Arsenal were runaway winners against Fulham in the opening fixture of this season’s Premier League campaign, with Mohamed Elneny thoroughly impressing.
I have personally been a fan of the Egyptian’ previously claiming he wasn’t given a fair shot in his previous stints with the club, and am not surprised at all by his performance.
Elneny has always done the job asked of him, and was overused in an unfavoured centre-back role also, but his best job is always done in the centre of the field.
Elneny’s calm attitude in front of the defence can be a strong force, and while he isn’t one to soak up the praise due to his role, he is one who I have always seen as consistent.
Under Mikel Arteta, I only expect him to progress, and with a consistent role in the team we could finally get the best out of our signing of 2016.
Arsenal are still in need of midfield additions despite the resurgence of Mo, and much of the talk has been that Thomas Partey is our priority, but with Elneny an option for our side, I can’t help but believe that Houssem Aouar has to come first.
The Lyon star is known to be a highly creative ingredient that our team is currently lacking.
Last season, not a single Arsenal central midfielder scored more than one Premier League goal, nor could one boast more than two assists for the entire 38-match campaign, and Elneny is another who will not be bringing much on that front either.
Partey a player who can help out at both ends of the pitch, with 16 goals and seven assists in his 160 La Liga outings thus far, but surely our team is screaming out for someone who is going to be more attack-minded to thrust us forward.
Aouar is expected to cost slightly more than Partey, with Romano claiming he could cost around €10 Million more.
Atlético are still convinced to refuse any negotiation for Thomas [€50m release clause]. OL have turned down swap deals for Aouar and are still pretending €60m as price tag. Top targets, complicated deals. #AFC now need to sell players – also after extending Auba’s contract. 🛑
— Fabrizio Romano (@FabrizioRomano) September 13, 2020
Am I alone in believing that Arsenal needs to add more creativity in the middle, and not another defensive-minded midfielder?
Patrick
How quickly we forget!
Elneny had a good game on a bright Saturday in September by the Thames.; against Fulham.
We were not playing Burnley away in December in the wind and rain (or snow).
When you write these articles please try to add some realism!!!
We need to buy a Partey first, before we try to buy the man of the seven vowels.
Hey don’t you think Elneny played an “away game in December” against northern teams in his many years with us before going to Turkey?
I think you need a more discerning argument…
Eleney was deemed not talented enough just last year, (and in his prime years) to be apart of a premier league side and loaned to Turkey. No disrespect to the Turkish league, but I doubt Mo “figured it out,” over there. If he stays he should only be used in a deep, deep bench role making appearances in low cup ties and against championship promotion sides. If he plays any kind of major role in our midfield, arsenal will miss out on top 6.
Seven vowels 😂😂…… I do agree with you though, Partey should be higher up our priority list….. I would have loved us to keep Torreira, to pair with him against teams like City (that can pressure us relentlessly). But if we have to sell him to fund Partey, then so be it.
Sure we need Partey more then any other players
ok we need Aouar coz Ozil will leave next season.
I just do not agree that Elneny is good enough for us. Not remotely , despite his solid game yesterday against, a let’s be honest, woeful Fulham side that look certs to go down this season.
TO ME HE IS A BITS AND PIECES PLAYER AT VERY BEST AND NOWHERE NEAR THE QUALITY WE WILL NEED, TO MAKE A NECESSARY AND SERIOUS IMPROVEMENT IN THE TABLE.
IMO, HE IS MERELY A STOP GAP MADE TO LOOK BETTER, AS ARE ALL OUR PLAYERS, BY THIS MAGNIFICENT MANAGER.
He had a pretty decent game as well against the EPL champions a few weeks ago in the CS. Just saying.
True. Who knows what he can achieve under a man with a plan, someone who can correctly utilise his talents?
Doesn’t mean much. Cant get carried away over one game. How many times have we fans done that and then the player is average? We know Elneny’s quality and we know he is an average player. Two matches changes nothing. Partey and Aouar are leagues ahead in terms of quality. If you want to compete with the best, you dont have Elneny in your XI for a whole season. We need to be serious here.
Agree Jon, he is what he is. We have ambitions to improve from last year Elnenny is not good enough to take us to lofty heights that we dream of, thats obvious. Lovely man and a great attitude but lacks the class required.
