With every new transfer window a story of William Carvalho joining Arsenal unfolds so we decided to take a look at what kind of player Carvalho has become and how Arsenal might benefit from the transfer.
William Carvalho currently plays for Portuguese side Sporting, and the player has spent his whole career at the club, only going on two loans before he eventually broke into the first team squad.
The 25-year-old is a dominating force in midfield and has been the backbone of the Sporting squad for the last few seasons.
In 2016/17 he made 43 appearances, managing to score two goals and assist four.
Style and strengths
Carvalho is a dominating midfielder, always putting opponents under pressure and helping his team defend in every way possible. His work is best seen in the defensive phase and the midfielder makes 1.34 interceptions per-game, winning almost 52% of all duels on the ground (1.44 successful tackles per-game) and is also decent in aerial duels winning 64.15% of them.
The Portuguese is great at keeping possession and picking his passes. He maintains around an 88% of successful passing rate creating 0.56 chances and 0.47 key passes per game.
Carvalho is best suited to playing alongside a more offensive midfielder as his work rate to cover space behind and steady passes allow the players in front to remain calm and concentrate on attacking.
With his great dribbling he often opens up space between the opposition’s defensive lines and has 81.4% of successful take ons per-game, a high number for a defensive midfielder.
Weaknesses
The player doesn’t have any obvious weaknesses in his abilities and skills but his approach to the game can often lead him into trouble and the player should put in a serious amount of work to improve his disciplinary record.
In 2016/17 he managed to collect an impressive 10 yellows and one red card.
Can he improve Arsenal’s midfield?
For a midfielder of such great physical strength and tactical awareness he could truly make significant impact on the whole Arsenal squad. His presence on the pitch influences the whole team and the player still has loads of potential to fulfil.
If Carvalho manages to get his disciplinary record under control and adopts a more subtle approach, he can surely become one of the best defensive midfielders in Europe.
The required fee for Carvalho is reported to be around £30m and Sporting still have plenty of time to hold out on any insufficient offers as the player is bonded by contract until 2020.