Even before he had officially signed for Arsenal , Eberechi Eze had his mural defaced. An image of him near this stadium headlined “All roads lead home” had white paint thrown over all it (see page two). Without evidence, suspicions turned to Tottenham fans.
Half an hour before his new team-mates walked out to face Leeds here, Eze became Arsenal’s seventh signing of the summer, for £60m plus add-ons, from Crystal Palace on a four-year contract. Ten minutes before the whistle Eze wandered out in the No 10 shirt once worn by Dennis Bergkamp, the finest of all Arsenal’s “creatives”. Approval and affection engulfed him as he followed the Ian Wright path from Selhurst Park to Highbury and Islington.
The club said of Eze in a statement: “His creativity adds another dimension to our attacking options and his versatility means he is a player who can operate either on the left, the right, or centrally. He has fantastic football intelligence and an ability to see openings and passes many other players cannot see.
“We also know his character and charisma on and off the pitch will help him fit in well, and he is a player with whom our fans will really connect.”
Palace were gracious, posting: “Thank you for everything, Ebs.” A record sale for Palace took Arsenal’s spending this summer to £250m, and Arteta’s since he took over in 2019 to £900m. In their second game back in the Premier League, Leeds walked into a stadium awash with optimism. They were 3-0 down in less than 50 minutes.
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Eze’s arrival is less of a signing than a homecoming. He was here from nine to 13 years old but then sent down a circuitous route back, via Fulham, Reading, Millwall, through trials at Bristol City and Sunderland, to Queens Park Rangers and Palace.
With the Eze mural now invisible, except as counter-art, daubing was in evidence on a sandwich board outside a cafe. “Arteta – now we want more. No excuses,” it said, a touch hysterically, considering that Arsenal have finished runners-up to Manchester City and Liverpool in the last three title races.
The team the impatient manifesto writer supports finished eighth as recently as 2021. The more Arteta spends though, the less slack he will be cut.
In the age of “transitions”, add this one: from squad depth to stockpiling, in which the biggest clubs stack big-name players and their managers work overtime to persuade those left out to be patient, realistic, sacrificial. How does Arteta pick a starting midfield from Martin Ødegaard, Ethan Nwaneri, Mikel Merino, Martín Zubimendi, Christian Nørgaard and Declan Rice? How does he select a forward line from Viktor Gyökeres, Bukayo Saka, Gabriel Martinelli, Noni Madueke, Kai Havertz, Gabriel Jesus (when those two are fit), Leandro Trossard and now Eze? Promoted Leeds will have a few challenges this season – but not that one.
Answer: by telling half a dozen internationals every week to watch from the bench and await their chance to “help the team”. A challenge not so much of typing 11 names as placating those not on the list is becoming ingrained at the top Premier League clubs.
Good luck to the managers, who need to be diplomats, psychologists and priests, while always watching for daggers in their backs, from disaffected players and agents.
Ever since Eze jilted Spurs late on to return to the club who discarded him, analysts have asked: where will he fit in? Fans love those debates. They suggest “good problems to have” – talent brimming over.
It is easier when the club can expect to play 60 games or so, with Champions League action. Then, rotation can be cast as resource management. “Top players want to play every game” is a truism that the richest clubs are now chipping away at.
Eze’s purchase is neither vulgar nor gratuitous. They already have a playmaker in their captain Ødegaard, who wears No 8, and who lasted only 37 minutes here after injuring a shoulder. But Eze has more speed and power and is a master of the unexpected. If he starts wider, he and Ødegaard should combine comfortably.
The Arsene Wenger-era label of a team who try to walk the ball into the net hangs less heavily after the summer’s acquisitions. You don’t buy a £65m centre-forward (Gyökeres) if you only want to tippy-tap past the goalkeeper. Nor, buy Madueke, who, Arteta says, can “unlock situations and create uncertainty in and around the goal.”
Arsenal’s strong midfield base of Rice, Merino and Zubimendi and the best defence in the league permits Arteta’s attackers no excuse for not taking care of their end of the deal. A defender, Jürrien Timber, struck first against Leeds, and naturally the stadium camera panned round to Eze, applauding in the stands. Gyökeres began quietly at Old Trafford last weekend but has his first Arsenal goals now – his team’s third and fifth of the night.
When Saka limped off early in the second half, Arteta’s selection dilemmas began to feel less acute. Maybe injuries, in this case to Ødegaard and Saka, will make some of Arteta’s decisions for him. But as the goals rolled in for Arsenal – four in less than an hour – Eze’s presence began to feel like a statement of Arsenal’s ambitions, a willingness to pile talent so high that it acquires unstoppable momentum.
To accentuate that point, they sent on 15-year-old Max Dowman, the wonderboy and second youngest player in Premier League history – who promptly won the penalty for Gyökeres to score his second – to make the crowd even happier.
Photograph by John Walton/PA Wire