After a frenetic transfer window, Arsenal’s recruitment team can breathe a sigh of relief.
It has been a frantic period, especially for manager Mikel Arteta, technical director Edu and director of football operations Richard Garlick. This is the first summer in which that trio has worked together. Across the course of the window, a dynamic has steadily developed.
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Now their work must bear fruit on the pitch. Arsenal have suffered a dreadful start to the season, losing their three Premier League games without scoring a single goal. A strategy built around youth faces a stern and immediate test as Arsenal seek to overcome this stuttering false start.
But how did this summer’s business come to pass? In this piece, The Athletic explores Arsenal’s recruitment strategy and the process by which they arrived at their targets. In the busiest of transfer windows, who exactly did what?
Strategy
Arsenal’s new direction is perfectly clear: They have made six summer signings, all aged 23 or under. There has been a clear attempt to refresh and rejuvenate the squad.
If any confirmation of Arsenal’s thinking was required, it came in the form of a leaked all-staff communication from chief executive Vinai Venkatesham.
“Our approach for this window was framed by fully recognising that we are not where we want to be on the pitch — finishing eighth last season, with no European football for the first time in many years. This is well below the standards each of us all have, and of course that our fans rightly demand of us, which is to be competing for the biggest trophies in the game.
“Whilst we would love to jump from where we are to where we want to be in an instant, we need to be realistic that the gap is too large to do that. As such, our activity this window has been focused on youth.
“Our strategy is to fill our squad with some of Europe’s most exciting young talent, with players from both our academy and further afield, that can grow and develop together under Mikel to take us where we want to get to.
“Whilst this will not be overnight, we can make positive progress, and it gives us the best route to future success in a sustainable way.”
On a recent Sky broadcast, pundit Gary Neville said he was unsure what Arsenal’s recruitment strategy was. Fortunately for Neville, Venkatesham has provided a concise distillation.
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This appears to be indicative of a club learning from its mistakes. Just last summer, they handed three-year contracts to Willian and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, both the wrong side of 30. So far, neither deal has provided anything like value — in fact, Willian’s contract was terminated by mutual consent shortly before the transfer deadline.
There were several imperatives behind Arsenal’s strategic switch: most obviously, a need to rebalance the age profile of the squad.
However, there were also financial motives at play. Arsenal have been touted as spending more than £150 million in transfer fees this summer. While it’s true the owners have made funds available to support the team, most of those deals include performance-related add-ons and staggered payments.
Perhaps more importantly, these deals have helped Arsenal recalibrate their wage structure. In 2019, Josh Kroenke admitted Arsenal had “a Champions League wage bill on a Europa League budget”. For the time being, they are in neither competition. Arsenal can’t, in their position, continue to dole out the extravagant salaries afforded to the likes of Aubameyang. Arsenal are also conscious of the regulations regarding Financial Fair Play that exist in both the Premier League and UEFA competitions, in which they hope to participate.
Without exception, the new arrivals will receive affordable salaries. It’s important to contextualise these purchases, and the fees paid for them, accordingly. Ben White may have had commanded a higher transfer fee than Raphael Varane, but is understood to earn less than a third of his wage. The Athletic understands White earns around £80,000 per week with bonuses, white Varane’s salary at United is at least £300,000 per week.
That means over the next four years, including a baseline fee of £34 million, Varane could cost Manchester United a gross total of £100 million. By that stage he will be 32, without significant resale value.
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In the same period, White would cost Arsenal closer to £67 million. Furthermore, he will be 27 at that time, and ought to still have considerable value on the transfer market.
Players on lower salaries are, as Arsenal have discovered to their cost, typically easier to sell. Arsenal have bought players whose transfer value stands a good chance of increasing over the coming seasons. In the cases where the deal doesn’t work out, they hope they will be protected against being lumbered with unwanted, immovable players on prohibitively high wages.
