Mikel Arteta and Eddie Howe on the touchline during the Premier League match between Arsenal and Newcastle United | George Wood/Getty Imagesplaceholder image
Mikel Arteta and Eddie Howe on the touchline during the Premier League match between Arsenal and Newcastle United | George Wood/Getty Images | George Wood/Getty Images
Mikel Arteta’s side are in contention for the Premier League and Champions League despite missing a world-class left winger
Arguably Arsenal’s only weakness following a blockbuster 2025 summer transfer window was left-winger, and though they opted not to try and upgrade there in January, that’s no indication that they won’t target the position in a few months’ time.
Reported interest in Rodrygo, Nico Wiliams and Rafael Leao failed to yield a superstar signing and despite topping the Premier League team scoring charts, Arsenal have still found it difficult at times to break down teams that are dug in defensively.
And though Liverpool and Manchester United are very interested in the 25-year-old, TEAMtalk believe Arsenal lead the race for Gordon, reportedly targeting a £75 million deal with Newcastle who are hoping for a fee closer to £95m.
Could Gordon be Arsenal’s missing piece?
On paper, yes. While Bukayo Saka has been a phenomenon on the right flank for at least five seasons, notching 135 goal contributions in all competitions since missing that penalty in the Euros final, Arsenal’s left flank hasn’t been anywhere near as productive.
After Gabriel Martinelli was outstanding in The Gunners’ first title charge in 2022/23 he’s only scored Premier League 15 goals since then and the streaky Leandro Trossard has netted 26 top-flight goals in his Arsenal career, with each player’s assist tallies even worse.
So fill that slot in the starting 11 with someone who’s recorded 35 goals and 28 goals in the last three seasons and Arsenal’s only real weakness is filled, right? You’d think you could pencil them in for at least two trophies per season for the rest of the decade with a strongest lineup looking like that.
But maybe not. Because if this season is anything to go by, the era of free-scoring wingers could be coming to an end.
Gordon could well be right player, wrong time for Arsenal
The 2010s was certainly the decade of the wingers as the 4-4-2 formation faded into insignificance and Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo broke record after record effectively starting as wide forwards.
Even behind the two era-defining players, so many of the biggest stars of the decade operated in the wide channels - Neymar, Gareth Bale, Eden Hazard, Mohamed Salah, Frank Ribery, Arjen Robben, Raheem Sterling, Alexis Sanchez, Sadio Mane, Son Heung-min and Marco Reus to name but a few.
Yet after Robert Lewandowski broke Messi, Ronaldo and Neymar’s 12-year stranglehold on the Champions League Golden Boot in the 2019/20 season, no winger has won the Ballon d’Or apart from Messi himself once.
And while Messi and Ronaldo’s continued presence in European football alongside the likes of Salah and Son going from strength to strength plus the emergence of Vinicius Junior, Lamine Yamal, Michael Olise and Raphinha initially hid the decline of goalscoring wingers, this season’s numbers have been stark.
Antoine Semenyo is the only winger who’s hit double figures in the Premier League this season while only four other out-and-out wingers have hit that tally in Europe’s other top five leagues.
The Champions League has been a different story, but it looks likely that European competitions will fall in line with the biggest domestic leagues rather than the other way around.
Indeed, you might’ve even noticed how I cherrypicked stats when comparing Saka with Martinelli and Trossard. Saka has only made five goals and five assists in the Premier League this campaign and looks like the rule rather than the exception - as does Gordon with the Liverpudlian’s stark contrast in output between domestic and European football well documented.
With defences (and particularly full-backs) getting bigger and the centre of the pitch getting more congested, there’s simply less space for wingers to cut into and create goalscoring opportunities from.
Interestingly, many of the standout wide players (taking a loose definition) this season haven’t been those developed mainly by the academies of big six clubs like Saka or Phil Forden - but in the EFL where they learned adaptability and versatility over a rigid philosophy that now looks outdated.
Semenyo, Bryan Mbeumo, Jarrod Bowen, Harry Wilson and Morgan Rogers all played close to or over 100 games for teams in the Championship or below, but Gordon’s only experience below the Premier League was a dreadful spell at Preston North End where he made no goal contributions in 11 games and was dropped for the final month of the season.
This isn’t to say that Gordon can’t or definitely won’t succeed at Arsenal. But if he does then he may well be an outlier in world football and he may be one of the last wingers in the mould of Messi or Ronaldo to move for £75m or above until the next major tactical shift in the sport.
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