Morning folks. Looks like we’re in for a left back then.

An injury prone left back.

A left back who has not been getting in to the PSG team and with whom the home fans are supposedly happy to see the back of.

Doesn’t exactly want the cockles of your heart, does it?

The fact that he’s a Kia Joorabchian client, who is close Raul and Edu, also gives me cause for a little unease I have to say, but the idea that we’re getting ourselves a third first team left back, whilst still operating with an auxiliary right back and an injury prone Hector Bellerin, makes me think that we must be a little mad.

Ornstein said yesterday that the club are looking at multiple deals this window, but that they’ll all be loans or low fee, which is amazing that a club with the revenues we have seem to be constantly playing the poverty card. But I suppose as a fan I’d rather get the right deal, than the quickest deal, because doing the equivalent of what Liverpool did with Andy Carroll all those years ago is not a good way to run a football club.

I guess if we’re going to look at the upside of this – and let’s face it we might as well because there are still plenty of positives of the early part of Arteta’s reign – it’s that the guy is clearly an understudy player. Kieran Tierney gets back in March, he’ll probably take two to three weeks to get back to full fitness, by which time we’re getting into April and only about six weeks until the end of the season. Perhaps the club are just being pragmatic and getting cover now and for the player – Layvin Kurzawa – it probably means more game time this season and he probably wants that. And he’ll be thinking that if he gets the game time, plays well, then he might be able to keep his place. He was a €25million player four years ago, so hopefully he comes in and gives us some good performances, assuming it happens.

Apparently he’s a good overlapping full back too, which fits in with what Arteta is trying to do with his team, so I suppose given Maitland-Niles is also able to do that on the right hand side, perhaps the transfer team at Arsenal are looking at the impending return of Bellerin and thinking that we have two players on that side who can both do the job. On the other side Kolasinac can do that job very well, but Saka is 18 and we don’t want to ‘kill’ him through over playing. If Arteta is mirroring the style of Pep and Man City then we all know how important the full backs are in the build up in play. So whilst on the surface it feels like this is a strange deal, it makes sense for the here and now.

What it does for the summer remains to be seen though. At the moment until we win the Europa League we won’t be getting Champions League football next season and so cashing in on assets might be one of the bible options of getting cash in to rotate the squad. Kolasinac is on a big wage – having come on a free transfer – and with a few years left on his deal we could very well get circa £20million for a player like him in the summer. To me that makes sense because we’ll need to shuffle our playing pack a bit to get the shape and style of team Arteta wants.

But until the deal is done for Kurzawa it’s purely just speculation at this time, so we have to look at what’s in front of us, which is Sheffield United tomorrow. Chris Wilder has been giving the platitudes to Arteta this week but make no mistake about it, he’ll be prepared for what Arsenal have tomorrow. I’ll do a bit more of a preview tomorrow but Chris Wilder has been a very clever guy in what he’s done and the approach he’s given to the Blades this season. They set up very well organised and Tricky Micky has already told the assembled media on Wednesday that he’s warned his players what Sheffield United will do on Saturday. As the onus on us being the home team, we will need to start strong and in control, so what I hope we don’t see is another repeat of the start of the Leeds game.

But, as I say, more thoughts on the game itself tomorrow. For now, it’s a ‘cheerio’ from me as we let the excitement build for AN ACTUAL 3PM KICK OFF GAME.