Arsenal accept they have paid a premium for the English pair of White and Aaron Ramsdale. In both instances, it was manager Arteta who urged the club to complete the deals. They believe, however, that English premium works both ways: when they come to leave Arsenal, their homegrown status should protect their value somewhat.
Arsenal also believe they have not simply acquired “kids”. These six players all have considerable experience. Martin Odegaard is the captain of Norway, Albert Sambi Lokonga captained Anderlecht. Takehiro Tomiyasu has already won 23 caps for Japan. Even Nuno Tavares has already payed 35 games in the Portuguese Primeira Liga. There is no goalkeeper in Europe aged 23 or under who has played more top-flight football in the past two years than Ramsdale. Arsenal hope the team will feel their impact sooner rather than later.
This is not, however, a strategy of Arteta’s design. It is something the club’s hierarchy have arrived at together. Strategic conversations between the technical director, the wider executive, the board (including trusted Kroenke advisor Tim Lewis), and ownership saw the club take this course. The manager was of course a voice at the table, but this was not one man’s plan. This is a club decision. Arsenal gave consideration to laying out their strategy publicly at the start of the summer but ultimately decided to let their actions do the talking.
Talent identification
The initial list of transfer targets that formed the basis for Arsenal’s summer businesses was actually pulled together in advance of the 2021 January transfer window. Names have been added or dropped off since then, but that was when the blueprint for this strategy was first laid out.
Arteta’s promotion from head coach to manager has created some confusion among outsiders over what the hierarchy of decision-making is. While every deal is different, the basic internal process for recruitment is as follows:
Firstly, Arteta and technical director Edu draw up a list of requirements. Arsenal’s “scouting” team then draw up lists of potential targets. While the club dispensed with the vast majority of their scouts in the redundancies of 2020, they retained some staff who effectively took up the mantle: Jason Ayto is the club’s player recruitment co-ordinator, Mark Curtis is first-team scout, and Tolly Coburn is in charge of analytics strategy and application. Ben Knapper, the club’s loan manager, also forms part of this team, which loosely became known as the “Football Intelligence” department.
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The idea was to integrate a number of previously separate departments, reporting directly into Edu, streamlining information regarding squad-planning, scouting assessments, development pathways and loans. Arsenal have subsequently begun adding new scouts back into this team. Edu and Ayto interviewed successful candidates including ex-Fulham senior scout James Ellis, former Manchester United and City scout Romain Poirot, and the former Manchester United and Inter scout Toni Lima.
While previously there was tension between the traditional scouting department and “Stat DNA” (now known as Arsenal Data Analytics), the “Football Intelligence” team contains a number of former analysts who are more comfortable with using video and data in assessing players and producing reports. The intention is to see data become integrated in the process — for it to be a complement rather than a contradiction. Any potential signing goes through a data-based “check”. In most cases this summer, a consensus was found.
Arteta and his coaching staff both filter and feed into the lists produced by the recruitment team. Both of Arteta’s assistants, Steve Round and Albert Stuivenberg, have a voice in these discussions. They also contribute to building up knowledge of the player, discreetly speaking to coaching staff from other clubs to determine information about their background and character. That was of particular importance to Arteta this summer: he was clear he wanted players with the right personality for his project.
With the list of targets finalised, it falls to Arteta and Edu to decide upon what action to take. The case of Odegaard was one of absolute consensus — he had figured prominently on those initial lists from the winter of 2020, and his loan spell had convinced everyone of his quality and strength of character.
The additions of Lokonga and Nuno Tavares, meanwhile, were heavily influenced by Edu’s scouting department — Arteta even went so far as to thank the recruitment team for pointing him in Tavares’ direction. It is, for the most part, a very collaborative process.
However, the indications this summer are that Arteta has ultimately wielded the most influence. While White and Tomiyasu were both approved by all departments, it was Arteta’s testimony that convinced the hierarchy to proceed with the deals. In the case of Ramsdale, the coaching department had perhaps the greatest input, partly because goalkeepers are considered such a specialist area. When Sheffield United dug in with their demands, Edu and his team advocated for cheaper alternatives, including Barcelona’s Neto. In the end, Arteta’s conviction in Ramsdale is what won out, and the clubs met in the middle. If a collaborative process drew up the list of targets, it seems it was Arteta’s single-mindedness that drove through the deals he most wanted.
