Arsenal and David Luiz: Terrible and not terrible idea

Arsenal are reportedly pushing to sign David Luiz from Chelsea as the transfer deadline looms. It seems like a terrible idea, and to some extent it is, and yet, at the same time, it isn’t terrible.

Arsenal wanted to sign a centre-back this summer. It was arguably their most problematic position last year and there were very few internal solutions at the position. Investment was required, and somewhat inevitable.

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Their answer to the problem, however, 18-year-old William Saliba who they believe is special, will not join up with the team for another year. The near-£30 million deal from Saint-Etienne included a loan back to the Ligue 1 club for next season. Saliba, then, was and is the long-term solution, but the centre-back conundrum still remained at large.

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Then it got worse. Laurent Koscielny kicked his toys out of the pram, demanding a return to his native France, which was finally made official on Tuesday. While the divorce was messy and his leadership was called into question, the 33-year-old was Arsenal’s best central defender last season, despite coming off a ruptured Achilles that almost forced him to retire — that, incidentally, says more about the standard of the other centre-backs than it does the brilliance of Koscielny, all of those centre-backs now being bumped up a slot in the squad with Koscielny’s exit.

And so, with the deadline looming large and the position looking bleaker than it ever has, panic set in. Suddenly, Arsenal needed a centre-back for the coming year, and it almost did not matter who it was. At first, it was Europe. Dayot Upamecano of RB Leipzig. Daniele Rugani of Juventus. The former looks dead in the water, the price simply unaffordable, but Rugani is still an option. But on Wednesday, a new, more familiar, perhaps more terrifying name, rose to the surface: the flame-haired, flame-playing David Luiz.

Luiz missed Chelsea training on Wednesday and is reportedly keen on an intra-London switch. The now 32-year-old would certainly not be a long-term solution, very much like Sokratis last summer. He also does not represent a world-class defender, despite his obvious talent. In fact, at first glance, this may seem like a terrible idea: bringing in an infamously unhinged defender to play in a team with an infamously unhelpful and unprotective system.

But while being one of the hair-raising propositions that have come about this summer, there is a little method in the coiffed madness. At this stage in the window, and with money having been spent at other positions, especially if a deadline-day move for Kieran Tierney evolves as is highly anticipated, it is slim pickings. Manchester United just paid £80 million for an average Premier League defender, after all.

Luiz is experienced, enjoyed his best season playing in a back four last year, and would certainly be an improvement on the hapless Shkodran Mustafi and largely unproven young trio, Calum Chambers, Rob Holding and Dinos Mavropanos, the latter two of which are yet to prove their fitness ahead of the new campaign. Given the financial and time restrictions that Arsenal are working under, are there any better options out there?

So yes, Luiz might be coming to north London. And yes, that might be a terrifying prospect at first. But it might also be the best that Arsenal can hope for. Let’s just hope they have plenty of hair gel available.