Arsenal could raid Liverpool, Aston Villa or West Ham for Edu replacement

Arsenal have lost Edu to Nottingham Forest so it is only right that they raid a Premier League rival for his replacement. Liverpool should be worried.

Edu announced his resignation as Arsenal‘s Sporting Director on Monday after spending more than five years in an executive role with the Gunners.

He is expected to accept an offer to reportedly triple his wages in a position overseeing the network of teams owned by Evangelos Marinakis, including Premier League rivals Nottingham Forest.

Attention thus turns to who might replace Edu at Arsenal, with Mikel Arteta likely to have a great deal of influence in that decision. In this, the era of Sporting Defectors swapping Premier League clubs with increasing regularity, might they target someone close to him?

These five Premier League candidates could be of interest ahead of an Arsenal raid.

Monchi from Aston Villa

Arsenal eventually landed on their feet with the appointment of Edu as their first sporting director in July 2019. The supposed diamond eye of Sven Mislintat could not translate his vision to actual success in north London and his departure that February left a void belatedly filled by two former players when Arteta became head coach by December.

For a while, that was the chaos timeline. There is an alternate reality in which Unai Emery never needed a second bite at the Premier League cherry; the first already proved beyond doubt that he deserved recognition among the elite.

Had Arsenal managed to link the Spaniard with Monchi again in north London the masterplan could have been accelerated a few years ahead of schedule. Arsenal were undoubtedly interested but perhaps the preeminent sporting director of his time picked “the project which convinced me and which appealed to me the most” in his beloved Sevilla instead.

In truth, little could really have rescued Emery’s reign. Him and Arsenal were not particularly compatible and introducing Monchi to the equation might well have simply been doubling down on a mistake.

But their work together in this Aston Villa revolution does restore Monchi’s mid-2000s status as the executive head all clubs should crave. While the power he has been afforded in the Midlands would make extracting him difficult, the prospect of getting even slightly closer to signing Jhon Duran is irresistible.

MORE ON ARSENAL’S STRUGGLES

👉 Arteta and his ‘Mourinho-lite’ pragmatism are costing Arsenal

👉 Flawed Arsenal left side both make worst Premier League XI of weekend

👉 Premier League winners and losers: Praise for Bournemouth and Gomez, flak for Arsenal, Lopetegui, Palmer

Richard Hughes from Liverpool

The first transfer window in charge of Liverpool was something resembling a shambles.

Federico Chiesa has predictably offered nothing. Giorgi Mamardashvili was secured a year in advance from a Valencia side bottom of La Liga with a defensive record as poor as Everton’s. The Martin Zubimendi saga was embarrassing.

But Hughes helped nail the big decision – and not for the first time.

Having had a massive input in identifying and appointing Arne Slot as the replacement for Jurgen Klopp, he can look upon the nascent Premier League and Champions League tables with satisfaction. It was a left-field choice but the early evidence is that Liverpool got it right.

But Hughes has other reasons to be satisfied with his work. Dominic Solanke has been excellent for Spurs, further solidifying his signing as one of the former Bournemouth technical director’s greatest decisions. And the brave call to move Gary O’Neil on in the summer of 2023 has been vindicated ten-fold.

Bournemouth owner Bill Foley has credited Hughes with persuading the club hierarchy that Andoni Iraola was the coach to establish them as a true Premier League force. The transfer hit-rate is solid enough but that knack for seamless managerial succession plans will come in handy once Mikel Arteta’s fraudulence is properly uncovered.

Dougie Freedman from Crystal Palace

It would be a difficult sell to frame the pursuit of a sporting director at a club sat one place above the relegation zone as anything other than a monumental disappointment and step backwards for a club aiming to deliver on a promise of trophies and titles. The optics are not quite right.

But that is not really a fair reflection on the work of Dougie Freedman at Crystal Palace, who are taking tentative steps out of this difficult period to find some middle ground between the poor start of this season and the incredible end to the last.

Freedman was targeted by Newcastle and Manchester United for good reason in the summer. His recruitment work has been phenomenal – shush, Eddie Nketiah – in laying the foundations for Palace to quietly construct one of the longest continuous stays in the Premier League of teams outside whatever colour the cabal is supposed to be this week.

Eberechi Eze, Marc Guehi, Joachim Andersen, Michael Olise and Adam Wharton have registered on Arsenal’s radar at various points and it would be interesting to see how Freedman translates his impeccable operation in Football League talent discovery to a grander stage.

It would also confuse Rio Ferdinand as an added bonus and frankly more clubs should operate with that specific purpose in mind.

Mark Noble from West Ham

West Ham supporters might not mind their power structure being ripped apart, although the sense is that most would prefer to lose technical director Tim Steidten. Or Julen Lopetegui. Or his coaches. Or David Sullivan. Or Bubbles and Hammerhead. Or most of the squad, obviously excluding Michail Antonio.

It is not explicitly clear what Noble’s sporting director role at West Ham entails. He pushed for Ruben Amorim to take over from David Moyes in the summer but was overruled. Steidten handled most if not all of the recruitment. Beyond some sort of ambassadorial position and middle-man from boardroom to dressing room, the former captain’s influence is not particularly defined.

But his brief time in the Arsenal academy, his fingerprints which almost certainly still cover the Europa Conference League trophy, and his close bond with Declan Rice could be worth exploring.

Rice once described Noble as “one of the best captains” and the affection is entirely mutual. With his form suffering as part of Arsenal’s wider struggles, a reunion could spark some more value from Arsenal’s record signing.

Tony Khan from Fulham

The Hale End revolution at Craven Cottage is real. Alex Iwobi took a more circuitous route from Arsenal to Fulham than Reiss Nelson and Emile Smith Rowe but their reunion under Marco Silva has been eye-opening all the same.

Beyond that obvious link, it would be a necessary test of whether playing WWE themes at half-time is among Arteta’s non-negotiables.

READ NEXT: Five Chelsea rejects included in ranking of every Arsenal signing made under Edu