I like Danny Welbeck. I think Danny Welbeck is a decent, hard-working, underrated player, which, following his £16million move to Arsenal, appears to be the vogue opinion of the month.

Yet, the manner in which he moved to the Emirates in the final moments of summer transfer deadline day leaves me rather underwhelmed, and once again, critical of Arsene Wenger.

The England international is an interesting addition to the Gunners squad. In terms of link-up play, he suits Arsenal’s style well, his physicality going forward addresses one of Arsenal’s major flaws from last season and his defensive work-rate should improve Arsenal’ shape off the ball – especially in those dreaded away fixtures to the title rivals.

However, he’s not the out-and-out striker Arsenal desperately needed, or at least,  Welbeck is yet to prove he has the quality or firepower for that role. Welbeck is by no means a panic buy – he fits the philosophy and adds to the English core that Wenger is determined to develop for club and country, an issue he commented on after signing Calum Chambers earlier this summer.

But to suggest he was Arsenal’s priority choice to share the load with Olivier Giroud would be an equal fallacy. We know Wenger tried to hi-jack Chelsea’s deal for Loic Remy, we know he had some interest, before the finances came into it, of signing Radamel Falcao, AC Milan claim he was eying Mario Balotelli ahead of the World Cup, and back in January, a rye, unexpected smile during a press conference suggested the Arsenal boss had even considered bringing Robin van Persie back to his old stomping ground. Apparently, free agent Nikola Zigic was also somewhere in the equation.

Yet, Wenger’s interest never materialised into anything concrete until Giroud picked up an injury against Everton that will see him sidelined for the next six months, leading to Arsenal buying a back-up striker, in the final hours of the summer window, who  rarely played in that role for Manchester United and boasts a return of just 20 goals in 90 appearances for his former club.

Of course, the prevailing theory is that Wenger’s loving approach, a move to a more advanced role and a run of regular action until at least January will see Welbeck  unleash his true potential in front of goal. Comparisons with the journey of England’s leading striker, Daniel Sturridge, who left Chelsea for Liverpool in January 2013 after producing a near-identical scoring-rate to the Arsenal signing from wide positions, have not been hard to come by.

But that is still a theory. In other words, signing Welbeck was a serious punt, one the Gunners were forced into by Olivier Giroud’s injury – an accident waiting to happen since he moved to the Emirates in summer 2012.

The France international’s quality as a top centre-forward remains open to debate, but his vitality to the Arsenal cause over the last two seasons is undisputed. He finished last season as Arsenal’s top scorer with 22 goals in all competitions, and Giroud’s static style, like a powerful, immovable pillar for the Gunners’ slight and technical midfielders to reverberate from, has become a key characteristic of his side’s attacking play.

But the work-load placed on the Frenchman’s shoulders over the last two seasons in the absence of a genuine understudy has been simply unbearable. He’s already made over 100 appearances for Arsenal in all competitions –  17 more than he managed in two years at Montpellier and 35 more than his two seasons at Tours – not to mention the 21 international appearances he’s made throughout 2013 and 2014. With that in mind, it’s not surprising that Giroud has now picked up a long-term injury that threatens his and Arsenal’s season.

Wenger will claim misfortune, as he often does when it comes to the Gunners’ incredible injury record. But there’s such a thing as making your own luck; the Arsenal boss has had two years and four transfer windows to find another striker that can parallel, improve upon or compliment Giroud’s quality, yet he left it until deadline day – in fact, through an agreed extension with the FA, Welbeck actually signed for Arsenal at 1.30am on Tuesday morning – to actually sign one.

In that period, he’s given game time to Nicklas Bendtner and Yaya Sanogo, two strikers well below the quality Arsenal should be looking at, and tested square pegs in round holes in the form of Lukas Podolski, Theo Walcott and recently Alexis Sanchez. Throughout, he’s adamantly refused that Arsenal need another centre-forward. In parallels to his late move for Mesut Ozil last summer, it took a gang of ferocious fans during Arsenal’s visit to Leicester City, exclaiming  from the away end ‘Sign an Effing striker’ for the Gunners gaffer to act.

To bring the discussion full circle, I do not see Arsenal’s capture of Welbeck as a bad investment. But it’s not the best investment they could have made this summer; the 23 year-old is not the calibre of striker who will breach the glass ceiling between the north Londoners and the Premier League title. A strike-force of Giroud and Welbeck, compared to Balotelli and Sturridge at Liverpool, Edin Dzeko, Sergio Aguero and Stevan Jovetic at Manchester City, Robin van Persie, Wayne Rooney and Radamel Falcao at Manchester United, Diego Costa, Loic Remy and Didier Drogba at Chelsea and even Romelu Lukaku and Samuel Eto’o at Everton, is rather uninspiring.

The idea that top class strikers, or even those well-proven at European level, aren’t available to Arsenal is a complete myth. They spent £75million this summer, the fourth most of any Premier League side, more than enough to source a high-quality goalscorer. And whilst none of the Gunners’ signings have been unnecessary or conceit, only £16million has been put towards rectifying an integral weakness of the squad that’s existed for over two years.

It’s a simple case of long-term planning that you’d expect from a manager of Wenger’s reputation. He’s now stuck with a player who may or may not prove to be a productive centre-forward, and will be relying upon him for the first half of a campaign in which Arsenal are meant to be competing for the Premier League title.

The FA Cup win at the end of last season – Arsenal’s first trophy for nine years – was meant to usher a new dawn at the Emirates. It was meant to be the catalyst for further glories. Yet Welbeck’s arrival, another short-cut in the transfer market to provide depth in a position that should have been filled last summer , gives the unwanted feeling that little, if anything, has actually changed.

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