Home Transfer Deadline Day No repeat of transfer rush 2011, insists Wenger

No repeat of transfer rush 2011, insists Wenger

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Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger insists that he will not be panic buying like he did back in 2011.

After being thumped 8-2 by Manchester United at Old Trafford, Wenger reacted by signing five new players on transfer deadline day and two years later, only two of them remain in the first-team squad.

Mikel Arteta and Per Mertesacker were the only two successful transfers from ’11, whilst Andre Santos, Park Chu Young and Yossi Benayoun failed to make an impact at the Emirates Stadium, despite the latter only being a loan move.

With no star signings as of yet this summer, many Arsenal fans are worrying the same thing could happen this time around, however Wenger has confirmed that it will not be the same as it was two years ago.

“At that time it was linked with injuries, we had unexpected long-term injuries and you cannot sit there and do nothing at all,” Wenger said. “If you have unexpected injuries you have to do something about it.

“We are not in need of numbers like we were at the time. We have our targets, we will try to achieve that and I am confident we will get there.

“I am confident [of new signings]. The desire of the players to join us [makes me confident] and the fact that we have – maybe not as much as everyone writes – but we have some funds available to do the transfers.

“Ideally I would rather have the squad in place at the start of the season and I am a big fan to cancel the transfer window at the start of the season anyway.

“Once the season has started you should be capable to focus on the quality of your play and have everybody with the same players for the whole season – it makes sense.

“We work very hard on it and it didn’t come off as quickly or as well as we wanted, but in football you have to deal with any situation and be patient. So as long as the transfer [window] is open, until the last minute anything can happen on many fronts.

“I’m very, very happy with the squad we have. When I tell you that, it’s about the quality of the players I have. With the number, at the moment we are short.

“Therefore I would be a bit worried that number-wise, we are not strong enough to cope with all the targets a club like this has. We will not go into the new season with only the number of players we have.”

Written by Alex Batt – @AlexBatt

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