Why didn’t Arsenal sign Sporting CP striker Viktor Gyokeres? Is there any argument against Real Madrid forward Vinicius Junior being the best player in world football? And are Juventus even ready to compete in the Champions League again?
Juventus aren’t Champions League ready
Juventus have made very real strides under the management of Thiago Motta, who came to the Bianconeri as the most coveted manager in Italian football for taking Bologna to the Champions League.
But even as Juve have performed better this season with more promising results individually in an attacking sense, they’ve still only scored 11 goals and rank as one of Serie A’s worst offensive teams in the top half of the table.
Furthermore, the Bianconeri are third in the league, which is the same place they were in last season. Now, Juve are going to end up being a lot closer to the Scudetto than they were in 2023/24 (20 points away), but it’s important to temper expectations and remember that Motta is still part of a rebuilding project.
So when Juventus go from producing a marvelous late win against RB Leipzig to failing to score and blowing the game completely in a 1-0 loss to underdogs Stuttgart, you can see why the Bianconeri haven’t been fixtures in the Champions League for years now.
Not since Cristiano Ronaldo produced a magnificent comeback over Atletico Madrid have Juventus even held a semblance of relevancy in the Champions League, which is a huge downfall from a team that regularly competed for the title in the 2010s.
The thing is, Juventus are very young as a squad, particularly in the attack. Their most established forward player is striker Dusan Vlahovic, and he has no real experience going deep in tournaments.
In fact, Vlahovic, once again, was part of the problem for Juventus in a big game, ghosting against a Stuttgart side that should have been more vulnerable to Juve defensively.
Motta has his work cut out for him. It’s going to take years, honestly, before Juve’s young crop develops and before new transfers emerge to shape the future of a Bianconeri attack that has been listless since the days Cristiano and Paulo Dybala played together – and even then, it was still a flawed unit.
Vinicius Junior is indeed the world’s best player
Real Madrid did what Real Madrid do, and that is come back from an alarming deficit on a Champions League night. After Edon Zhegrova danced his way through the Madrid defense like the ghost of Eden Hazard in a Lille kit, Real knew they had to avoid embarrassment by falling to a Borussia Dortmund side that has been mired in mediocrity again in the current Bundesliga campaign.
Dortmund’s rapid-fire double had Real Madrid reeling, but even as Real have seemingly been even slower starters in an already turbulent 2024/25 season, their star man has been just as ready to rescue them.
After his winning goal over the weekend against Celta Vigo, Vinicius Junior led the way with a hat trick of goals and a handful of dribbles completed to spearhead a rather commanding Real Madrid comeback at the Santiago Bernabeu.
While Vinicius Jr. certainly didn’t win the game all by himself, he was very much the superstar performer on a team of superstars, and if he is the one leading the team in big comebacks in the biggest games over two other main contenders for this title – Jude Bellingham and Kylian Mbappe – then even the biggest of Mbappe and Jude fans have to concede that this gives Vini Jr. an advantage in being named the world’s best player.
As much as I believe Jude should win the Ballon d’Or for his overall 2023/24 season performance from start to finish (recency bias hurt him), Vinicius Jr.’s ability to transcend the biggest games – like Real’s previous No. 7…no, no, the one before that guy…Cristiano Ronaldo – places him alone at the top.
Vini Jr. never gives up. He has that uncanny ability to make something out of nothing when his team needs it most, and his fearlessness is so often rewarded. Having a player like that doesn’t just win you games from the direct goals and assists, but his attitude is infectious and instills a fighting spirit that the rest of his teammates clearly pick up on by vibration.
Through three Champions League matches, Vinicius Jr. now has three goals with an average of 2.3 key passes and 3.7 dribbles completed per game. He has turned the Champions League into his personal training ground in a way that no other winger has. Well, except for one.
Arsenal should have signed Viktor Gyokeres
I still cannot believe that Arsenal did not sign a single attacking player in the previous summer transfer window despite having an established need for an out-and-out striker and even a need for a more consistent goal-scoring left winger than Gabriel Martinelli.
Perhaps Raheem Sterling is seen as part of the solution, but it has legitimately been years since he was someone capable of threatening to score 20 goals in a season, which is the caliber of attacking player the Gunners need.
On Tuesday night, Arsenal squeaked by Shakhtar Donetsk in the Champions League thanks to an own goal. Kai Havertz and Gabriel Martinelli combined for 10 key passes in strong individual showings, and even striker Gabriel Jesus won four dribbles.
However, Arsenal couldn’t find anything more than a goal that Shakhtar scored, and if they were facing a stronger opponent, they may not have been so lucky to get the full three points.
Arsenal are third in the Premier League table and tied for third in goals scored, and while those aren’t bad spots to be in by any means, it’s familiar territory for a club that has been “almost” far too many times to ever sit comfortable through a transfer window without adequately addressing their biggest need.
While Arsenal can be praised for not rushing into a rash decision, such as being the only team willing to spend 100 million euros on the injury-prone Victor Osimhen, they did have a reasonable top transfer target at striker even after Benjamin Sesko snubbed suitors to stay with RB Leipzig for another season.
Sporting CP’s Viktor Gyokeres is a natural at striker with clinical finishing, silky movement off the ball, and highly underrated creative ability. Gyokeres turned in another strong Champions League performance on Tuesday at Sturm Graz, scoring and assisting the goals in a 2-0 win with three total key passes.
The 26-year-old scored 29 goals with 10 assists last season as one of Europe’s most prolific all-around strikers, and, this season, he’s already at 11 goals in 8 games as he enters his prime years at striker.
Gyokeres is a better goal-scorer than anyone Arsenal has, and he is statistically at least as good of a creator as the Gunners’ best creative center forward or left winger, which would be Kai Havertz.
In the 99th percentile for shot-creating actions and the 97th percentile for both expected goals and expected assists, Gyokeres is a statistical marvel and passes the eye test technically and athletically.
At worst, Arsenal would have only benefited marginally from a decent striker costing around 60 million pounds (the 84 million pound release clause talk was all a bargaining play from Sporting) with moderate resale value to a lesser club.
At best, Arsenal missed out on a potential game-changer who could elevate them into Champions League contenders and the favorites in a wide-open Premier League after Rodri’s season-ending ACL tear.
And now, Arsenal are left sitting in the same position they were last season – worrying that even as they are great, they are not quite elite, destined to fall short for a third season running. There is no worse feeling in sports than feeling like you are standing in place, with a championship slightly beyond arm’s reach.
The managing editor of The Trivela Effect, Kevin has 15 years of experience in digital media. He covered Real Madrid from 2019-2022 for The Real Champs as a site manager. His work has been featured in ESPN, Bleacher Report, Yahoo! Sports, NBC Sports, and other major outlets. You can contact him at the site’s official Twitter handle @TrivelaEffect or via the site’s official email thetrivelaeffect@gmail.com.