Arsenal and Manchester United have gone in opposite directions when it comes to clearing out ‘dead weight’ from their squads.
Rewind to this time five years ago, both clubs required open heart surgery to reignite any hope of challenging at the top of the Premier League again.
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Arsenal had just finished fifth in the 2018/19 Premier League season under Unai Emery, who was later sacked in November 2019 and replaced by former captain and current boss Mikel Arteta.
Meanwhile, Man United ended the season in sixth under former star Ole Gunnar Solskjaer who had come in to replace Jose Mourinho mid-way through the campaign.
The Norwegian stayed on until November 2021, with Michael Carrick and then Ralf Rangnick coming in, both on a temporary basis, afterwards.
By the start of the 2022/23 season, Man United appointed then-Ajax boss Erik ten Hag as their new manager, with the Dutchman tasked with rebuilding a squad that had severely under-performed for too long.
Arteta has of course had almost three years longer to recreate the underwhelming Gunners side he inherited than Ten Hag has had to shed the dead wood from Carrington.
But comparing Arteta’s first squad to Ten Hag’s first, the Gunners look much more unrecognisable than Man United’s after both clubs tried to address their squad issues.
At the time of writing, just five players are left from the first team squad Arteta inherited from Emery – Gabriel Martinelli, Reiss Nelson, Bukayo Saka, Kieran Tierney and Eddie Nketiah.
Emile Smith Rowe, who was there when Arteta arrived, moved on to Fulham this summer after lack of game time with the Gunners.
It remains to be seen if Tierney will leave, but the fact the defender was left out of the matchday programme totally for the pre-season clash with Bayer Leverkusen suggests his Emirates career is over.
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Former captain Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, Alexandre Lacazette, Matteo Guendouzi and Konstantinos Mavropanos are just some of the names that got the chop during Arteta’s reign.
And that brutal squad rebuild has led the Gunners to challenge for the Premier League title for two years in a row, with them bringing in highly rated stars such as Declan Rice, Leandro Trossard and David Raya.
Meanwhile, talkSPORT’s Micky Gray believes Man United’s ‘dead weight’ still in the squad is a huge concern heading into the new campaign.
That’s even with the addition of Leny Yoro, who signed from Lille for £52million, and Bologna’s Joshua Zirkzee, who cost £36million, as well as them shedding Anthony Martial and Raphael Varane this summer.
talkSPORT’s Manchester football correspondent Gray said: “I still think it’s a concern that they’ve not made too many signings and the players they want to get out of the club are still basically there.”
Even though new co-owners INEOS have taken over the footballing side of the club last season, Ten Hag’s first ever XI includes many names that are still at the club today.
That’s despite new co-owners INEOS taking over the footballing side of the club.
Harry Maguire, Lisandro Martinez, Diogo Dalot, Luke Shaw, Bruno Fernandes, Christian Eriksen, Fred, Scott McTominay, Marcus Rashford and Jadon Sancho made up the team. Only Fred has left.
Alejandro Garnacho, Aaron Wan-Bissaka, Malacia and Tom Heaton were on the bench too and are still at the club.
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Although not all those players are ‘dead weight’ a majority of them have been linked with exits.
That includes ex-skipper captain, Maguire, who Ten Hag took the armband off in favour of Fernandes.
Gray continued: “They all talked about getting the job done as quickly as they possibly could and getting the squad done as quickly as they possibly could.
“Unfortunately they’ve not been able to do that.”
Manchester United kick off their season in the Community Shield against Manchester City this Saturday, live on talkSPORT.
Meanwhile, Arsenal take on Wolverhampton Wanderers in their opening Premier League fixture on Saturday August 17.