With authority, comes responsibility. Arteta is aware that as manager he will be judged by the quality of his talent identification.
The deals
Perhaps the most significant difference in Arsenal’s approach to deal-making since the previous transfer window has been the addition of Richard Garlick. Although he has no input on the technical decisions on recruitment, he provides considerable support on contractual matters. The former director of football at the Premier League joined as Arsenal’s new director of football operations in May and was almost immediately thrown into the cut and thrust of negotiations. Within a matter of days of the Premier League season ending, talks for White, Lokonga and Ramsdale were underway.
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Garlick initially led the charge on all those deals. In the cases of White and Ramsdale, there was a clear logic to putting him front and centre — in his Premier League role, Garlick had developed relationships with many English clubs. He has a particularly strong connection with Brighton technical director Dan Ashworth on account of their time together at West Brom.
Arsenal and Garlick hoped to get deals done early — this was always going to be a busy window, and there was a desire to start ticking items off their considerable “to do” list. For Garlick, there was the added pressure of being the new man at the club, and wanting to deliver.
It was not easy to move fast, however. With Arsenal having to delicately manage their expenditure, and Garlick new in the job, almost every new bid or revised contract offer had to be approved at a board meeting. Whereas the Arsene Wenger and Ivan Gazidis regime were granted considerable latitude in negotiations, this summer the board were kept abreast of every development. In the midst of the transfer window, the Arsenal hierarchy convened between one to three times a week to consider their next move. Arteta attended many of these summits to receive updates and voice his opinion. Towards the end of the window, Josh Kroenke travelled to London to be around for the deals and was in attendance at the training ground on the day Arsenal signed Martin Odegaard and Ramsdale.
In the end, it took five formal bids to land White. The Ramsdale negotiations were particularly protracted as Sheffield United’s owners had appointed intermediaries to act for them in the sale: only near the end of the process did Arsenal deal directly with the key decision-makers. In the case of White and Ramsdale, Arsenal faced the difficulty of balancing their desire to get the deals done quickly, with the fact they were effectively bidding against themselves.
Edu did his share of the talking too. When negotiations with Anderlecht over Lokonga reached a critical point, it was the technical director who stepped in. He led talks with Benfica for Nuno Tavares, and was heavily involved in the deadline day deal for Tomiyasu. The Brazilian also liaised with Barcelona over a possible swap deal for Hector Bellerin, spearheaded Arsenal’s interest in Inter striker Lautaro Martinez, and made contact regarding a possible deal for Jules Kounde. It was a “horses for courses” approach: Arsenal leant on the varying contacts and language skills of Edu and Garlick to navigate the market accordingly.
Unsurprisingly given the travel restrictions, most deals were done digitally — via phone calls, Zoom meetings, and WhatsApp. Edu’s family holidays have generated significant publicity, understandably so given the optics, but he was still able to join the necessary calls. Face-to-face meetings were held with Brighton and Sheffield United, with Edu and Garlick both in attendance.
Once fees were agreed, it was Arteta who was charged with making phone calls to players, informing them of his plans and persuading them to join Arsenal. In some cases he spoke with players multiple times, explaining how he saw them fitting into his tactical system.
Under Edu’s instruction, it was Garlick who brokered the player contracts. This summer Arsenal have fully dispensed with the inclusion of image rights in new player deals — only one remaining senior player has those, and it is a contract granted by a previous regime. Arsenal have also inserted an optional extra year on the deals of each of their summer signings, granting the club more flexibility and agency in their squad planning. It is worth pointing out that Arsenal also reached new long-term agreements with Kieran Tierney and Emile Smith Rowe this summer — two hugely important players in their own right.