Partey should come first because of his all around game; scoring, defending, creating, and the steel he adds in midfield.
Didn’t the last decade show how important it is to have steel in the midfield? A decade of bringing in CAM’s hasn’t help us progress
Durand, I couldn’t say it better. People need to re evaluate their opinions once Arsenal faces a team with a decent strong midfield. Like you, for too many seasons I have seen Arsenal bullied in the centre of the park with and without the ball. A balanced midfield is required to compete at the top level in the EPL, which Arsenal hasn’t really had since the days of Gilberto Silva and Patrick Viera. It is not coincidental, that when they were in midfield, this is the last time Arsenal won the League.
Well said
Well, you’re entitled to your opinion but if you think a one-dimensional player who’s admittedly had good performances against two mediocre teams is the basis for your submission, then…
Indeed, the ideal scenario would be to have both, if we sincerely want to crack the top four places given the level of strength of our competitors, but if reality dictates that we choose one, then Partey would be the more sensible in my opinion.
The combination of dynamism, steel and presence as well as his ability to chip in with the odd goals here and there, will be more crucial to our progression. Solidifying the spine with a true and gifted world-class player is a step in that direction. In addition, Partey will settle in a lot quicker: English speaker, used to similar intensity, more consisitent over a longer period. Aouar is just getting into his own: a gamble at best.
Yes, I do agree that we lack creativity sometimes, but I feel that William and Ceballos, if played further up the pitch can be a temporary solution till we strengthen that area.
Williams in particular can fill in that role very well not talk of the young English Smith Rowle
Elneny is not good enough for AFC, he’s an expensive back up if he stays. He’s a sideways passer that isn’t really quick or physical enough for the EPL.
I think he started so it would be easier to shop.
Well spoken Marvin,, we have too many mediocre midfield players especially one Granit Xhaka who everyone heaps praise on for making his skill of doing nothing by passing sideways and back look impressive,, There are so many dumb and blind commentators trotting verbal excretion on the sport these days it all stinks
Woah, that’s disrespectful! Mind if you tone it down a bit? Thanks!
Is he expensive? If his wages are low he’s fine to have. He tries hard enough, doesn’t complain about low game time. Fine filler player you need to throw on to rest your better players in Europa matches and dying minutes.
Elneny was given a chance and he didn’t let us down ,”is he good enough ?i don’t know “
(Probably not )but fans clambering for the 2 players we are supposedly after I would imagine 80 % or more haven’t even seen them play ,apart from YouTube vids .
Fans get swept up in the moment because the twitter brigade come out and tell us a story our fans think any signing is better than none but in reality we probably are not even looking at them .
I suggest wait until we get players before thinking that we defi in for them .
Arteta is doing a fantastic job with what he has what he won’t want is fans on his back asking why he or the club haven’t signed this or that player when they wasn’t even on his radar
Good comments Dan 👍
As Durand and I stated above, wait until Arsenal plays against a top class midfield. This is the area Arsenal has been deficient for some years. Elneny is a solid back up player only.
Please give Mikel Arteta the tools he wants and needs.
We did play against a solid midfield in Liverpool and Elneny did really well in my opinion. But having said that, I would also like us to have Partey before anyone because he has been a great performer consistently.
Well my own opinion is that I will take Partey first before Aouar or any other midfielder and the reason being that I watched this guy against us in Europa league semi final and I was like who is this guy that have been disturbing us not to penetrate athletics and he been playing as if he was there defender, defensive midfielder, attacking midfielder and even there supporting striker… Since then I have falling in love with him and have been following him in la liga and especially in champions league. Then the day I heard that we are in for him, I have been praying and telling my friends that if we are opportune to sign this guy, you will all be in trouble because that is the only missing link we have been lacking in Arsenal for some years now, the strength, the work rate , the short and long range pass, the ability to dribble his opponents with out stress and the ability to cover his defenders is or are just too amazing… I am not trying to over hype this guy but its what I saw and what I have seen in him that makes me say this….. Please Arsenal sign this Partey guy and let’s see how he will improve us or not…..
OT.. Wow, the PSG game saw 14 (?) yellows and 5 reds overall… that was some mass brawl at the end and PSG lost again!!! 😱
arsenal fc were amongs the top 7 clubs in europe’s top 5 leagues to have conceded the highest number of shots against last season (very alarming). And this article is prioritizing aouar over partey? Yes both are welcoming additions but partey should come in first at least to compliment Gabriel and saliba making arsenal really difficult to beat..
