AFTV News

Loan watch: Folarin Balogun breaks 47-year-old goal record for Reims  By Ben Hart Arsenal’s loanees enjoyed a fruitful weekend across Europe. One youngster even broke a goal record which had stood for 47 years at his new club. Elsewhere, there were debut goals, first starts and injury absentees. Read below our top three stars of the week, as well as a full round-up of each player hoping to impress away from north London.   Folarin Balogun   Folarin Balogun continued his fine start in Ligue 1, scoring for the third straight game and setting a new club record for loan side Reims.   The 21-year-old has become the first Reims player since Jacques Vergnes in 1975 to score in each of his first three matches for the club.   With three rounds played in the French top-flight, only Neymar and Kylian Mbappe have scored more goals than the England youth international.   Balogun’s latest effort, against Strasbourg, earned Reims their first point of the season after heav...

Who do Arsenal need to sell? By Tom Masters Arsenal ’s transfer policy appears to have changed recently, with Mikel Arteta handed significant amounts to land his summer targets.   Ben White, Albert Sambi Lokonga, Aaron Ramsdale, Martin Odegaard, Takehiro Tomiyasu and Nuno Tavares all joined the Gunners in the summer for a total of £149m – the most in the Premier League.    But while they managed to secure a lot of talent coming into the club, they were unable to move a lot of players onto pastures new, with only Joe Willock leaving permanently.   But this January it will be Arteta’s main goal to see some of the lesser members of his squad sold to generate more funds to bring in that all important goal scorer.    We look at who could be on their way out of the Gunners squad this January.    Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang    The Gabonese forward was only made captain recently, but that has already been stripped, as has his place in the team as ...

Good business? Ranking all of Arsenal’s 2020/21 season transfers By Josh Graham Now the season has ended it is time to rank Mikel Arteta’s business in the transfer market from both the windows last summer and in January.  Thomas Partey 6/10 It was finally Partey time on deadline day at the end of last summer’s delayed transfer window. Ghanaian midfielder Thomas Partey arrived from Atletico Madrid for £45million with big expectations after some impressive engine room displays in La Liga. Much like the team as a whole, there have been glimpses of the real quality Partey can bring to the side but overall he has failed to live up to the hype in his first Premier League campaign. The 27-year-old has battled with injury and if he can string a run of games together next season is sure to become a fans favourite and help boss games in the middle for Arteta. Gabriel Magalhaes 6/10 Another man who arrived to much fanfare, centre-back Gabriel rocked up at the Emirates for £23.5m after Gunners...

                                            Mid-season report card: Who's near the top and who's been a flop for Arsenal in the Premier League this season? By Adam Le Roux We’re over halfway through the Premier League season, and for Arsenal it has been a campaign full of ups and (mainly) downs, with the Gunners sitting 11th in the table after 23 matches played. Mikel Arteta’s side have had their woes at both ends of the pitch since the 2020/21 season got underway back in September, with a dawdling defence and misfiring frontline contributing to a below-par performance to date. But individually, there have been some reasons to be cheerful this campaign, with a number of players performing solidly when they take to the field, so it hasn’t been all doom and gloom around the Emirates. Here we take our first look at just who has impressed in this weird and wacky season, and who has ...

Pablo Mari is the reason why Arsenal's form has turned around with the Gunners starting to rise up the Premier League table By Peter White Arsenal’s resurgence since the festive period has been met by a wave of praise aimed at the team’s electric youngsters, but should Pablo Mari’s influence be considered when contemplating the reasons for the upturn in fortunes?  The likes of Emile Smith Rowe - who scored in the Gunners’ 2-0 FA Cup win over Newcastle last time out - and Bukayo Saka have rightly been recognised for playing their part, but Mari has been equally central to their success.  The Spanish defender has endured a largely interrupted start to life at the Emirates having initially joined on loan from Brazilian Serie A side Flamengo 12 months ago, with injury and the Covid-19 pandemic restricting him to just three appearances last season.  Boss Mikel Arteta’s decision to make the move permanent in the summer despite Mari’s lack of playing time suggested he had spotte...

Magic Mari and amazing Emile - all the fallout from Arsenal's 2-0 victory over Newcastle in the Emirates FA Cup third round By Adam Le Roux Let’s be honest, Saturday’s FA Cup third round clash with Newcastle was hardly a classic. It was a two-hour slog, with a sprinkle of quality at the end to seal the win.  Arsenal weren’t much better than their opponents at the Emirates, and if Andy Carroll had any sort of goalscoring instinct then we could be sat here digesting another defeat, but that’s football for you.  Maybe it’s about time that the Gunners edged a game that they could so easily have lost. It seems that the reverse has happened so often this season, where the results haven’t matched the performances, that they were due one of them.  Sometimes it doesn’t matter how you win a game, as long as you do, and that’s exactly what happened on Saturday evening, as progression to the fourth round of the Cup is all that matters.  There were still plenty of talking points ...

Are Arsenal back on track? What we learned from the thumping Premier League win over West Brom By Peter White The festive spirit was certainly flowing at Arsenal after back-to-back successes over the Christmas period, and the Gunners carried their recent upturn in form into the New Year with a thumping 4-0 win at West Brom on Saturday night.  Having failed to win their previous seven, successive wins over Chelsea, Brighton and now the Baggies have lifted Mikel Arteta’s charges to 11th in the table - swiftly reigniting hopes of securing a European place. It’s certainly amazing how much can change in the matter of just a couple of weeks, with the free-flowing, confident play on show throughout a scintillating display at the Hawthorns a far cry from some of the turgid stuff fans were put through earlier in the campaign.  The hugely impressive Kieran Tierney set the tone for a comfortable night in the Black Country with a stunning solo effort in the 23rd minute, before Bukayo Saka...

Is Laca back to his best? Three things we learned from Arsenal's 4-1 victory over Rapid Vienna in the Europa League By Adam Le Roux It almost felt like the good old days last night, as a rampant Arsenal side demolished Rapid Vienna 4-1 in front of actual real-life supporters, as they kept up their 100% record in this season’s Europa League group stage. The 2000 Gooners in attendance were treated to a free-flowing side that looked capable of scoring each and every time they came forward at the Emirates, with the confidence oozing out of the team by the end of the 90 minutes - a stark contrast to what we've seen in the Premier League recently... Alexandre Lacazette’s early thunderbolt set the tone for a routine victory for Mikel Arteta’s side, before Pablo Mari added a second before the clock had even reached 20 minutes, as the Spaniard netted on his return to the side after six months on the sidelines. The hosts continued to toy with their opponents throughout the first half, an...

How was Arsenal's summer - from Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang's new deal to Mikel Arteta's title change and new signings? By Bradley West One of the most turbulent seasons in Arsenal’s history ended in promising fashion last campaign and, after a summer of change, the future is beginning to look brighter at the Emirates. Buoyed by evidence of progress made under Mikel Arteta, and with a record 14th FA Cup trophy in the bag thanks to an incredibly satisfying win over Chelsea, the levels of optimism both inside and outside of the club are the highest they have been for as long as many fans care to remember. And, even if the gap to the top two continues to be a step too far for now, the feeling is that the only way is up for the Gunners. That has been helped by a fairly successful ‘summer’, or whatever you can call that short gap between these two most unique of seasons, with key additions made in several areas. Let’s look through some of the key changes made over the summer a...