Arsenal are very serious about their team this season. They don't want to be the guard first ranked and fail at the end of the season. This proves that Arteta is very active in adding new players. Meanwhile, Merino should just have to wait for time. I read Merino had a medical test, I think it was only a matter of time. Merino has also played at Newcastle United. The statistics in Sociedad are also quite good. He played 32 times with 5 goals. He can be a creative midfielder to overcome Arsenal's stalemate.
The failure in the last two seasons has given Arteta the most valuable lesson, Arsenal was able to reach the top of the standings and even became the team that dominated the standings the longest but failed to win a trophy. This season, Arteta will try to make up for that failure, he has started to actively improve the team's performance with several new players brought in.
Now Arsenal quality is almost at Manchester City level, Arteta only needs to maintain the stamina and performance of the players to always appear consistent. I prefer Arteta to focus on EPL rather than UCL, because the competition level is different. It is very difficult for Arsenal to win UCL even though they have the chance to win it, but Arteta should start from EPL to improve the mentality of his players.
Arsenal have been in a very strong position in the last two seasons. And the team competed for the title. But in the end the Arsenal team failed to win the title. One of the reasons for this was injuries to some key players in the squad. Arsenal's performances lost stability after players suffered injuries. We have seen that in the last two seasons. It cannot be guaranteed that the same thing will not happen this season.
It is true that Arsenal team is strong this season. But at the same time, Manchester City and Liverpool teams are also strong enough. And all three of these teams have won their first two matches. However, the teams are yet to face any strong squads. The next few weeks will tell exactly how strong a team is now.
In the last two seasons Arsenal have been the most serious title contenders with Manchester City, but when they are just one step away from breaking the negative trend over the last 20 years consistency is the main problem that makes them finally fail to break the dominance of Manchester City, I think in the last two seasons Arsenal have had quite good squad depth and they can minimize the occurrence of injuries to their players, But the main problem for Arsenal at the moment is that the mentality and consistency they have is not as good as that of Manchester City, besides that Arsenal still often lose momentum when they have to face crucial matches that they should be able to win, this season many other teams have improved their main squad so I think it will not be easy for Arsenal to repeat what they did in two last seasons, Besides that I think we all here would agree if Arsenal need a qualified main striker at the moment.