Arsenal: 3 reasons it wouldn’t be awful if Mohamed Elneny stayed

The sheer volume of work needed to be undertaken at Arsenal is beginning to sink in. Left to right, up and down, there is going to be considerable change in north London in every department. But what should happen with Mohamed Elneny?

Mikel Arteta and Edu are embarking on a major squad overhaul. It’s not just a case of selling bad players and signing better ones. It’s taking place for more reasons than that.

Last season’s dire campaign was made brighter by the emergence of a glorious young core. The face of the club, in many ways. Emile Smith Rowe and Bukayo Saka carried the whole team, one filled with players coming towards the end of their cycles, or in some instances, already way past their best.

This rebuild is about building a squad to compete for years to come, with the right age profiles and with scope to develop and even be worth a few quid if money comes in for them. Arsenal are aiming their sights high at the likes of Ben White for £50m and James Maddison for £60m; ignoring price they’re ideal profiles to kick-start a new era in the club’s history surrounded by talent for the short, mid and long-term.

https://twitter.com/ElNennY/status/1400844375027027970

3 reasons it wouldn’t suck if Mohamed Elneny stayed at Arsenal in the summer transfer window despite being a distinctly average footballer

So where does Mohamed Elneny fit in to all this? Well, he doesn’t.

Seeing the likes of Granit Xhaka, Bernd Leno, Alexandre Lacazette, Cedric, Willian and David Luiz all either departed, departing or rumoured to be on the move, the Egyptian’s name would surely make sense to be among them.

It would and it wouldn’t.

Vast change is afoot in north London and looking across the squad at who could be moved on to raise the ceiling, there are next to none who would even contemplate arguing that Elneny can’t be improved on.

But it would not be a total disaster if he stayed. Why? Well, let’s try three reasons and see how many people can disagree in one fell swoop.

1. Arsenal Won’t Get Everything Done This Summer

Granit Xhaka, Konstantinos Mavropanos, Eddie Nketiah, Matteo Guendouzi, Lucas Torreira, Hector Bellerin, Sead Kolasinac, Joe Willock, Ainsley Maitland-Niles, Reiss Nelson, Bernd Leno and Alexandre Lacazette could all leave during this window.

That’s a lot of players.

While this rebuild is going to be ‘ruthless’ and the turnover unlike anything seen at Arsenal in most supporters’ lifetimes, it would be overambitious to assume the club will complete all of their business in one window. Not least over a summer with a major international tournament taking place.

If we look at the players being linked with moves to Arsenal we can already see that full-backs are yet to be among them. There is still plenty of time to go in this window for that to change but it demonstrates a degree of prioritisation – maybe having Calum Chambers at right-back for next season wouldn’t be so bad if it comes down to it.

The same applies in midfield where four of the central options could all move on. Arsenal don’t need to replace all of them but some irons will have to be left hot and Elneny, if it came down to it, isn’t going to fetch a considerable fee and can be deemed as a non-priority member this window.

Arsenal can’t do it all.