that needs more depth, and a team that needs more goals. If you step back and look at it objectively though, he’s never played a single minute of Premier League football and the most sensible way of ensuring he gets plenty of playing time next season (and not just occasional cameos off the bench), is to send him out on loan. He’s at a point where he needs to play, and with Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, Alexandre Lacazette and Eddie Nketiah all still at the club, the pathway isn’t sufficiently clear for a young player who can only now make progress through first team football – and plenty of it. We might shift a couple of those strikers before the end of the window, clearing the decks a bit, but even then it’s a lot to ask of a young player of such limited experience.

Anyway, if you’re looking for encouragement, that’s eight goals in the two behind closed doors games, and there was a bit of Kieran Tierney pushing and shoving at one point. Look how quick Mikel Arteta is to get on and protect his boy! Last week he spoke about the former Celtic man and said he:

… transmits every value that I would like to transmit to the club and our fans.

That character, I think it shows on the pitch – when anything happens that is not going for us, you don’t give up, you just raise your level, try to be better and transmit that to the rest of the team so they all believe.

To be completely transparent, he was also talking about Emile Smith Rowe and Gabriel Martinelli in this context too, as players who can do something special and lift the crowd, but if it was the schoolyard and Arteta was one of the captains picking the team, he’d pick Tierney first, no doubt about it.

Next up in pre-season, Sunday’s home game against Chelsea, which I think is our first real chance to judge where we are. I have to say, I really, really dislike this game and the one against Sp*rs. I just think facing two teams in pre-season that you’re playing in the opening six games of the Premier League campaign isn’t a good idea. I can’t even fully explain why I think this, and I know the fixtures themselves will be a decent test, but Community Shield aside, I think we should avoid games against other Premier League opposition if at all possible.

I know that the current Covid-impacted world we live in has probably played a part in this, and it’s sensible to avoid unnecessary travel and so on, but I still don’t like it. I guess it’s probably the fact that if we win everyone will say ‘It means nothing, it’s just a friendly’, whereas if we get beaten it’ll be the end of the goddam world. Nobody really cares if you lose to Lyon, or something.

Meanwhile, on the transfer front it looks as if Ben White is basically done and dusted after he was at London Colney to do his medical and sort out the final details of his near £50m move from Brighton:

Ben White leaving London Colney after his Arsenal medical today #arsenal #benwhite #transfer #medical pic.twitter.com/eQVuFf7ZDh

— Harry (@HAZZER14) July 28, 2021

I have to say, I’m encouraged. Not many players would rock up to Arsenal for a meeting of that importance in an Asda van. It just shows how down to earth this young man is. Whether it starts a war between himself and Tesco loving Tierney remains to be seen, but sometimes that competitive energy on the training ground can be a real positive.

Look, this one has been in the post for some time, and it looks as if it’ll all be officially announced imminently. As and when that happens, we’ll have plenty to talk about, lots of Ben White profile/data stuff lined up for you, and he would become basically our first ‘first team’ signing. It’s not that Lokonga and Tavares aren’t that, but right now they’re more back-up than guys who are being brought in to start straight away. Ben White is arriving as a key piece of Mikel Arteta’s plan for next season.

Ok, let’s leave it there for today. We’ll have any breaking news over on Arseblog News during the day, more from me tomorrow including a brand new Arsecast. Until then, take it easy.

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