Ranking Arsenal's 10 best transfer windows of the Premier League era | OneFootball

Highlights

Arsenal are undoubtedly one of the biggest teams in Premier League history and indeed English football as a whole. Only Manchester United and Liverpool have won more league titles than the Gunners' 13, with three of those coming in the Premier League era.

They played a big hand in the globalization of the division during the 90s with their 1996 recruitment of reputable French manager Arsene Wenger, who was able to lure some of Europe's greatest talents to North London. Certain players signed by the manager are still regarded as some of the greatest signings in Premier League history due to how well they went on to perform in England.

However, it must be remembered that the transfer window was only introduced to the Premier League in 2002. Therefore, this means the likes of Thierry Henry, Patrick Vieira and Robert Pires will not be featured in this list.

There are still a number of great acquisitions made by the Gunners under the control of Wenger and Mikel Arteta, who the Frenchman himself brought to the Emirates Stadium in 2011. But which manager has overseen the greatest transfer window during the club's Premier League stint?

Ranking factors

We have judged this list based on these three points:

Individual signings will not always outweigh the business that goes alongside them. So for example, Alexis Sanchez was an excellent acquisition for the Gunners in 2014, but the window in which the Chilean was signed is not included due to the expensive purchases of Calum Chambers, Danny Welbeck and Mathieu Debuchy alongside him. So without further ado, join GIVEMESPORT as we rank Arsenal's ten best transfer windows of the Premier League era.

10 2017/18 summer window

Admittedly, when most football fans cast their minds back to Arsenal's bits of business in recent years, they probably don't immediately think of Alexandre Lacazette and Sead Kolasinac. Nevertheless, the Frenchman was popular with Gunners supporters for a time, as he scored 36 goals in his first two seasons in North London, while the full-back proved a fairly astute addition on a free transfer.

Another factor that works in this window's favour is the money the club managed to generate from selling Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, Wojciech Szczesny, Gabriel Paulista and Kieran Gibbs. Those departures meant Arsenal ended the summer having made a tiny profit, despite splashing out a then club-record fee of £46.5m to bring Lacazette to the club.

9 2012/13 summer window

The Gunners' summer of 2012 was rocked by the departure of their talisman Robin van Persie to rivals Manchester United. Despite being 29 years old, the Dutchman was the Premier League's top scorer the previous season and so cost the Red Devils £24m as he left Arsenal along with Alex Song and Carlos Vela, who both went to Spain for decent fees.

The club spent that money on bringing in French goal machine Olivier Giroud, who never quite the heights of his 21-goal season with Montpellier but was still a regular goalscorer in his five-and-a-half years with the club, and Santi Cazorla, whose creativity made him immensely popular with supporters. Lukas Podolski was another hyped signing that summer, but he never truly settled during his three years in North London.

8 2002/03 summer window

Having convincingly won the double the season before, it would have been hard for many to spot which areas Arsenal needed to improve on during the summer window of 2002. However, never one to rest on his laurels, Wenger still delved into the transfer market and made two subtle additions to bolster his squad.

Fresh from winning the World Cup with Brazil, defensive midfielder Gilberto Silva was snapped up from Atletico Mineiro and he immediately announced himself to Gunners supporters with the only goal in the Community Shield versus Liverpool and would go on to be a key player throughout his six years with the club. Lille captain Pascal Cygan was also signed, proving a solid defensive option for four seasons, while unfancied goalkeepers Richard Wright and Alex Manninger were both offloaded.

7 2005/06 winter window

This is the only winter window that has made it into this list as it has become abundantly clear that the Gunners prefer to do their business in the more reliable summer window. However, January 2006 proved an exception as they added three talented youngsters to their roster.

Theo Walcott became the most expensive 16-year-old in world football when Arsenal bought him from Southampton for a fee that could rise to £12m and the pacey winger would end up making just shy of 400 appearances during his 12 years in North London. Injuries robbed the £2m-rated Abou Diaby of becoming the long-term successor to Patrick Vieira, while forward Emmanuel Adebayor was a goalscoring threat for Arsenal and would later be the source of a huge profit for the club after his move to Man City.

