Monaco play with 12, Arsenal with 9 for defeat in North London

26 February 2015 10:13

Sometimes expectation can encumber a team as much as dead weight. Sometimes you find yourself in a scenario which encompasses both. So it was with Arsenal on Wednesday evening who, having secured a draw so favourable that even the most pessimistic of fans salivating in anticipation of a last eight position, decided the result was a forgone conclusion and thus forgot / chose not to try.

Statistics don't lie. Danny Welbeck, a player deemed surplus to requirements at Old Trafford by a Manchester team who finished 15 points behind Arsenal last season, touched the ball 27 times all game, of which 19 were passes and 16 were completed, registering not a single shot on target. Oxlade-Chamberlain in contrast came on for the last 25 minutes, had more touches (29) and scored.

Then there is the enigma Mesut Ozil. Or rather, he used to be an enigma. The definition of an enigma is "a person, thing, or situation that is mysterious, puzzling, or ambiguous" and yet Ozil's performance is nothing new in an Arsenal shirt. "Disinterested", "wasteful", and "lethargic" are far more accurate, because to be an enigma, what you're producing has have qualities which you're not expecting, whereas the German World Cup winner continually and consistently fails to show up for Arsenal's games. In fact, for all of Ozil's touches (81), only 67 were passes, and 10 of those failed to find another Arsenal player, all of which means 24 of Ozil's touches resulted in gifting possession back to Monaco.

So. Ozil gave possession to Monaco 8 times more than Welbeck completed a pass to his own team. Is that a performance of a £42 million player? I reiterate : Ozil gave possession to Monaco a full 8 times more than Welbeck managed to complete a pass to his own team.

The presence of Ozil at Arsenal changed the profile of Wenger's team in terms of buying power and attraction for other world class stars but in terms of the team he has produced little or nothing to justify the outlay. Welbeck was a panic buy to fill a perceived void. Instead he's creating one, which either Walcott or Oxlade-Chamberlain should be filling when fit.

I fear I've not given enough credit to a Monaco side who came to do a job and did so with aplomb. Congratulations to the Principality's team. However, their job was made easier by having Arsenal's world cup winner appearing to play for the opposition, and Welbeck going missing in action.

In a game where all the players stayed on the field, Arsenal in truth played basically with 9 men, and Monaco with 12. With an absentee, and a trojan horse in the team, what hope did the Gunners really have?

Source: DSG