2023-07-15 13:02:18
This sum smashes the record for the biggest transfer between English clubs when Jack Grealish was transferred in the summer of 2021 from Aston Villa to Manchester City for 100 million pounds and that of the Arsenal club which was 72 million pounds for the Ivorian Nicolas Pépé in 2019, a masterful flop for the Gunners.
Five lengths behind Manchester City last season, having spent 248 days at the top of the Premier League, more than any other English side that did not win the title next, the Londoners were at a crossroads.
Aware that their career also owed to the failed seasons of Liverpool or Chelsea, and while next season Manchester United and Newcastle will present themselves even stronger, Arsenal had to be aggressive on the transfer market in order not to fall into line.
“We will have to succeed perfectly in recruitment because we know that we will have to play at another level and that the requirements will be even higher,” coach Mikel Arteta predicted in May.
In addition to the championship, Arsenal will also have the Champions League on its calendar, for the first time since 2016/2017, which requires mixing quantity and quality.
Arsenal become very attractive again
The recruitment of Rice is, from this point of view, a masterstroke.
If City briefly joined the fight to secure the services of the West Ham midfielder and the England team – perhaps just to raise the stakes – this recruitment is the culmination of a long-term job by Arteta, but also by the sports director Edu, who courted him for many months, discouraging the many other potential suitors in England and even abroad (Bayern Munich).
It is also double proof that Arsenal is once again becoming an attractive club for the very best players and that it is capable of putting money, a lot of money, on the table to achieve its ends.
With the arrivals of Kai Havertz for 75 million euros and Dutchman Jurrien Timber for 40 million euros, the Gunners have bet big on three young players who will flesh out weak sectors in the final sprint last year.
The sum of 122 million euros, which places Rice in the top 3 of the biggest transfers in the history of the Premier League, may surprise, especially for a player who had only one year left on his contract.
But it can be explained by invoking the “jurisprudence” Jack Grealish, who arrived for a sum just below City two years ago.
Rice, already a “finished product”
The two players share many characteristics: exceptional talent and above all “victims” of the hyper-inflation that affects transfers from English club to English club.
But at only 24, Rice also already has solid international experience with 43 selections, including tenures in the 12 matches of the Three Lions in the final phase of the Euro or at the World Cup, not counting the Europa League Conference won with the Hammers. “The responsibility and the role he has taken on has been very impressive,” Mikel Arteta said on Saturday.
While he undoubtedly still has room for improvement, Rice is much more of a “finished product” than Grealish, who took a whole season to digest Pep Guardiola’s ideas.
Rice’s physical impact, his impressive recovery statistics, his ability to improve the ball and break the lines with his passes or his runs, as well as his leadership qualities, make him a modern midfielder of the highest order, even if he will have to get used to playing with a much higher defensive line than with West Ham.
Rice is also a force of nature having played 177 of 190 Premier League appearances over the last 5 seasons, recovering in record time from a knee injury in April 2021 to take part in the Euro two months later.
With, moreover, a coach who knows his position perfectly, in the person of Arteta, the union between Rice and Arsenal looks like a perfect marriage.
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