6 2009/10 summer window

It was the summer of 2009 that saw Adebayor make his move to Manchester and thus begin the process of burning all bridges with Arsenal supporters, celebrating in an over-exuberant fashion when he scored against them and later joining their deadly rivals Spurs. Kolo Toure also joined the Togolese international at the Etihad Stadium.

Having made £41m off of the Premier League's newly-crowned richest club, the Gunners reinvested just £10m of that into the signing of Thomas Vermaelen as a replacement for the departed Toure. Despite struggling with injuries, the Belgian would make 150 appearances during five years at the Emirates before he was sold for a handsome £5m profit to Barcelona in 2014, at which point his career soon began to peter out.

5 2021/22 summer window

We now jump to the first window on this list under the stewardship of Mikel Arteta and so far, the Spaniard is regarded as having a pretty good record in the transfer market. It was in the summer of 2021 that it became clear a young and hungry team was forming while older players were shown the door.

The standout signing was Martin Odegaard, who was promptly snapped up for £30m after impressing on his loan spell from Real Madrid the previous season and he would soon become club captain. Takehiro Tomiysau turned out to be a very astute purchase at just £16m and while pundits turned their noses up at the expensive signings of Ben White and Aaron Ramsdale, both quickly became crucial members of an Arsenal team that were quickly starting to look like serious competitors for the league title.

4 2004/05 summer window

Arsenal's summer of 2004 was something of an evolution after just going a whole season unbeaten, with many players were let go while three youngsters were acquired on the cheap in their place. Senior stalwarts Martin Keown and Ray Parlour were both allowed to leave for nothing along with Nwankwo Kanu and Sylvain Wiltord, while Francis Jeffers was offloaded to Charlton Athletic for £2.6m.

Incoming from Feyenoord was promising young forward Robin van Persie, who would score 128 goals in eight years with the Gunners before earning a big-money move to Man United. Spanish goalkeeper Manuel Almunia would soon provide competition with the veteran Jens Lehmann while Mathieu Flamini arrived for the first of two fruitful spells at the club and proved a valuable member of the squad both times.

3 2003/04 summer window

Arsene Wenger was coy in the transfer market during the summer of 2003, with the only serious issue to address being that of finding a replacement for long-serving goalkeeper David Seaman, who had joined Man City on a free transfer. The manager elected to replace him with the experienced Jens Lehmann from Borussia Dortmund for a fee of just £1.5m.

The eccentric German played every league match that season, serving as a reliable presence between the sticks as Arsenal ended an extraordinary league campaign unbeaten. The Gunners also shelled out a mere £250k for the signature of young left-back Gael Clichy, who served as an understudy to Ashley Cole for three years before becoming first-choice after the England international's infamous move to Chelsea in 2006.

2 2008/09 summer window

The 2008 summer window was a perfect example of Arsenal managing to strengthen their squad while still generating a net profit. The highly-rated Samir Nasri was signed from Marseille for £12m and immediately became a star at the Emirates, spending three years with the club before moving to Manchester City for over double that fee in 2011.

The Frenchman's arrival paved the way for the popular Alexander Hleb to join Barcelona for £13.8m but his career would soon fade into Eastern European obscurity. Following him out the door was a 32-year-old Gilberto Silva for £1m, while talented young midfielder Aaron Ramsey was poached from Cardiff City and the Welshman would go on to make 369 appearances during 11 years in North London.

1 2022/23 summer window

In a list that has been dominated by Arsene Wenger, it's a window overseen by Mikel Arteta that takes the top spot and for good reason. Over just one summer, the Spaniard was able to transform the Gunners from Champions League hopefuls into serious title challengers, while also shifting plenty of deadwood off the wage bill.

Arteta went to his old club Man City and brought in both Gabriel Jesus and Oleksandr Zinchenko, who immediately became a part of the team's best XI, while the additions of promising youngsters Fabio Vieira, Matt Turner and Marquinhos helped to flesh out the team. Meanwhile, the likes of Alexandre Lacazette, Lucas Torreira, Hector Bellerin, Bernd Leno and Matteo Guendouzi were all offloaded to give the Gunners' squad a much healthier look.