Paul Merson has explained why Declan Rice might struggle at Arsenal this season as he highlights the key difference between the Gunners and West Ham.
Rice was one of the best players at West Ham, where he led them to win the Europa Conference League last season.
Even before they won that trophy, Arsenal had wanted to add him to their squad for a fee.
The midfielder moves to the Emirates as one of England’s best players as he also performed well at the World Cup for the Three Lions.
Arsenal fans are excited about the prospect of watching him play for their club, but former Gunner Merson explains why he might struggle.
He writes in his column on Sports Keeda:
“I think it’s going to be hard for Declan Rice to come into his own at Arsenal. When you play at West Ham, you haven’t got the ball much. When you do, you keep possession to give your defence a breather. When Arsenal win the ball back, they get forward and don’t mess about.”
Just Arsenal Opinion
Rice is one of the finest players in our squad now, but he is in a different environment and we do not have to get our hopes high.
The midfielder will need time to reach his best form, so we must be patient with him to gain some momentum.
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Haarland costs less but adapted immediately. Timber is already on the move. Stop telling us stories about a 100M+ player
Haaland didn’t adapt immediately – it sounds strange, but he scored loads without really fitting into the team, and city were worse when he played for a large chunk of last season (I know it sounds crazy, but he’s such a brilliant goalscorer that his goals papered over the cracks in their side imo). At some point in 2023 he clicked with the rest of his team, and they were collectively brilliant over the last 10-15 games.
Impossible for Declan Rice to struggle an entire season at Arsenal and I will tell you why.
It’s not like Rice is coming from some curry goat league in a remote part of the globe, and even then his remarkable understanding of the game suggests otherwise.
A quick look at Declan Rice has shows an intelligent player reading of the game who was equal at depth playing even as a center back before making transition.
With his tall frame and abundant athleticism, 6′ 1″ Rice certainly has the capacity to thrive in a high press system, but is yet to showcase those attributes consistently for club and country due to the role he is ask to play in both teams..As West Ham typically sits in a mid to low block when out of position, he was rarely ask to step out and press high up the field
So a different role no doubt will bring out a more aggressive, front foot style that will suits his skills sets.
But with his undeniable intelligence defensively well established, which is his primary responsibility, his ability to adapt quickly cannot be question.
The other thing is at West Ham the ball is given to Rice, a good player in a crap team. At Arsenal, there are a few better than Rice. No one wants to go to West Ham, although they did win the equivalent of the Intertoto cup
Rice isn’t as good as everyone is making him out,even in a crap West Ham team he went missing in lots of games,just look at there game in the final,he’s still in Amrabats pocket,he would of been a better signing.Not convinced but time will tell.
Correct. Massively overrated
Lols, easy comrade.
I am most worried about our midfield 3. For me Odegaard has to start and if you spend 100 million on Rice, so should he. But if you pair those two with Partey we might lose a little going forward and if we try Havertz we might lose a lot defensively. For now, I would pick Partey over Rice and I would play ESR as replacement for Xhaka. But given that we spend close to 175 million on Rice and Havertz this is unlikely to happen.
But I am so not feeling Havertz in a Xhaka role.
A careful observation of the partey-rice partnership against Monaco shows that rice is the advanced one while partey plays deep hence enough players attack wise whilst maintining defensive solidity.zinchenko’s return will complete the fluidity jigsaw IMO.
I think that’s how it has to be – rice replaces xhaka, and apart from that, it’s the same as last season. I missed most of the Monaco game, but my impression is that we weren’t exactly bossing it, which is a bit concerning at this point. We do have to be patient – rice is coming into a completely different side, with a very different style of play – but there’s not much margin for error if we want to have another run at the title this season.
Zinchenko might make the difference, but I’d expect timber and/or Tierney could also do the job – I hope so because we can’t expect zinchenko to be fit and on form for every game.