Unai Emery Says Arsenal Can Improve by 'Spending Money' in Transfer Window

Unai Emery believes Arsenal need to spend money to improve in the summer transfer window and explained he is eager to find a player who can have a similar impact to the one Virgil van Dijk has had at Liverpool.

Liverpool signed Van Dijk for £75 million from Southampton in January 2018, and his huge influence on the Reds' defensive solidity has transformed them into Premier League title challengers.

Per Goal's Charles Watts, Arsenal are only likely to have a transfer budget of around £45 million in the summer, which could be bolstered by sales, so they will not be able to break transfer records as Liverpool have recently.

But Emery believes some astute purchases could make a big difference, as well as developing academy players, per Watts:

"I think we can improve first, by spending money to achieve players. In the past the club have done great work in watching players, finding and signing young players and developing our players in the academy.

"I have big respect for our work, for our players in the academy. I want to develop the players here—giving them progress to achieve something at a big club like we are. We can also achieve [buy] some players who are in other teams, who can come here and give us this performance—like Van Dijk with Liverpool."

While Liverpool and Manchester City have been going toe-to-toe in one of the Premier League's most high-quality title battles, Emery has quietly been doing a remarkable job a little further down the table.

Arsenal spent a little more than £70 million last summer and could make only loan signings in January, but Emery has made all of it count.

In his debut season at the Emirates Stadium, the Spaniard has already led Arsenal to the same points tally they finished with last term with seven matches to play:

They will likely finish with somewhere between 75 and 77 points in 2018-19.

If Emery were to mastermind a similar level of improvement again next season after some signings and the benefit of another pre-season at Arsenal, the north London side could be title challengers.

The former Sevilla boss has most notably succeeded in making the Emirates a fortress for Arsenal.

They have not lost at home in the English top flight since City beat them on the opening weekend of the 2018-19 campaign, and the Gunners are on a 10-game winning run at home in the league:

Away from home, Arsenal have been less successful, a trend that fits with the fact that the weakest part of their squad remains the defence.

Per Miguel Delaney of The Independent, Bayern Munich's David Alaba and Barcelona's Samuel Umtiti top Arsenal's list of transfer targets for the summer, and both boast the quality to dramatically improve Emery's back line.