Eberechi Eze’s calf injury feels symptomatic of Arsenal’s season in attack. Every time one of the Gunners’ attacking or creative players threatens to hit something approaching a groove, injury tends to hit. In the Premier League so far this season, Bukayo Saka has played just over 71% of the minutes available, making him the most frequently used attacker in the squad.
Viktor Gyokeres has played 68% of minutes available, Trossard 60%, Eze 51%, Odegaard 38%, Merino 36%, Madueke 32%, Martinelli 32%, Havertz and Jesus are on around 11%. On one hand, Arsenal’s summer policy of stacking numbers by adding Eze, Madueke and Gyokeres, is justified by the number of injuries incurred. On the other hand, it is also true that it has been difficult to find rhythm in the final third.
In recent games, injuries to Odegaard and Merino and Havertz’s prolonged recovery meant that Eberechi Eze had a prolonged run in the number 10 role. Eze fired in seven shots in the 2-0 victory over Everton- well above his season average of 2.72 per game. He had three, one a goal of the season contender, in the game against Bayern Leverkusen.
His confidence was such that he injured his calf on a mazy run and in trying to fashion a shooting chance when maybe he should have passed. Eze is famed for his ability to dial up his talents in direct correlation to the extension of daylight hours.
In a season when a lot of Arsenal fans have been waiting for one of the team’s attackers to ‘pop’, Freddie Ljungberg spring 2002 style, Eze looked the most likely. So obviously the injury gods just had to intervene. While Eze has had to get accustomed to playing for Arsenal- of not being the player around who everyone else orbits, of playing 10 man defences every week, of playing a slightly different role to the one he enjoyed in the left half-space at Palace- Arsenal had to get used to him as well.
Eze is much more in the mould of a second striker as an advanced midfielder, whereas Odegaard is probably his polar opposite as a high touch technical hub. Odegaard is the pencil behind the ear guy while Eze gets his overalls covered in motor oil.
There is such a huge divergence between the two that Arsenal have had to learn to operate with a totally different advanced midfielder in Eze after several seasons of Odegaard dominating the position. The second those connections start to fire and familiarity foments; Arsenal will have to alter their muscle memory again.
The ideal scenario is that Martin Odegaard comes back into the team, has no further fitness problems and maybe some of Arsenal’s creative issues are reduced in the process. However, Odegaard has only played a little more than 1/3 of the season with niggling injuries halting his progress.
Last season, the Norwegian suffered an ankle injury early in the campaign and even when he returned, his form tailed off. His presence, even from the bench, was greatly missed in games against Brighton, Leverkusen away, Chelsea, Wolves and the Carabao Cup Final as Arsenal’s technical level was too low to take control of the ball and the game at key periods.
Recent trends do not point to Odegaard being able to play the remainder of the season injury free and in his pre ankle injury form. We are not exactly in the experimental stage of the season and, personally speaking, Odegaard has plenty of credit left in the bank with me.
Assuming that he is able, he should assume Eze’s mantle and we should all hope for a renaissance of fitness and form. That said, he is unlikely to be able to play every minute of every game even with a good wind behind him. I would imagine that Kai Havertz will continue to play in that advanced role from time to time.
While that plan did not work at Wembley, it is worth remembering that Havertz played there for a 3-0 win over Sunderland and a 4-0 win over Leeds earlier this year. There is also the option to move Bukayo Saka inside and play Madueke from the right and I would wager we will see this from time to time.
I don’t think I have seen Saka necessarily perform better in a more central role this season. I suspect Saka has lost a little explosiveness after his hamstring injury last season but, given his age, it ought to return to him. Madueke offers enough threat to be an option, either from the start or the bench and moving Saka inside will offer the opportunity to bring Madueke on without removing Saka.
Max Dowman is a further option and if pure talent were the only consideration, he would be high up the list for that position. But talent is not the only consideration for a boy who turned 16 not long ago. The fact that he didn’t get on at Wembley at 0-2 tells me that Arteta is cognisant of looking after Dowman physically and mentally. I think it was deliberate not to try and cast him as the saviour, especially as the game was pretty much over.
I think if Arsenal are a goal down with 15 minutes remaining, we will see Max- or else if they are a few goals up (!) Otherwise I think Arteta will use him on a purely ‘break glass in case of emergency’ basis. He is a boy, hopefully with a long career ahead of him, looking after his brain and his body are significant considerations.
We could also see Myles Lewis Skelly play in midfield but I suspect this will only be in ‘minute eating’ scenarios when a game is safe and Rice or Zubimendi can be afforded a few minutes of downtime. Other than the Southampton cup tie, potentially, there is going to be very limited room or tolerance for experimentation.
For all Arsenal’s ills at Wembley, losing Eze, Merino and Odegaard for the same position proved to be pretty fatal in the end. The good news is that they are not playing Manchester City every week. Clicking sounds were audible between Arsenal and Eze but the injuries have been so dizzyingly constant, we ought not to be surprised by the latest intervention. It does mean that Arteta and his staff will need to go back to the drawing board once more.