Arsenal Transfer Target Oleksandr Zinchenko Will Add Quality To Midfield

Arsenal look set to make their second signing from Manchester City this summer after agreeing a $36 million deal with the Premier League champions for Oleksandr Zinchenko.

Once personal terms are agreed and a medical is passed, the Ukrainian will be the second player to join Arsenal from City after Gabriel Jesus joined earlier in the transfer window.

Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta has links to the Manchester club after spending three and a half years as Pep Guardiola’s assistant, so will know more than anyone what these players can bring to his side.

But there remains a question of what exactly it is he will look for from the versatile Zinchenko, who played as a left back for City but for his country and previous clubs has always been considered a central or attacking midfielder.

This part of his game was most recently on show when Ukraine played in World Cup qualifying playoffs against Scotland and Wales. He was the best player on the pitch against Scotland, running the game from midfield as ukraine won 3-1.

From a distance, Zinchenko can look like Kevin De Bruyne, at least in appearance, and he does have the ability to play an energetic midfield role between the boxes, bringing no little amount of skill, vision and technical ability to the role.

Even when has played left-back for City, this wasn’t in an orthodox left-back role, as Guardiola likes his full-back to join in with midfield play in certain circumstances.

This is something Zinchenko was regularly asked to do, and in this role, he could use his midfield skills to contribute to the buildup play and adapt well to what, positionally, isn’t the easiest task.

His left-footedness and City’s lack of options at left-back meant he was used in that position rather than in midfield, but there’s also a sense Guardiola didn’t look for reinforcements in this area as he trusted Zinchenko, whose skillset offered exactly what was needed.

As City shake things up this season, it appears they will look to sign Marc Cucurella from Brighton to offer a new kind of threat down the left. With the midfield packed with world class players such as De Bruyne, Ilkay Gundogan, and Bernardo Silva, Zinchenko is moving at the right time to a club where he will get regular games.

But what position will he play at Arsenal?

Arteta certainly knows what the 25-year-old can do at left-back, but in his Arsenal system, there may not be too much of a leap to go from a City left-back to an Arsenal left-sided central midfielder.

He’d bring the same quality and work rate down this side of the field and would be able to get into slightly more central and slightly more attacking positions than he could at City, even though much of the positioning will be the same.

“The day we need him to play in the middle he’s going to play really well,” Guardiola said of Zinchenko last year.

“He is a guy who understands the game, a guy who plays football really well, and has a huge personality.”

Now he might finally be needed to play in the middle, but not for Man City.

Should they sign Zinchenko, Arsenal will be getting a player who covers two positions really well, and one who will do a similar, effective job in both.