So too was hearing that William Saliba had a good game for OGC Nice last night, even though they lost 2-0 and the Brest ‘keeper nearly scored the most bizarre own-goal you’ve ever seen from a pass back from his defender, hitting the crossbar and post before it rebounded back to him. Google it and see if you can find it – it really is quite something. But as for Willy himself, according to my mate Giles who watched the game, he was solid enough at the back. He wasn’t specifically targeted by Brest and that suggests an element of respect for the youngster, but there will come games when he’s tested and then it will be interested to see how he gets on.

Arsenal will certainly be keen to find out and watch closely. I can’t think of a situation in our history where a big money signing was on loan in the situation he’s been in. By that I mean usually our loan moves have been for youngsters that we want to see if they are going to come good, like Smith-Rowe at Huddersfield, or if you want to go way back then you look at Wilshere at Bolton, for example. But those are young academy players who are on low wages and who, if they don’t quite manage to impress enough, would probably just be moved on by the club. The other type of loan is the one where a player is surplus to requirements and we just want to get him out for game time in a hope we can move him in the follow transfer window. Kolasinac and Torreira are clearly that type of player and we know that their card is probably marked in terms of their Arsenal career. But a young, newly signed prospect who we have publicly stated has a long-term future at The Arsenal? That’s a new scenario and I suspect the Arsenal Loan Manager Ben Knapper will have been given a particularly detailed remit to keep a close eye on Saliba. He is an expensive asset that Arsenal need to see plenty of game time getting and also improving, so I suspect there will be plenty for him to be observing in the coming months.

The other Arsenal noises continue to rumble along about a creative midfielder. Julian Brandt’s name keeps popping up and this morning I saw a Tweet about Dortmund supposedly being willing to let Brandt go on loan until the summer. Maybe that is an option for us. We’ve already said that ideally we’d like to get a loan move this January and then make a decision in the summer and if Dortmund really are open to that I think it might be an interesting approach. The only challenge with that, however, is that it either goes two ways with this type of player:

1. He comes in, hits the ground running instantly is a hit, meaning Dortmund want him back and we don’t get to see him beyond this season. Alternatively, it drives his price up and we have an expensive signing to make (although that is more justifiable if he has indeed had a blinder playing for us as you know what you are getting).
2. He comes in, is patchy and inconsistent, doesn’t really improve the team and as a result we don’t hit our objectives for the end of the year. Sure we have mitigated risk in having him on loan, but the reason we want him in the first place is so that he can improve us, and if he doesn’t then it’s another waste of resources.

Either way it is a tricky one but if we did decide to go for a loan move like that then it does buy us more time for a proper look for a creative midfielder in the summer. Maybe that’s when the discussion over Buendia can be restarted, because that seems like a no-go with the supposed £40million that Norwich would want for his services.

Personally I’d do it if the financials are right. Buys us time, gives us another options and means you can alternate between Smith-Rowe and Brandt. And if Smith-Rowe gets more game time then that’d be perfect, because he has more of a future at the club than a player who is on a loan with no obligation to buy. It also covers the question that everyone has about our reliance on Smith-Rowe given his injury record, as well as the fact that the club see Smith-Rowe as a guy to come in and be the deputy rather than the main man. Brandt is 24 and has more senior football under his name, as well as being a German international with over 30 caps to his name, so would clearly come in and be the main man. But Smith-Rowe will have enough of a carrot dangled in front of him if it were a ‘loan only’ move, knowing that by staying fit and playing well he could really have Arsenal asking questions about who they bring in during the summer if he succeeds.

Either way it will be interesting to see what Arsenal have planned and how quickly they are going to move. I hope they do something soon because in January alone we have five games to play in the space of 21 days – that’s a game roughly every four days and if we are going to leave it until the end of the window we are either playing Smith-Rowe and risking some kind of injury given how little senior football he has played for us, or we are going to use a square peg in a round hole. We tried that with Lacazette – didn’t work. Willian has never played centrally in his career and yet we were looking at him and wondering if he would do it – he won’t. With Ozil on the verge of exit, or at least certainly not a player who will be named in the Arsenal squad, then we really don’t have anybody other than Smith-Riwe who has even come close to looking like they could do it in that connector role between midfield and attack.

