It is fair to say that both Arsenal and Barcelona have had troubled seasons, although the degree of trouble has varied greatly between these two clubs. Arsenal were in a poor position early on, facing issues within their squad itself with Granit Xhaka’s pointed gesture to the home crowd in October being just one example of how the team was under a lot of pressure. Manager Unai Emery was sacked not too long after, with the club deciding to appoint former captain and Pep Guardiola’s assistant coach at Manchester City, Mikel Arteta, to the role. Arteta had a challenging start to his managerial career as well, but the last week has shown the progress he has made, with Arsenal beating Liverpool and then City in quick succession.
On the other hand, the mess at Barcelona only seems to be getting worse. The club sacked Ernesto Valverde despite being top of the league in January and brought in Quique Setien. However, he was very much a backup option, with the club’s primary managerial targets all either unavailable or unwilling to arrive at the Camp Nou. Setien has struggled with this team, even though he has had a reputation for attacking football, and the result has been that Barcelona meekly surrendered their La Liga crown to Real Madrid. The collapse even brought about a rare public show of dissatisfaction from Lionel Messi, who said in a post-match interview that they have no hope of beating Napoli in the Champions League if they continue playing like this.
This is just a small snapshot of the true picture at both clubs, with the boards at both coming under fire from fans for some poor decision-making. In fact, fans of Barcelona could be forgiven for thinking that the board of directors are gambling with the club, much like you would do with online casino games, due to some of the transfer decisions which have been made in recent years. One of those decisions, to bring in Philippe Coutinho from Liverpool, has backfired immensely, with the club’s outlay of £142 million nowhere close to being recouped by the Brazilian’s displays. He has struggled to fit into the team’s tactics, and was loaned out to Bayern Munich this season, with the hope that they would pick him up on a permanent deal. However, the Bavarian club have declined to do so, leaving Barcelona saddled with Coutinho and looking for a way to move him on.
Arsenal too have some players who are no longer wanted by Arteta. While Mesut Oezil is the highest-profile player without a future at the Emirates, Matteo Guendouzi seems to have joined those ranks recently as well. The French midfielder’s antics in the game against Brighton seem to have been the last straw for Arteta, as he has not featured since then, and it is likely that he will be moved on in the summer. You can probably be certain that Ozil will not play for Arsenal under Arteta, with the odds of that happening being worse than those you would find at online casino websites like paripop.com/fr.
Thus, if reports are to be believed, the two clubs could end up discussing a swap deal for these two players. Of course, Arsenal will have to pay some sort of fee as well, since Coutinho’s market value is still a lot higher than Guendouzi’s, notwithstanding his recent fall from grace. Nevertheless, these two players could offer qualities which are lacking at both these clubs, and while this deal may seem outlandish at the moment, the nature of the game at the moment due to the ongoing pandemic could make a swap deal like this very attractive.
