Loans, Reserves and Academy

Sanogo's bright start to his Charlton loan has got me thinking whether we are utilizing the loan market effectively or not.

This is the first time I've seen Arsenal get down to work in the loan market.If I'm not wrong, this season we've sent the maximum number of players for loan.

But have we done it effectively?

There has been Jon Toral, who has almost effectively got a decent chance at least during the pre-season at Arsenal. Niles, Akpom, and Zelalem have had decent spells while Silva has showed if he's worked upon We've got a genuine winger on our hands. But on the flip side, we've had three players come back with two of them having played precious few minutes at their loaned clubs.

What did AW think when he sent Sanogo to Ajax and Gnabry to WBA. Though it might seem like hindsight, I remember a lot of us were skeptical about these two loans or, at least, Gnabry's since this was the season where he should've got more first-team minutes as he was returning from an injury.He ended up getting 12 minutes ( he created one semi-chance with a dribble). Both Sanogo and Gnabry were playing for the reserve teams while Crowley being sent back seemed stupid as I remember he was playing well.

I believe we should concentrate more on loaning our players with a guarantee that they'll get a handsome amount of first-team minutes under their belt.

Honestly, I feel the Premier Reserve League and other underage leagues are serious waste of time. Players are gonna learn much more if they're loaned out than playing in the Reserves.

And to all those who say here they'll get to learn the Arsenal way, I need to point out there's no certified Arsenal way. We seem to have adopted an occasional sit back-counter-tiki-take the weak teams-pass to Oezil-compulsarily bottle strategy. If the first team itself doesn't have a hard and fast strategy like say La Masia, why are we wasting the talents?

Also,I've always had this doubt, are the reserves and the underage teams playing the same formation/strategy as the first team. Coz it saves time on adaption if at all they get to play for the first team. But,I don't think we play the same formation as can be seen with the 0 DMs we've got in the Reserves and underage groups. All we seem to have on our hands are attackers, attackers and more attackers. Ultimately, at some point we let these attackers go as they're in abundance right from the first team to the underages ending up losing some great talents.

I read the La Masia teams play the same formation/strategy as the first team and the results are there for all to see.Munir,Sandro and Samper all have played for the first team and have had decent performances compared how our Academy grads.

After a long time, we seem to be having a good batch of English talents coming up. If they're trained properly and loaned correctly, we can go the Barca/Bayern way.

That brings me to the next question, have we got a good enough satellite club?

The Chelsea-Vitesse partnership is the perfect one for the loan system. Chelsea get to cherry pick any talents that Vitesse may have and also get their loaned players first team minutes. Also, the occasional chance of Europe as well.

We need to do the same,IMO or watch all our academy talents shine elsewhere. How we wish we had a Nordveit or Ozyakup now?

TL;DR We're not utilizing the loan market effectively and our academy/underage teams need to be improved.

Also, which loanee do you think should have a go at the Arsenal first team fringes?

My answer is Jon Toral.This is the second loan where has performed well and should be given a first team chance.

Also,Silva to at least play for Arsenal in the pre-season.

The thing is, we wouldn't have sent Gnabry to West Brom without assurances he would get first team games. That Pulis decided, after seeing him in training, that Gnabry wasn't working hard enough is not something you can predict. Questions should be asked about sending one of our better youth prospects to a Pulis team, but at the same time questions need to be asked about the player's mentality and attitude while he's on loan.

For the most part our loans have been successful this year. Toral, Maitland-Niles, Akpom, Hayden, Silva, Zelalem and Crowley all got regular games at their clubs. Crowley was sent back for whatever reason - maybe Arsenal wanted him back, or maybe Barnsley thought his application wasn't good enough either despite his good performances. Previous years it's worked well too for the likes of Bellerin, Coquelin and Wilshere. A couple of poor loans doesn't mean we haven't been using the system effectively. All clubs have loans that don't work out.

As for the academy itself, not enough good keepers and defenders are coming through, and that's down to the coaching and scouting at the youngest levels. I also think there are too many foreign players being brought in, not necessarily because they block off opportunities for home-grown players but because it shows there isn't enough good home-grown players coming through. It's something Jonker has to address but it's also something that's not going to be resolved in a short space of time.

The most important thing, I feel, is having a pathway to the first team. All the age groups play the same way (you'll be hard pressed to find a club that doesn't do this) so young players can step into the first team ready, but it's pointless if there's no pathway to that first team. Chelsea can send as many players on loan as they want, but the number that actually get games at Chelsea and play an active role in their squad is small. Barca have a fantastic structure all the way through and part of that is the willingness to give their most talented B-team players chances in the first team.

And yes, the U21 league does suck, but with so much resistance to the B team structure it's not going to change any time soon.

Guess I jinxed it, Sanogo red card.

Jay, the point I'm saying here is, we must've been careful while sending out Gnabry and Sanogo on loan.

We must be kidding ourselves if we thought Sanogo will get chances at Ajax. Neither the league nor the club suited his strengths. To add to all this the competition for places.

Similarly, Gnabry's loan was also stupid, IMO. His first season after injury and he should've been sent to a club where he'll be given host of chances and thus, can get his confidence back.

Instead we send him to a club that despises attacking football, managed by someone who despises AW.

It seemed like we considered these two as lost causes and CBA about where to loan them.

It may seem like nitpicking, but one screwed loan can make us spend 20 mio for the same postition that the loanee could have played if his loan had been a success. Gnabry could be our RW in the future, if his loans are well thought.

Same goes for the Underage teams. They suffer from the same problems as the senior team. The highlights vs Liverpool I posted in the Reserves thread shows what's wrong. None of the players seem to even try and stop Masterson from scoring. Most of them are static. I can understand the ball came to him through a lucky deflection but that doesn't mean we need to be static.

Maybe the lack of proper defence coaching is the real reason why we don't have many defensive talents?