Arsenal: Missing Aleksandar Golovin only bad if he’s truly special

Arsenal are set to miss out on Aleksandr Golovin, with the Russian expected to move to Juventus. It’s only bad, however, if Golovin turns out to be truly special.

As the summer window rumbles on, there will be a myriad of names linked with moves to the Emirates. It seemingly increases with every week that passes. Obviously, Arsenal are not going to sign them all. Rarely do they sign more than five players in a window — in the last five years, they have signed more than five in a summer just twice.

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Contrast that figure to the number of players that they are relentlessly linked with — I don’t dare to think what the number is, but I am fairly sure I could think of 30 players that have been reported as potential targets this summer alone — and it’s easy to see that there are going to be many ‘missed’ targets.

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I say ‘missed’. It’s never quite known if they were ever a target in the first place or just a figment of the media’s imagination. Nevertheless, come the end of the summer, all fans will be able to think back on the window and regret the club not signing this player or that. And one such example could well be Aleksandr Golovin, the darling of the World Cup as the creative heartbeat of the hosts, Russia.

Golovin had been mentioned as a possible Gunners’ acquisition prior to the World Cup. He impressed against them in the Europa League for CSKA Moscow, attracted the admiration of Arsene Wenger with his performances, and proved himself to be the type of player that Arsenal tend to pursue: a technically gifted, creative, intelligent and young attacking midfielder. But since his heroics in the World Cup, the rumours have been rife.

That said, while deals for the likes of Luca Torreira, Sokratis Papastathopoulos and Bernd Leno have progressed or even been completed, there has been little progress in regards to Golovin’s proposed north London switch. And now it looks as though Juventus are the frontrunners for his signature. Arsenal could be set to ‘miss’ out on Golovin.

But, actually, with a pause to think and actually consider his signing, that might not be a bad thing. Golovin is a very similar player to Alex Iwobi, Aaron Ramsey, Henrikh Mkhitaryan and Mesut Ozil. Do Arsenal really need another one? The answer is a fairly resounding ‘no’, especially when considering the improvements that the Golovin cash could make elsewhere.

In fact, I would posit that missing out on Golovin would only be a major shame if the Russian truly developed into a special player. He certainly has the talent and potential to reach such heights. But at this early stage, it is difficult to say for sure whether he will attain the world-class level of a Mesut Ozil, Kevin de Bruyne or Eden Hazard.

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And, for me, I will only be disappointed in Arsenal’s inability to sign him if he does develop into a player of that calibre. That is not to say that I would be underwhelmed if he did move. It would be thoroughly enthralling to watch him play at the Emirates. But it would not be the end of the world if it never happened either.