Was missing out on this target Arsenal’s biggest summer mistake?

If Arsenal had brought in Alexis Sanchez on deadline day, rather than Danny Welbeck, I think fans would feel a lot more impressed by their club’s work this summer. The fact of the matter is, however, that The Gunners are stronger in most areas than they were last season.

New recruits Danny Welbeck (who grabbed a couple of goals for England the other night) and Alexis Sanchez will add some much needed pace to The Gunners’ forward line (alongside the soon to return Theo Walcott).

But whilst The Gunners are stronger upfront, they’ve somehow endeavoured to become weaker at the back. Arsene Wenger agreed to let Arsenal’s third choice centre-back, Thomas Vermaelen, move to Barcelona during the summer as part of a £15m deal.

For some reason, he failed to bring anybody else in, despite surely knowing in advance that Vermaelen’s time at the club had come to an end. It really is a sorry state of affairs.

It’s not like there weren’t options out there. The Gunners were linked to a number of them.

Take for instance, Greek defender Kostas Manolas, the option that Arsenal were linked to most strongly. The Metro note that Arsene Wenger and co. had managed to agree an £8m fee for the 23-year-old. Unfortunately the deal fell through when Roma came in with a £10.3m offer. So it was off to Italy for Manolas and Arsenal were left short of defensive options.

Arsene Wenger has a frustrating tendency to avoid competition for players in the transfer market. Given the situation, he really should have taken Roma on. Instead, he decided to drop out of a deal, because of a £2.3m difference in the player’s evaluation.

If The Gunners miss out on silverware this season because of this, then how costly would this decision have proved to be? The failure to bring in a decent centre-back could set Arsenal back considerably more than £2.3m.

If he rated Kostas Manolas, then he should have closed the deal. Failure to bring him in (or any other defender for that matter) could set Arsenal back considerably. Let’s just hope that Per Mertesacker and Laurent Koscielny are able to pick up the lack.

What’s your take? Were Arsenal right to let Kostas Manolas move to Roma?

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