Mikel Arteta, 29, and Yossi Benayoun, 31, are of course both well known for their exploits in the Premier League. Both players in an attacking sense give Arsenal a well-rounded midfield, with Arteta likely to play similar to that of Fabregas played, in a more midfield dictator role.
Arteta has signed a four-year contract and has clearly been seen to take over from Fabregas at the heart of the Gunners midfield.
The capture of Benayoun on a one-year long deal from Chelsea has been seen as negative by some Gunners fans. The talented Israeli brings creativity and flair with his experience, and will provide backup for a number of positions across midfield in an attacking sense.
Both players experience of the Premier League will be vital to an otherwise young Gunners team looking to rebuild after losing key personalities in the dressing room.
The acquisition of 26 year-old Park Chu-Young is an interesting one, with the player seen as more of a creator of goals than a prolific scorer of them by many of his admirers. Park has been given the number 9 shirt, and will look to continue the good form of Koreans in the Premier League.
Park, who scored 25 goals in 91 Ligue 1 games for Monaco, made his Korea Republic debut aged 19 and played at both the 2006 and 2010 World Cups.
He succeeds Park Ji-Sung as captain of his country earlier this year after the latter’s international retirement.
“I am very honoured and I feel very happy to be at Arsenal,” Park told www.arsenal.com.
While Wenger no doubt did thorough scouting on the technically gifted Korean, he only averaged around a goal every four games for Monaco. Arsenal need a 20 plus goal a season forward, which they have been unable to find since the departure of former Gunner Thierry Henry.
The Gunners have also filled the left defensive position vacated by Gael Clichy, with the signing of 28 year-old Andre Santos from Turkish Super-lig champion Fenerbahce. The Brazilian international brings more experience to the backline, as well as some “samba” flair. Well known in for his fancy footwork and great left foot, he defends well and attacks even better. He will no doubt make the position his own.
Arsene Wenger has, in this writer’s opinion, brought together a group of players who will bring much needed experience to a youthful team, though may still lack a prolific goal-poaching forward. I want to be proven wrong.
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Arsenal are now superior to face any club addition of (arteta).so lost gooners fan come and feel happy,we are one family
At first glance it has been a bit of a bad summer for them as they’ve lost two of their best players and replaced them with inferior talent.
However, they’d be a lot worse off without the signings they did make, with the best being Mertesacker. At 6ft 6, you can’t help but think they’ve finally got in someone that’ll help prevent teams from bullying their defence.
Tipping them for a 5th-place finish still.
I’m sick and tired of ppl saying Arsenal haven’t won anything for 6 seasons. Gary Neville went on 5 live & moaned that he didn’t win a medal playing for England & now he’s retired, he thinks what was the point of playing for England? Well, that being in mind, England haven’t won anything since 1966, so should we all stop supporting England, especially after we were thrashed 4-1 by Germany in the World Cup? I think the Arsenal critics can go & f*ck off & keep 2 supporting Germany, Spain & Man Utd. We’re just licking our wounds, but we’ll be backing fighting as always. Arsenal till death & Wilshire to become England’s next David Beckham.
why are some arsenal fans think they are in a candy store, mertesacker lacks pace, last season he was injured with a ripped achillies, fast pace players will turn him over like he does not exist, santos, can not even make it into the brazil squad because of his inept display against paruguay where he was turned over and over by a qucik paced attacker, arteta never been the same since his serious injury 2 years ago, the korean striker sorry what can he offer that bentdner could not,and the chelsea reject always injured, and if he was so good why was he not in the chelsea team, these purchases smell of deperation wenger kroenke and gazidis live in cukoo land, believe players should be on minimum wage, we lost three world class players and bought inferior ones to replace them, it shows kroenke is not interested in success, we will not finish 5th we will be fighting relegation, that is obvious by our performances to date the writing has been on the wall for some time, but wenger and the board have refused to acknowledge it, claiming we have quality in the team if we did it be evident by perfomances and all we have to say is man utd, wenger kroenke and gazidis and board need to go we need usamonov and dein running this club becuase they will have arsenal interest at heart what we have now is a board interested in lining their own pockets it is called greed
With the signings and possible additions in January of a $30 million mid fielder and another $10 million defender,ARSENAL will challenge effectively
for throphies. We ofcourse need also LADY LUCK. Ron Aborowa