ARSENAL turned heads last month with their club-record capture of Nicolas Pepe, but the £72m signing of Ligue 1’s most sought-after winger left most observers questioning whether The Gunners ought to have funnelled some of those funds towards improving their leaky defence.
Unai Emery’s men may have only missed out on a place in the top four by a single point last season, but their 51 goals conceded was a defensive record bettered by all of the top nine bar Manchester United.
But as the final hours of the summer transfer window approach, it seems there might still be hope that Arsenal fans will be presented with the kind of defensive upgrade they have long craved; a necessity made all the more urgent by Laurent Koscielny’s expected return to France before Thursday’s deadline.
I see Harry Maguire going for £85m. Nathan Ake has a valuation of £75m, James Tarkowski at £40m, Lewis Dunk at £45m.
Upamecano at £70m isn't that bad when you think of it. Just 20 y/o and a MUCH bigger talent. If he ends up leaving, we still make huge money on resale.
— LTArsenal™ (@ltarsenal) August 5, 2019
Reports emerged on Monday claiming the north London side had seen a €60m bid for RB Leipzig defender Dayot Upamecano refused. It remains to be seen whether Arsenal return with a fresh offer, but the 20-year-old centre-back would represent a significant and timely upgrade on the error-prone Shkodran Mustafi.
Upamecano has been hailed as one of the brightest young defenders in Europe since his arrival at RB Leipzig in January 2017, arriving from sister club Red Bull Salzburg.
Rapid across the turf, immovable in one-against-one duels and confident on the ball, the France U21 international has all the hallmarks of an elite-level central defender. But Upamecano’s rise is one built on hard work, a receptiveness to coaching and a constant search for improvement.
"He wasn't a natural talent,” said Romaric Bultel, who coached Upamecano as a teenager at Evreux FC. “The abilities he has now weren't there when he came to us.”
"He worked hard and listened. He even worked with us outside of training, practising ball control, working on his speed and tactical aspects of the game. That's how he continually overcame that initial deficit. He was a touching kid. Not particularly talkative, but when he did say something, it had an effect on you."
Born and raised in Evreux, northern France, Upamecano lived in the same apartment block as Barcelona winger Ousmane Dembele as a child and spent hours indulging his love for football in the local playing courts.
He first came to the attention of scouts across the continent while on the books of Valenciennes, although he never made a senior outing for the French club, instead joining Salzburg aged 16, making his senior debut for Liefering, a feeder side to the Red Bull-owned Austrian outfit.
After just 23 appearances for Salzburg, and having helped secure a domestic double for the club, interest from Barcelona was resisted as Upamecano moved to Leipzig. He assimilated quickly to life in the Bundesliga, debuting against Borussia Dortmund and helping RBL finish second in their maiden top-flight campaign. The Frenchman had so impressed, that he was being tipped to soon become the first €100m defender, and he credits his time in Austria with a transformative effect on his development.
This is what Dayot Upamecano would bring to Arsenal
pic.twitter.com/iGOxlOoESL— WorldwideArsenal™ (@WorldwideAFC) August 5, 2019
"I learned almost everything there [in Salzburg],” he said. “I developed; I learned to go forward, judge my movement better. As a person, I was a bit shy before, and it also made me grow in that sense. Leaving France was beneficial [and] I didn’t want to go to a very big club too soon.”
A regular at every youth level for France, Upamecano is yet to make his senior bow for Les Bleus. A call-up for Didier Deschamps’ world champions is an inevitability and might have already arrived were it not for an injury keeping him out for most of the second half of last season.
“Dayot is already very mature,” France U21 coach Sylvain Ripoll told L’Équipe in 2018, having awarded Upamecano his first call-up at that level in 2018. “He’s playing in European competition and [is] among the most reliable defenders in the Bundesliga, and practically the leader of the Leipzig defence.”
Watching Upamecano in action, it’s easy to understand why Arsenal have decided he’s the man to entrust with shoring up their sub-par backline. The Leipzig youngster stands an imposing 6ft 1, is a dominant aerial presence and is so quick and focused even the speediest Bundesliga attackers have found themselves frustrated with his ability to track and stifle runners in behind.
Upamecano’s ball progression is a key tenet of his game and one of the reasons why he is considered one of Europe’s brightest defensive talents. A confident passer, his unique, stabbed technique of sweeping attack-launching passes from his left-centre-back position to the right wing is an asset perfectly aligned with Arsenal’s Pepe and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.
In addition to his passing, Upamecano is also able progress play with the ball at his feet, regularly seen combining tackles and interceptions with darting, direct runs into midfield, reminiscent of a more powerful Rio Ferdinand.
For all his many qualities, though, Upamecano is still prone to many of the errors common among developing centre-backs: he is liable to positional lapses, can be too hasty in his eagerness to nick the ball ahead of his opponent, and leans heavily on his pace as a crutch for getting him out of trouble.
It is not necessarily a given that these flaws will be corrected with time – a fact Arsenal fans will be more aware of than anyone, with their club having signed and failed to develop many a promising defender in the recent past. But it seems Upamecano has the capacity for learning and inclination for improvement to make the necessary adjustments with the right guidance.
Experience at the back isn’t an issue for Arsenal; a lack of quality is. Upamecano isn’t the finished product, but his ceiling is high. Although he won’t come cheap, he could be the bedrock of a better defensive outlook at the Emirates for the next decade.
