Arsenal Transfer Talk: Wenger's Weakness in Transfer Dealings

6 years back, Arsene Wenger was a successful manager in the Premier League having won 11 trophies in 8 years.

Currently he seems to be losing grip of his success with consecutive trophy-less seasons. Not that Arsenal never came close to winning a trophy in these 6 years. The Champions league finals in 2006 and Carling Cup finals in 2007 and 2011 were some close moments where the Gunners came so close to breaking the jinx.

Even the 2010-11 season was a season which promised so much but led to a disappointing end. Arsenal's defense was a major reason for the collapse that started in the Carling Cup final against Birmingham.

Last season, Arsenal's central defense was taken care of by Johann Djourou, Laurent Koscielny and Sebastien Squillaci after the Verminator's absence due to injury. Squillaci turned out not to be a success and the defense largely relied on young Djourou and Koscielny.

Wenger, knowing that he had to bring in reinforcements in the defensive part of his game, is yet to make a significant signing in that area. Cahill, Samba and Jagielka are linked with the Gunners with Wenger making a derisory £10m bid for Jagielka, some £2m less than last summer's offer.

Cahill is rated at around £17million,Samba at £12million and Jagielka at around £20million. After almost two months into the transfer window, Wenger should have signed at least one defender(he has been provided a  transfer kitty of around £35million too) so that they can train with the team and get accustomed to Arsenal's game play.

Arsene Wenger's weakness, according to Sir Alex Ferguson, is his lack of balance in transfer dealings. Balance here does not mean showing a net profit. It is giving equal importance to both the attacking and defensive signings. And Ferguson said this 3 years ago! Wenger is yet to change his ways.

In 2010, Wenger signed Koscielny and Squillaci but that was to compensate for the departure of Gallas and Campbell.

Ferguson's quote about Wenger:

“He believes profoundly in his youngsters, he doesn’t like to blend them too much with older players,” 

“What astonishes me is that he always buys attacking players, like [Andrei] Arshavin. He is a good player but [Wenger] already has [Samir] Nasri, [Emmanuel] Adebayor, [Robin] Van Persie, [Nicklas] Bendtner, Eduardo and [Theo] Walcott.

“I don’t think he likes buying defenders. That lacks balance.”

This season also Arsenal has been linked with a large number of attacking players of the likes of Benzema, Falcao, Alvarez(before he signed for Inter), Chamberlain, Mata and Gervinho. 

Wenger has already signed Gervinho and if reports are to be believed, he has a chance to sign Mata too. Also, Valencia's coach has hinted at Mata's exit. This is also another case of Wenger signing attacking players.

With the current attack, Arsenal was able to score 70 goals, the second highest in the league, whereas it allowed 41 goals, the highest in the top four. In 2009-10 also, Arsenal defense allowed 41 goals! in 2008-09 it was 37 goals. In all these cases, Arsenal let the highest goals in the top four.

Position	Team	Goals Scored	Goals Allowed
1	Manchester United	74	35
2	Chelsea	69	32
3	Manchester City	58	33
4	Arsenal	70	41

With the same attack, Wenger can expect the same result. He has to reduce the number of goals his team has allowed to improve the team's position.

Will Wenger prove Ferguson wrong and sign some quality defenders to support the attack the Gunners possess? We will have to wait and see!