As I went for my run this morning I was listening to my usual podcasts on all things The Arsenal (I usually get through two to three a week, mostly four or five depending on how much time I get to run with work in the way) and I was listening to one of them waxing lyrical about Jurrien Timber. I talked about him briefly on the Same Old Arsenal pod on Sunday morning with James, but I wanted to dedicate a few paragraphs to giving him some flowers this morning, because I think even in this early stage of the season he’s showing us just how much of an asset he is to Arteta and his Arsenal squad.
I likened him to Lauren and that comparison keeps running through my head again and again. Lauren was a midfielder when we brought him and Wenger converted him in to a right back, whereas Timber as been a centre half/right back who has almost exclusively been used by Arteta as a full back so far, but that (as well as the two players’ respective passports) are, to me, some of the few differences between the two.
To me, footballistically speaking, the similarities are amazing. Lauren was an integral part of an athletic and physically dominant Arsenal side in the early 2000s. We’ve all heard the stories of ex-pro’s talking about how you’d get in that small tunnel at Highbury and you’d be up against these big, powerful, imposing Arsenal players. Lauren wasn’t the biggest of the lot, I think he was 5’11 or 6 foot, but he was arguably one of the strongest in that side. He was a hard tackler. He was strong in the duels. He could keep up with players in a foot race. And when you wanted to have a tussle with him, he’d have a steely gaze to meet you; Lauren wasn’t afraid of a scrap and we will all remember those tussles with United at Manchester – Lauren was involved in those and he was ready to fight for his team.
He also had a huge engine too. He’d be an overlapper of his wide player, he’d be able to get forward, but he was also part of a miserly back line that didn’t concede a ton of goals. I loved him at his peak and he was one of those guys you just know opponents knew he was tough to play against; he was a hard man.
I get the same vibes with Timber. When you saw him scrap in the North London derby, he just looked like one of those guys who would stand up to an opponent. He has a steely stare about him too, plus I think the engine that he’s shown already this season, covering ground and getting forward as much as he’s been compact and strong as part of a defensive regard that is already racking up the clean sheets this season.
And this Arsenal team looks physically imposing. Raya, White, Saliba, Gabriel, Calafiori, Rice, Havertz, Partey – all of them are big guys. We’ve just seen the return of Merino too and he’s no shrinking violet; at 6 foot 2 he’s another big and physically imposing player; a duel winner who adds yet more physicality to this Arsenal side. Timber may only be 5 foot 11, but what he lacks in those extra couple of inches in height, he more than makes up for in his physical stature and prowess. I look at the way his body is built and he looks like quite a strong and powerful player. There’s just something about him; I remember a lad I used to go to school with. He was a centre half and he was about my height. I was a bit of a bigger lad (weight wise) than him but whenever we played football together, despite his smaller size, he was so strong. He had a strong core and every time we went in to a shoulder-to-shoulder, he’d be able to nudge me off the ball easily. Years later, as I started to go to the gym and learn about core muscle structure, I’d realise that is why he was able to do it, and it feels like Timber is the type of player who also has that core muscle structure and way that his body is shaped to make him a very strong guy indeed. Arteta brought him off at halftime on Tuesday and most of us instantly had worries; after the game he said that he felt something in his muscles and so they didn’t want to take any precautions. Hopefully that is just a bit of fatigue because with every passing game that we see him playing, we see a guy who is becoming more and more important to this team.
Since Ben White signed for us and was moved to right back, we have had a player who is so robust and able to play that we have just had to pray that something bad doesn’t happen to him, but I think it is a real testament to the impact Timber has made this season that none of us are lamenting the loss of White. We all love him, we want him to come back and there’s no way he doesn’t get plenty more matches this season, but the impact of Timber is such that none of us are worried that our season is in danger of unravelling.
You can say the same about the Odegaard injury too, by the way, because this selection of players Arteta has at his disposal has been able to cover for the absences that we’ve had. It’s phenomenal that we’ve gone through this period of the season, with injuries we’ve had, yet we’ve come out the other side and now we’re starting to see big players return for us. Merino got on the field on Tuesday, Tomiyasu is back in training, the hope is that we get Odegaard back after (yet another pointless) internal break period is over. The strength in depth of this team is real and the confidence that must be flowing through this team as a result of what we’ve been able to overcome already is amazing.
It’s exciting times right now. But complacency is something that Arteta will be mindful of. We were some injury time goals away from an unfortunate result at home to Leicester on Saturday and Mikel will no doubt be at pains to point out to his team that concentration needs to match confidence.
But when you have players as serious as Timber in your squad, then you know that you’ve got a good chance of minimising that, which is fabulous if you’re an Arsenal fan like us right now.
Back tomorrow as we built up to the Saints at home.
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