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An unsung hero of the club, the long-serving player liaison officer Paul Irwin, also played a key role in the logistics of each transfer, ensuring signings navigated the necessary COVID-19 restrictions, and organising travel and accommodation.
The deal to sign Odegaard was one where Arsenal were prepared to wait — and they had to. The player’s priority was to remain with Real Madrid, but when he was excluded from the squad at the outset of the Spanish season, Real’s intentions became clear. Unable to shift other saleable assets, Madrid decided to sell the Norwegian to raise funds for their ill-fated bid for Kylian Mbappe. When Odegaard saw the writing on the wall, he was more than happy to rejoin Arsenal. Ultimately Kia Joorabchian helped broker the transfer, representing Real Madrid as an intermediary.
When it came to right-back, Arsenal laboured to find a player of the correct profile and was available at a reasonable fee. Tomiyasu is someone they had expressed interest in earlier in the window and returned to in the final 72 hours. Arsenal always hoped to add a right-back, and after the team’s poor start to the season, that need became all the more pressing.
Player sales
Once Arteta and Edu have made a decision on a player’s future, it falls to the technical director (with Garlick’s assistance) to negotiate their exit.
This is the area where Arsenal have struggled to execute their strategy. It was hoped their expenditure would be offset by recouping significant money through sales.
It was, in fairness, a difficult market. However, according to The Athletic’s calculations, 10 Premier League clubs brought in more transfer revenue than Arsenal this summer.
In some cases, the situation can’t be helped: it is impossible to sell a player that no one wants to buy. There are other instances, however, where Arsenal could not capitalise on interest. Arsenal received bids for Granit Xhaka and Eddie Nketiah, but without a sale going through.
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In the case of Xhaka, Edu and Arteta determined that Roma’s offer was insufficient to allow an important first-team player to leave. Instead, the club opted to trigger a clause in his contract to extend his deal until 2024.
Arsenal had offered Nketiah a new contract to protect the value of their asset. Thus far, he has shown unsurprisingly little interest in signing an extension with a club where he seemingly has little future. Given that stalemate, it is perhaps surprising the club were not more receptive to Crystal Palace’s offers.
Joe Willock did leave the club for Newcastle in a deal worth around £22 million, and Matteo Guendouzi joined Marseille on loan with a compulsory purchase clause worth around £9 million.
In some instances, Arsenal have effectively gambled that the market will pick up sufficiently for them to capitalise in a year. They have chosen not to allow certain players to leave in the hope they may fetch more in future windows. Ainsley Maitland-Niles hoped to leave, but Arsenal rejected Everton’s loan bid, holding out for a higher loan fee or permanent deal. Whether the market will recover sufficiently to make that likely in January remains to be seen.
The Athletic’s analysis
Arguably, Arsenal’s owners deserve some credit for sticking to the recruitment plan despite the failure to recoup more money through sales. The club had a clear strategy for the kind of players they wanted to add — and they executed it, at considerable cost. Edu and Garlick were able to land a number of their key targets, including No 1 priority Odegaard. In that respect, Arteta has been well supported.
In several cases, it is the manager who has ultimately decided on the chosen targets. Consequently, they will inevitably be judged as his signings. Responsibility for the strategy is shared, but on player selection his influence is clear. As is always the case, Arsenal will be judged by the quality of their recruitment decisions — although given the age range of their signings, it may take a little time for the wisdom of these moves to become clear.
Even in a difficult market, Arsenal would have hoped to bring in more revenue from player trading. Inevitably there will some scrutiny on the technical director. Arsenal may point to the lack of interest in certain players, but ultimately they are responsible for managing the values of their players and choosing the optimum point to sell. Turning down £15 million for Maitland-Niles in 2020, for example, looks increasingly misguided.
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Making six signings in a window is impressive, but had Arsenal been able to sell Xhaka or Alexandre Lacazette, the turnover in the squad could have been higher still. As it stands, central midfield and centre-forward will figure prominently on Arsenal’s agenda in the transfer windows to come.
(Photos: Getty Images; graphics: Sam Richardson)
