Arsenal are currently flying high in the Premier League, and despite the recent home defeat to title rivals Manchester City knocking the Gunners off top spot, avoiding victory in their game in hand would re-establish their lead.
Having failed to qualify for Champions League football in each of the past six campaigns, Mikel Arteta must be praised for the manner in which he has maintained an upward trajectory since his arrival at the helm, having previously starred for the club during his playing career.
After winning the FA Cup in 2019/20, his debut managerial campaign, the 40-year-old has made steady improvements at the Emirates Stadium, with the current campaign leaving the club firmly on course for a return to Europe’s premier club competition, 11 points above fifth-placed Tottenham Hotspur and with a game in hand.
Arteta can indeed take pride in the job he is doing at Arsenal, but he might have never had the foundation to build upon had the club succeeded in a past bid for Thomas Lemar…
Were Arsenal right to reject Thomas Lemar?
In 2017, AS Monaco seismically triumphed in Ligue 1, defeating overwhelming favourites Paris-Saint Germain to the crown and enjoying a memorable Champions League run to the semi-finals.
Winger Lemar, who was then 21, was integral in these endeavours with £92m bid for the pacy Frenchman, which the player rejected following concerns over the club’s failure to clinch Champions League football that year.
Last year, L’Equipe reported that the Gunners turned down the opportunity to dive back in for the now 27-year-old, who has succumbed to a significant plummet from the prominence of his early feats in his homeland.
In hindsight, Arsenal can be glad with that decision, with his fall from grace laid bare since moving to Atletico Madrid for £53m in 2018, one year after Arsenal’s exorbitant attempt to land him from Monaco.
As evidenced by the graphic displayed above, Lemar’s decline has been stark, and those close to the 27-cap dud must be somewhat incredulous as to quite how it happened.
At Diego Simeone’s Atletico, he has only scored nine goals and provided 19 assists from 163 appearances, and his current market value of just £11m (via Football Transfers) is indeed an illustration of the player’s bitter woes.
Once heralded as “lethal” by compatriot Hugo Lloris, Lemar now offers little more than a toothless bite, having failed to score from 20 appearances this season, setting up a mere two goals.
While his transitional play remains impressive – the 27-year-old ranks among the top 8% of positional peers over the past year for progressive carries and successful take-ons – his lack of dynamism would not knock Arsenal’s established wingers Gabriel Martinelli and Bukayo Saka off their respective perches.
The club did sign Nicolas Pepe in a £72m deal two years after their failed Lemar bud, a transfer which was widely acknowledged as a failure, with former Gunners boss Unai Emery saying of the Ivorian: “He didn’t give me the performances.”
Arsenal dodged a bullet, and despite the club being grazed by the expensive and lacklustre deal for Pepe in 2019, Arteta will count his lucky stars that both deals were not completed.
It’s hard to imagine that the club’s meteoric rise of late would have been quite so fluid had they blundered on Lemar too.