Why Arsenal’s new Smith Rowe will be forced to leave if Morgan Rogers signs

The number one target for Arsenal this summer is Morgan Rogers.

The Aston Villa man has had a brilliant time in the Midlands but now feels like a natural time for him to depart having won the Europa League.

Sadly for the Gunners, his club disagree with that statement and have placed a colossal £130m asking price on his head. The likelihood of him signing for that fee is remote. After all, it would be a club-record arrival.

While Rogers may not be worth quite as much as that, he would be a phenomenal signing for the Premier League champions as they look to back up that success.

Capable of playing out wide on the left or through the middle as a 10, Rogers would bring goals, assists and a powerful directness to Mikel Arteta’s side.

The winners from Morgan Rogers signing for Arsenal

Arsenal need a winger, they need more creativity and they need more goals. Rogers would bring that to the Emirates Stadium in spades.

This is a signing that would benefit so many areas of the club, notably on the flanks where they are in need of for someone capable who’s a bit more unpredictable and more of a maverick than Gabriel Martinelli and Leandro Trossard.

For the likes of Declan Rice and potentially even fellow big-money target, Bruno Guimaraes, having someone like that would be brilliant. The two midfielders love playing through the lines and regardless of whether Rogers would be playing out wide or at the top of a midfield three, they would flourish together.

However, the biggest winners of this move would undoubtedly be Kai Havertz and Viktor Gyokeres. They are simply crying out for more quality from wide on the left.

On the right, they have Bukayo Saka but a similar sort of threat has been missing from the opposite flank. Rogers could well be the difference maker.

In 2024/25, he registered as many as 16 assists in all competitions. Last term he picked up 12. To put those numbers into context, Arsenal’s top assisters last season were Rice and Trossard with 11 apiece.

If you give Gyokeres a chance, he usually takes it so this is good news. The trouble is that he didn’t really get enough space to operate in during his debut year in the capital. Rogers, however, is the type of player defenders naturally gravitate to, thus hopefully opening up bigger spaces for Arsenal’s strikers to attack.

All that said, it would not all be sunshine and rainbows if Rogers moved to north London. Some at the club would certainly suffer.

The losers from Morgan Rogers signing for Arsenal

While the general idea is that Rogers would play on the left, he has played the vast majority of his football for Villa in a central area. As a result, for Martin Odegaard and the aforementioned Martinelli, this move would not be good news.

Odegaard rediscovered some of his mojo at the World Cup, assisting three goals in six games, but his form in recent years has not been good enough. He scored just once in the Premier League last season, as did Martinelli. On that evidence, Rogers would be a big upgrade as far as goalscoring is concerned. The Englishman is a huge threat in the final third.

The likelihood is that both of those players will remain at the Emirates for the time being but the same cannot be said for a certain Ethan Nwaneri. Indeed, if this move goes through his future in the capital will look rather bleak. Truthfully, it already does.

While the teenager was part of the open top bus parade after the Gunners won the Premier League, you’d forgive Nwaneri for feeling a bit of imposters syndrome. After all, the Hale Ender had very little to do with that title success.

Before heading to Marseille on loan over the winter, the 19-year-old failed to start a single Premier League match. His time in France promised great things when he netted on Ligue 1 debut vs Lens but that was the best it ever really got for the youngster in 2025/26.

Nwaneri was initially signed by Roberto De Zerbi. His progressive nature was perfect for the Italian coach but he soon left. Arsenal’s young prodigy was hung out to dry as a result.

He only played nine times in the league, starting just three games. It just about summed up the teenager’s season.

How it got to this point is sad. In 2024/25, he was described as the “most exciting footballer in England and maybe Europe” by former Chelsea man Joe Cole.

It was easy to see why. It was a remarkable season for the attacker who stepped into the injured Saka’s shoes and performed admirably, scoring nine times in all competitions.

But, despite penning a new contract last summer, Arsenal signed Noni Madueke and Eberechi Eze. From that moment, his chances of minutes looked slim.

The trouble is that Nwaneri has desires of playing more centrally. It was on the right where he shone so brightly over a year ago but since moving into the middle, he has not been able to break into the team. There’s something of an Emile Smith Rowe about this situation.

One of the best young players to emerge from Hale End, much like Smith Rowe, it was not long before Arteta lost trust in him. The quality was still there but he was being quickly usurped by new signings, chiefly Odegaard. The Englishman never really did anything wrong but was the victim of Arsenal’s success.

The same situation is now playing out with Nwaneri and if Rogers signs, he can surely forget about having any long-term career at the Emirates. A departure now feels inevitable.