Arsenal's Attack Faces Crisis as Four Forwards Depart

Arsenal are walking a tightrope of their own making.

With the strongest squad in the Premier League on paper and a title to defend, this should have been a window of fine-tuning. Instead, deadline day at the Emirates is turning into a clear-out in the one area Mikel Arteta could least afford to weaken: his attack.

Four forwards out, no one in

The first domino has already fallen. Arsenal have confirmed Fabio Vieira’s permanent move to Hamburger SV, the Portuguese playmaker leaving for the Bundesliga in a deal worth €10m (£8.5m).

The club’s statement was blunt and to the point: “Fabio Vieira has joined Bundesliga side Hamburger SV on a permanent transfer.” No loan, no buy-back clause mentioned. A clean break.

He will not be the last.

By the end of deadline day, Arsenal are set to lose four attackers:

• Ethan Nwaneri to Borussia Dortmund on loan
• Gabriel Martinelli to Al-Hilal for a fee just over €65m (£56m)
• Gabriel Jesus to Barcelona for €14m including add-ons
• Vieira already gone to Hamburg

All from the same department of the pitch. All in the space of one window. And as it stands, no direct replacements lined up for any of them.

For a club openly chasing quadruples, it is a staggering gamble.

One in, four out

Arsenal have not been entirely inactive. Christos Tzolis has arrived this summer, earmarked for the forward line. But he is essentially the replacement for Leandro Trossard, who left for Besiktas earlier in the window.

So the net picture is stark. Trossard out, Tzolis in. Then Martinelli, Jesus, Vieira and Nwaneri all heading for the exit.

That leaves Arteta with a trimmed attacking core: Tzolis, Eberechi Eze, Martin Odegaard, Max Dowman, Kai Havertz, Viktor Gyokeres, Bukayo Saka and Noni Madueke.

There is still quality there. Plenty of it. Saka remains the talisman, Odegaard the conductor, Havertz and Gyokeres proven threats, Eze a match-winner on his day. But for a side expected to fight on four fronts, the depth that once intimidated the rest of the league suddenly looks fragile.

“I would have imagined two big hitters”

The sense of unease is not confined to the stands.

Writing for The Athletic, Oliver Kay captured the mood around the Emirates as the exits stack up.

“I’m fascinated to see who, if anyone, Arsenal will bring in to bolster their attacking options before the deadline,” he wrote. “If you had told me at the end of last season that they would sell Leandro Trossard, Gabriel Martinelli and Gabriel Jesus, I would have imagined they were bringing in at least two really big hitters.

“After all, Mikel Arteta was talking about higher calibre players who would ‘take this club to a different level’.”

Those words now hang heavy. The only attacking reinforcement so far is Tzolis, who, as Kay pointed out, “for all his obvious promise, found it tough going at Aston Villa on Monday night.”

Arsenal did look at Lyon’s 21-year-old winger Malick Fofana, a livewire option out wide. He is heading to Sunderland instead.

Targets considered, opportunities missed, time running out.

A title defence at risk?

The pressure, then, shifts to the players who remain.

Kay summed it up: “More is expected from Bukayo Saka and Kai Havertz, if injury-free and firing on all cylinders, and Eberechi Eze and Victor Gyokeres, with a full season at Arsenal now behind them.

“But for such a formidable squad, their attacking options will look rather light unless sporting director Andrea Berta can conjure a deal from somewhere.”

That is the crux of it. Arsenal have built a side good enough to be described, without exaggeration, as the strongest in the league. The title is theirs to lose. Yet in the space of one window, they are stripping away the very depth that made them such a relentless force last season.

If Berta cannot pull a late rabbit out of the hat, Arsenal’s season may hinge on one brutal question: can a team with ambitions of winning everything afford to go this thin in attack?