Joe Willock

[Pearljam10]

5 hours ago, Lucky said:

Howe's comments in the presser were quite telling.

 

Basically saying without saying that he’s not doing enough in training and then not taking his chance when he does get minutes on the pitch.

 

Won’t be surprised if he’s loaned out in January.

Thought the same. Didn't seem like Eddie was impressed with Willock either in training or in the game.

[Decky]

5 hours ago, Lucky said:

Howe's comments in the presser were quite telling.

 

Basically saying without saying that he’s not doing enough in training and then not taking his chance when he does get minutes on the pitch.

 

Won’t be surprised if he’s loaned out in January.

 

Sold more like.

[HawK]

Edit : I was being a bit of a twat

 

 

Edited October 3, 2025 by HawK

[Erikse]

14 minutes ago, Pearljam10 said:

Thought the same. Didn't seem like Eddie was impressed with Willock either in training or in the game.

 

Hopefully that also means that we are already out there collecting options for a potensial signing in january. Just for depth atleast.

 

 

Edited October 3, 2025 by Erikse

[TRon]

16 minutes ago, Pearljam10 said:

Thought the same. Didn't seem like Eddie was impressed with Willock either in training or in the game.

 

 

It's a real indictment of his lack of desire as a footballer if it's true. Seems like Arteta was right all along about him. 

[RUHRLYASLEEVESUP]

5 hours ago, Hanshithispantz said:

He probably needs to drop a level where he doesn't need to sprint about as often his body obviously cannot handle it. It's hard to blame him checking out tbf, working day in day out to build up your fitness to play a couple of games and be back on the treatment table would batter your head.

Especially for the pittance he gets in return 

[Hanshithispantz]

34 minutes ago, RUHRLYASLEEVESUP said:

Especially for the pittance he gets in return 

soldiers wages etc.

[The College Dropout]

5 hours ago, r0cafella said:

Really is a shame we couldn't move him on in the summer. If he's got a brain he knows Ramsey was his replacement. 

Probably why he given up.  

[Kanj]

I think it's a bit insane to me that while having worked with Eddie for 4+ years, despite being hurt quite a bit, and still being around the building/squad/tactical anlaysis he still seems to have dropped off from that incredible spell he had before his bad injury. Just very very odd. 

[Conjo]

As long as he doesn't get injured, it could be a good opportunity for us to move him on to one of the teams that are fearing relegation in January.

[Erikse]

7 minutes ago, Kanj said:

I think it's a bit insane to me that while having worked with Eddie for 4+ years, despite being hurt quite a bit, and still being around the building/squad/tactical anlaysis he still seems to have dropped off from that incredible spell he had before his bad injury. Just very very odd. 

 

Yes, he only missed 5 games last season through injury. He basically just missed an entire season with reoccuring problems after being rushed back a bit, but other than that he hasn't been injured much at all. Other players has recovered really well from worse. It's not just a physical thing, but also a mental thing.

 

 

Edited October 3, 2025 by Erikse

[Mountain]

Can't believe we replaced this injury prone fraud with ANOTHER injury prone dude.

 

Hope Ramsey proves us all wrong and has a good productive run of games after he returns.

 

 

[Lucky]

2 hours ago, Mountain said:

Can't believe we replaced this injury prone fraud with ANOTHER injury prone dude.

 

Hope Ramsey proves us all wrong and has a good productive run of games after he returns.

 

 

Hard to tell at this point. Ramsey is a superior footballer based on the last 2 seasons but we cannot also discount that Willock was very good for us at one point.

 

Howe will give him every chance to step it up but then if he doesn’t the writing is on the wall.

 

The current Ramsey injury was a bad tackle? So can’t really blame him for that.. and maybe in previous seasons he’d already be returned but the current medical team seem far more cautious.

[TBG]

One gun. One bullet. You can't put their heads together. Willock or Thiaw when he has a bad game. Who gets the bullet?

[PauloGeordio]

Mikel Arteta: Why Arsenal sold Joe Willock:

 

He said, as per Arsenal.com: “Well, we’ve seen Joe here for a long time in different stages of his career and Joe is a player that we valued and we liked so much. 

“After that spell, obviously, his profile changed, his ambitions personally changed, and the game time that he needed was very different to what we could give him in this moment. We made a decision together to decide the best way for his pathway in his career.”

 

It really is a shame that Willock couldn’t fulfil his life-long dream of succeeding at Arsenal. However, he has made everyone associated with the club proud, and even though he’s gone now, he’ll always be a Gooner.

As for Arsenal, Arteta and Edu, it was a decision that we simply had to make. Yes, keeping hold of Willock when we are short of options in midfield would’ve been ideal. However, he had just two years left on his contract and considering that, we simply couldn’t refuse the offer that arrived. 

 

Arsenal seem to have used the money that has come in from Willock’s sale well. We completed the signing of Martin Odegaard on a permanent deal this morning, and as much as we all love Joe, we’ve got to admit that selling him has worked out for all parties.

[Elliottman]

How long left on his contract? Hopefully can still get a decent fee for him. 

[Yorkie]

Funny reading pages 118-120 of this thread. Feels like that was basically that for him here. Ruined by injuries and, reading between the lines, attitude.

[Erikse]

19 minutes ago, Yorkie said:

Funny reading pages 118-120 of this thread. Feels like that was basically that for him here. Ruined by injuries and, reading between the lines, attitude.

 

If you go some pages back and forth from there, you can see that he had several absolutely great games that season, and we were talking about him deserving a callup for England even before that pass. After that pass his form was even better, with Big Joe on the left. Yet people will tell you that the only thing he did that season was that one pass..

 

 

 

Edited October 3, 2025 by Erikse

[kenlau88210]

1 hour ago, Elliottman said:

How long left on his contract? Hopefully can still get a decent fee for him. 

expiring in 2027 so a little more than 18 months left

[TRC]

Can see it being 10m or so for him, which I think is fair.

[Moose]

He plays like he has a single digital IQ and he doesn't trust his body anymore. The worst player in the squad right now, give him a painting of a Spitfire and send him on his way.

[elbee909]

My guess he'll go to West Ham or something.

[Nine]

The injuries obviously made it difficult, but the mentality has just become lacking over time. As others have said, the Ramsey signing was probably the nail in his coffin here. And if Howe has gone public, yeah he’s done. 

 

He was so, so good during our first CL qualifying season. A unique midfielder in the way Howe utilised him in that he did most of his damage off the ball making runs and did it well. 
 

Hes one of those that I don’t see much of a resurgence for either, slack mentality and ego along with declining physically/accumulation of injuries. Best bet is going serie A or something. 

 

 

Edited October 4, 2025 by Nine

[kenlau88210]

Wt exactly did Howe say about him?

[Skeletor]

Would definitely be more comfortable with a reliable midfielder taking his place, even if they were just solid and nothing fancy.