Every Player Arsenal Need to Sell This Summer

Sometimes Arsenal's transfer policy looks like a touch of genius, and other times, it's about as easy to understand as Wingdings.

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For every Matteo Guendouzi who looks like they'll be playing at the top level for years to come, there's a David Luiz who outstays their welcome, clogging up the wage bill and holding up the development of the next Tony Adams in Arsenal's academy.

The post-Wenger era has been billed as transitional, an opportunity to inject the squad with youth and dynamism, but there's just one problem - club management is hopelessly addicted to signing 30-year-old footballers on short term contracts.

Arsenal have an intriguing opportunity to put things right this summer, however, in the shape of a weird window where the impact of coronavirus on the footballing world means that they will very much have to sell before they can buy. With that in mind, let's have a look at the players who Arsenal should look to move on so that the club itself can move on.

Mohamed Elneny

Not to be cruel, but it does say a lot about Arsenal's recent history that Elneny's most memorable goal for them came in a 5-1 aggregate defeat.

Notwithstanding the brief glimmer of hope he gave the Gunners at Camp Nou that memorable night in March, Elneny was pretty hot stuff in the first few months of 2018 and certainly showed glimpses of the energetic midfielder that Arsenal signed from Basel.

But to say that Elneny's form dropped off was an understatement as the once industrious midfielder shrunk into his shell both physically and tactically as a player, becoming a bit of a sideways-passing merchant.

After a successful first season on loan at Besiktas, the powers that be at Arsenal should look to make sure that Elneny's stay in Turkey is a permanent one.

David Luiz

This is a slightly trickier one - arguably there's no real need to let go of Luiz, who only has a year left on his contract, won't fetch much money on the market, and has been what you'd expect for Arsenal (n.b. this is not exactly a compliment).

However, with French prodigy William Saliba set to arrive from Saint-Étienne this summer, Arsenal now have quite a few centre-backs to juggle, and with Calum Chambers, Shkodran Mustafi, Sokratis, Rob Holding and (probably) Pablo Mari also jostling for contention, Luiz is better off chasing his last payday elsewhere rather than taking away minutes from another developing defender.

The only counter-argument would be that a particularly aggressive gust of wind would probably end up sidelining Holding and Chambers at present, but Arsenal should be well-stocked in the department to stave off disaster.

Konstantinos Mavropanos

This one is a little easier - Mavropanos isn't quite good enough to play at the highest level (and there's no shame in that), but after a solid few months on loan in the German second tier with FC Nürnberg, Bundesliga clubs are reportedly starting to take notice.

It makes perfect sense to cash in on a decent young player who doesn't seem to have a future at Arsenal while there's interest in him, and they should do exactly that. Now how easy was that?!

Henrikh Mkhitaryan

Arsenal fans thought they'd pulled off the heist of the century when Mkhitaryan arrived at the Emirates in exchange for Alexis Sánchez, but there turned out to be nothing genius about swapping one declining winger for another one.

The Armenian is living proof that swaps only work out in the NBA, on FIFA manager mode and at lunchtime in primary school, and it seems as if English football has really struggled at unearthing the player who scored 23 goals in one season with Borussia Dortmund.

Fortunately, Italian football seems more Mkhitaryan's style, and a fantastic start to his Roma career which has seen him bag six goals and three assists in 13 league games means that the twilight of his career will almost certainly be spent in Italy, perhaps as transfer bait for a certain Justin Kluivert...

Alexandre Lacazette

This is a suggestion that mainly takes place in the conditional tense, but if Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang stays at Arsenal and if Lacazette's market value is as high as the £50m that's been quoted, then it's a no-brainer to use him to add to the transfer kitty this summer.

Lacazette's middling year has been slightly exagerrated, and he still has much importance in terms of connecting Arsenal's attacking play.

But we might look back at this window as one where clubs that gambled were rewarded, and with Nketiah rapidly rising, selling Lacazette at the peak of his value for £££ is a spin of the wheel that just might make sense for Arsenal. Imagine, after all, the impact on Arsenal's squad if Lacazette could turn into a Thomas Partey or a Houssem Aouar (not literally of course, that would be pretty special).

Mesut Özil

The polarizing German who loves creating chances almost as much as he hates cardio has probably come to the end of an often spectacular and sometimes frustrating journey at Arsenal.

Some of the decisions Wenger made towards the end of his tenure were so bad they verged on hilarious, and panicking so much at Manchester United's interest in Özil that the aging playmaker was promptly offered £350k has to be up there.

It gave Arsenal a wage structure migraine, and Özil an albatross around his neck which gave his detractors easy ammunition. Clearly, Arsenal don't win all of those three FA Cups without the World Cup winner's star power, but might they have been motivated to seek out a younger number ten if he'd been let go earlier?

You get the impression that the Gunners have yet to fully embrace the fast-paced present day of football, and moving on the languid maestro might just be the painful step needed for them to join the 2020s.