The Arsenal

Can't lie wish we signed Kudus instead

Imagine had we landed gundogan instead. Kai is not an arsenal player. I don’t think he is bad but he doesn’t have what the tenacity I like in an arsenal player. He looks like tired post Wenger pre teta player.

I think 2 major questions here regarding this information is were both Real Madrid and Bayern looking at him as a striker / false 9? And regarding havertz being highly rated by those knowledgeable in the football world do they rate him highly as a false 9 and perhaps as a 10? We have been playing him as an 8…I swear he has looked most effective as a false 9 when he started against Man City in the community shield —- nobody cannot deny he has not played effectively at 8 ( otherwise arteta wouldn’t be experimenting with others )…. I think he has looked considerably better when playing in the odegaard role —- but surely he hasn’t got the quality to replace odegaard or jesus? Is he more effective off the bench as a squad player and is it acceptable we have a 65 million signing on the bench? Lots of puzzling questions and different scenarios, but I guess arteta gets paid enough to handle these type of issues!!

this is a perfect timing for Ornstein to release these info. People who used not to believe in Havertz started to soften up after the goal and this podcast probably makes them fully believe in him, for some people hopefully.

Big difference in how public sees Havertz and how the people working in fotball see Havertz. He is highly rated in the fotball world.

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Great post but... I truly don't understand comments like these? How can 'the football world' see things that fans don't see? If a player is a bit wank, they're a bit wank.

I think 2 key points missing from the summary:

1. Havertz’s roles:

• He played as a 10 at Leverkusen
• He was then shifted to a 9 role at Chelsea
• Arteta now wants him in an 8 role

2. Odegaard’s roles:

• He played as a 10
• He had to learn how to play in the 8 role when he joined Arsenal – it took a while for Odegaard to adjust to it

For all the comparisons with Declan Rice: Rice played as a 6 at West Ham and is playing as a 6 now.

Havertz is learning how to play in a whole new role.

It’s also good to see stats that back-up what some of us have been saying about him contributing defensively off-the-ball (while we acknowledged that he’s not made progress offensively).

Our players need to feed him the ball. There’s been a visible distrust from players such as Jorginho and Saka eg. not involving him in build-up/passing to him, Saka running back to receive the ball when Havertz is closer and so it’s no wonder he’s deferred so much to other players especially when he’s had good chances to take a shot while in or next to the box.

Base salary in the region of 275k. This isn't talked enough about

He may be a model professional and I dont doubt he is well regarded in the game.

However, I dont think will win the fans over. That takes performances on the pitch. Not necessarily the flair stuff, but it still takes performances and thats what we havent seen enough from Kai for us. His main contributions that fans notice are missed chances and his impact on our game is that we have become far ore defensive and boring than last season without him.

So what I'm reading is that Havertz has good work ethic, attitude, "off ball movement" and defensive capabilities. Interesting, we bought a player who has excellent work ethic, attitude, "off ball movement" and defensive capabilities in the same window. For base salary of £275k a week and for £65m I would expect more tbh, but I guess if Arteta believes in him he has to be good right?

What we need more from Havertz is progressive passes & passes into the final 3rd which Xhaka regularly used to do.

Havertz crashing the box isn’t a problem, he does that regularly but there have been only 4 crosses aimed at him. We need to send him more especially that chipped cross from Saka and Odegaard.

/u/Dazed_and_Confused44, I'd like to hear your thoughts on these comments.

Listen I'm as big of a havertz apologist as anyone, but those wages for someone who has been so mediocre since they came to the prem is mad

I have faith that he'll come good, but putting up his off the ball stats as a mini justification of that price tag is ridiculous.

If we wanted a player who worked hard off the ball we could have spent a third of the money and got exactly that.

I think the reaction towards Havertz, in parts on here, but particularly anywhere else is crazy over the top. People act like he has been horrible - he has been OK.

And obviously he's highly rated I'm the footballling world. Chelsea and Germany kept starting him, and Bayern, Arsenal and Real Madrid wanted to sign him. But we need more in the final third, much more quality. That he's highly rated within the game, only goes so far, when we're not even starting him half the time.

It will take more than a few months to settle into midfield for him, which many completely fail to acknowledge. Would absolutely love it, if he ended up fitting us like a glove.

Happy that he scored but the timing of this and the actual content screams club propaganda.

Havertz base salary is in the region of 275k per week, almost same as at Chelsea.

This is where my pessimism starts. We're not Chelsea, United or City; our wage structure will determine how flexible we are in the near future in terms of squad building. If Havertz is demanding almost 300k while being in the "unsung hero" category, it will cause issues when extending players who are a lot more impactful more consistently.

275k a week for an advanced ball winner is very interesting. If you look at how many games are decided by chances set up by those kinds of plays, I’d bet it’s substantial in the modern game.