So my hope is that Arsenal are making their moves now because if you can get somebody in for mid-January, for example, there are games against Southampton, Man United and Wolves that this player could realistically be in contention for.

Right, that’s yer lot from me for today, so I’ll bid thee farewell and be back tomorrow with whatever other thoughts pop into my head Arsenal-related.

Laters folks.

Do we all have the energy for it though? In the last few months a lot of the joy was sucked out of my football watching experience, so the idea that we’ve got a month of rumour and conjecture to come on top of what still may be a difficult time is hardly filling me with excitement.

I must say though, at least some of the rumours that have emerged are a little different to what we’ve been hearing over the last few weeks. A couple of weeks ago it was a Xhaka/Erikson swap deal which hardly lights a fire of excitement, does it? The Dane has pretty much failed in Italy, is hardly the kind of athletic footballer that at 28 is going to improve, as well as the feeling of repeating our mistakes for going after older players. It doesn’t feel like a ‘going in the right direction’ move for The Arsenal and that’s probably why so many Arsenal fans have been a bit ‘meh’ about it.

Thankfully it appears as though that rumour has subsided a bit and in its place we’ve got noises that Arsenal have enquired about Julian Brandt at Dortmund. There’s a few names on this list in the Athletic and Brandt is on that list. Maybe it’s just because he has a similar name to Draxler, but it feels like a similar link there and whilst I’d love to believe we’re close, the player hasn’t really been at Dortmund too long. He signed a year and a half ago and has played 22 games this season and whilst he doesn’t seem to have lit up the place in Germany, I’d be surprised if they were willing to part with him just yet.

It feels – and sounds – like he’s similar to what we have in Pepe. Not in position, but in the fact he was signed for decent money, hasn’t really caught fire at any stage and by the sound of it is really inconsistent. Nevertheless I would still be more tempted by a move like that over the likes of Christian Erikson.

The other names in the article are Nkunku, who it very much feels like we should have been going after a little more than…ahem…Denis Suarez two January’s ago, but again he’s a player who I’d be surprised if we could afford now. He’s got eight goals and 20 assists in 60 games for Leipzig and to prize him away would take a heck of a lot of coin. He’s also a player with whom I’d be surprised if Leipzig would be happy to lose on loan too.

Buendia is seen as the other guy who everyone wants and Norwich’s promotion hopes no doubt will need him to remain with the number of assists and goals he’s got this season. He’s the type of guy who you’d think would jump at the chance of The Arsenal but he has a four year contract and that means Norwich can afford to ply hardball to inflate the price. That means even if we are interested we’d probably have to pay over the odds, especially in January, so that’s another one I’d be really surprised if it happened.

I don’t want to go all ‘Debbie Downer’ on you this morning, I’m just struggling to see where a gem can be found on a possible loan deal this January, because ideally that’s what we should be looking at. A ‘try before you buy’ is needed for where we are right now and it just feels like that option won’t apply to so many players. As well as that though, if we’re looking to haggle, how are we going to get deals done early January?

My worry is that in Edu’s first window where all eyes are on him, he’s going to make the same mistakes we always seem to make and not have done his deals and background work already. Arteta has already said the work is done and now they are just waiting for the window to open. That’s a smart move because it basically puts the spotlight on Edu and if he and his ‘team’ don’t make those moves swiftly as soon as the window open, then I’m afraid he will look like that weak link at the club who needs to pay with his job. We don’t have time to give Edu three windows. ‘Succeed now or off you go’ needs to be the mantra at Arsenal for this January.

For all of our sakes I hope he does succeed. And I hope he does it without reverting to a Kia black book or some ageing formerly good players who are just looking for another semi retirement package like Willian.

Catch you wonderful peeps tomorrow. We might have a press conference to discuss by then.