Arsenal: Jack Grealish preferable to Philippe Coutinho

Arsenal has “registered an interest” in Jack Grealish, which should be taking much higher transfer priority to Philippe Coutinho.

I love when transfer “reports” break news that is completely irrelevant. Like Arsenal “registering an interest” in Aston Villa. What does that mean? That we call up Villa and say, “Yes, we like Grealish”? It’s kind of like when a transfer is agreed “in principle.”

It’s a whole lot of fancy words that mean nothing. And yet, hearing that Grealish could cost £80m, essentially ruling him impossible to acquire, especially with Money Bags United on the chase, I couldn’t help but think—”well, if we’re going to spend that much on Philippe Coutinho, might as well spend that much on Grealish instead.”

In case you’ve missed anything I’ve said about Coutinho, I’m not a fan of breaking the bank to sign him. We already tried that with Ozil, I don’t want to pay the wages, we can find the creativity elsewhere, and cheaper, and there’s a bigger need to sort out the midfield.

Yet here we are seeing that Arteta has supposedly “personally asked” the club to secure Coutinho for him while we just “register an interest” in someone who practically single-handedly kept Aston Villa from relegation.

I get that Coutinho is a creative wizard. I get that we need creativity. But he’s so one-dimensional and Grealish isn’t exactly that far behind in the creative department. This year alone he created 2.5 chances per appearance. Last year was 2.3 The highest Coutinho registered at Liverpool was 2.9.

The big difference is that Grealish pulls the weight of being a pivot. He’s strong on the ball, he can contribute to defensive work when asked.

Coutinho doesn’t have that. He is the Ozil replacement that we don’t need. Grealish is the midfield solution we do need. He’s what Dani Ceballos is supposed to be and could actually work really well in tandem with a secondary Ceballos loan. Two midfield pivots, each creative, each far more versatile than Coutinho.

We aren’t in a situation where we can shovel out cash for luxury players. Nor should we even be that interested in luxury players. We need industrious players, versatility. Especially in the midfield. Grealish is that player. Ceballos is that player. Thomas Partey is that player. Coutinho is not.

I’m not anti-Coutinho. I’m anti the idea, the position, the limitations. If we were in a better place as a club and we just needed one last piece to the puzzle, then sure. But that isn’t the case.