Arsenal add Mattias Svanberg to midfield transfer list

What happens when there is a lull in Premier League football? Transfer news is what happens, of course, and with AFCON fast approaching for Arsenal it is the midfield that is taking centre stage.

Plenty of discussion surrounding a new striker has taken place, much of which has already been quashed, but with January coming around there will inevitably be plenty more links to get our teeth sunk into that aren’t just Dusan Vlahovic.

With Mikel Arteta and part of his squad hopefully enjoying some deserved time off before the daunting trip to Anfield on November 20, that doesn’t mean the phones won’t be ringing.

Edu has gone from zero to hero over the summer with his family barbecues clearly all just a ruse while he was secretly securing exciting young talent to bolster the first team. The fact nobody is talking about him is positive. No news is good news, and all that.

Arsenal add Bologna’s Mattias Svanberg to midfield transfer list as Mikel Arteta eyes reinforcements over coming windows

He won’t be taking it all too easy though, and recent links to Tyler Adams, someone Arsenal tracked over the summer, suggest that work is underway to try and bolster a key area of the pitch either in January or the coming summer.

The latest name to be linked with a move to north London is one that won’t be overly familiar to most, apart from Takehiro Tomiyasu. How so? Well, the man in question plays for the defender’s former club, Bologna, where they were teammates for two seasons.

And that player is Mattias Svanberg, who local newspaper Il Resto del Carlino list as a wanted man. Some of Serie A’s big hitters are mentioned as holding an interest, including Inter, Napoli and AC Milan, with Arsenal also thrown into the mix.

A key figure in the heart of Siniša Mihajlović’s midfield, the Swede has a contract that expires in 2023, although he has agreed to renew that deal until 2024. That extension puts the Italian side in a strong position to accrue as much of a fee as they can, which for them would ideally be until he end of the season.

Come that time, if ‘important offers’ arrive it would be down to Svanberg to decide what he would like to do, in the same vein of Tomiyasu where he was given the choice if an acceptable offer arrived, which it did.

So who is Svanberg? What sort of profile is he and will be fit what Arsenal are trying to build? Let’s take a look.

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Mattias Svanberg Fits the Recruitment Model at Arsenal

By now it is no secret that Arsenal have a plan in place when it comes to their recruitment. The desire for players in their early twenties with experience of playing in Europe, but who still have development potential in a new environment, is key.

At 22 years old Svanberg finds himself slap bang in the middle of that ballpark, and with just shy of 100 Serie A outings to his name he has had plenty of minutes in a top European division already.

He is also making inroads in the Swedish national team with nine caps to date, five coming in 2021, as the nation try to blood younger players into what was previously an ageing squad.

In terms of age and experience, he fits the bill.

For Sweden to plays in a two-man midfield in a 4-4-2, while for Bologna it is a 3-4-2-1 system where he most often operates on the right of that midfield pairing. Defensively alert, he isn’t someone to be heavily involved in build-up play, with all his passing numbers seeing him in the very low percentiles (10th or lower) with even his pass completion rates max out at 21st percentile.

Svanberg is surprisingly sound technically, however. He uses his body well and his frame acts as an interesting disguise to the occasional smart piece of footwork. What is surprising from the numbers is his shooting statistics: the lad likes a pop of goal, and produces a large amount of high xG shots.

His npxG+xA is a healthy 0.3 p/90, putting him up in the 93rd percentile, and his Goal Creating Actions p/90 of 2.24, including a 98th percentile rating for dribbles that lead to a shot, is quite impressive.

Watching the 22-year-old it becomes clear he’s someone who makes an impact at either third, with less involvement in central areas. His defensive and passing numbers do not make for good reading, but in Mihajlović’s wing-back system with two No. 10’s the emphasis is more on wide attacking with creation the half-spaces.

Due to his unfavourable statistics in areas Mikel Arteta may like, it would hint that the scouting department have seen his potential in a different team. Bologna also build up in a back three shape, and given the successes of the recruitment drive over the summer there is little reason to question their motives.

Yet, if we’re being picky, the one area of the pitch where the early twenties model might just be stretched is in midfield. Once (if) Granit Xhaka leaves, an established and elite central midfielder would be preferred, just to add some experience in such an integral part of the pitch. The need for someone to come in and hit the ground running would be ideal as there are ‘projects’ all across the squad and some seniority wouldn’t go amiss. Maybe just once, but, in Arsenal we trust, right?