Useless post. We getting no where with players like eleny
Elneny has had a few good games but these are early days. We played Fulham (no disrespect) so the opposition was not exactly “top level”. Partey is a must if we want a world class player who can bolster our midfield and attack in a way that Arsenal have needed for over a decade. Direct and quick! Partey could be our modern viera?
Ozil still left out, Guendouzi still missing. Both likely to be sold? We need to strengthen the midfield!!
Add to that we just sold the better keeper (Martinez) in my opinion! We’re not seeing much spending (No shock there) and it all seems a little too slow in the transfer market as usual. Elneny would be a great choice if the club want to save money but I’m not convinced yet that he is the answer to our problems. We have to spend still..
GunneRay well said
Elnely is doing awesome has a DM so like the writer I’ll say attacking midfielder 1st, partey can come in if torreira leaves. Arsenal needs a no10, a maestro
How will you just sitdown and post nonsense. We sold the better keeper how?? The keeper that wasn’t ready to stay and fight for his place?? Sorry to say but that dude is a coward and he knows Leno is better. Please explain to me why he isn’t ready to fight for his place?? You are judging a keeper base on few games when Leno save us a lot of points before is injury. Please reason well before you post here
He had been fighting for ten years. He was taking his chance and deserved it! Problem is, the club could still not give him the starting position he deserved. He wants to play for his national team but that will never happen while Leno is at Arsenal! Martinez added stability to the defence when Leno was injured. Under Leno Arsenal conceded a lot of goals last season. Fact!
Agreed but Martinez should have stayed n fight for the number 1 spot & not chicken out easily.. He’s going to compete against the highly popular tom Heaton who is villa’s number1 so what’s the point jumping ship?
And having dreams of been number 1 for Argentina isn’t an excuse to leave , just ask fellow Argentine Romero at man utd who is degea’s deputy and currently number1 for Argentina
Austin, also Martinez had put himself in the shop window with his displays and was on £20k per week. We don’t know how much Arsenal offered Martinez in an upgraded contract, but Aston Villa has apparently offered £60k per week wages.
At 28 Martinez has to take the money and the current #1 goal keeping spot.
Ozziegunner if you say so… I hope for he’s sake villa don’t get relegated back to the championship then all he’s hard work comes crashing
@gunneray
Most of Lenos games last season was played Emery ..Fact .
This guy since he has signed as saved us countless points and was probably one of our best players the season before .
Under Emery *
I definitely think we still need both, Partey AND Aouar. We still probably won’t be able to get both but if I had to pick one, it’d be Aouar for sure
Trusting a Mediocre like El neny wouldn’t help Arsenal… Check Liverpool bench and find Nabi kieta, Milner, Chamberlain not el nenny class. Not to mention man city.
That’s how to compete
The delusion keeps getting disgusting.. Not needing Partey because we have Elneny??? Some fans need a reality check.. Remember when everyone called elneny a gem back then for the price we bought him for? What happened later? He struggled! I wish Arteta doesn’t think like you guys and have some common sense in him
I understand the need for people to have differing opinions but what an article, we should forget Partey because elneny is doing great? What a load of BC, elneny whom we all know can be inconsistent? I bet you lot where the same fans that didn’t want wenger to sign a striker cos sanogo was banging in goals in preseason. We’ve gotten so used to mediocre that once we see an average player being his average self, we go crazy with the tag of World class, currently what we’re doing with elneny and xhaka now
Thank you, I’ve been biting my tongue about Xhaka. He’s not good enough either no way he would starting on a team with top 4 or title ambitions.
the midfield on display saturday will if lucky get us up to 6th place … it was fulham for gods sake … not one of them got in to box with serious intent … we need someone to support ceballos gives him freedom to go forward is comfortable on the ball and intimidates the opposition … none of current crop fit the bill qed
Nooo, Elneny is a SQUAD PLAYER. Don’t make the same mistake we’ve always done which is hype up players who play a few good games here and there and then they suddenly turn poor when the going gets rough. No team that wants to win anything consistently starts a player of Elneny’s quality. He is FINE for Europa League, and sub ons, but nothing more. GET TOP midfielders PLEASE.