Santi Cazorla has missed Arsenal’s last 14 Premier League matches due to injury and former Chelsea player Pat Nevin believes the Gunners aren’t the same team without him. However, new stats from daily fantasy football game www.oulala.com paint a different picture.
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The Spaniard has been touted as the club’s main creative spark in midfield, and has been talked about as being irreplaceable as his contract nears its end, but the stats reveal that we score no less goals without his inclusion, and pick up almost as many points.
Granit Xhaka, Mohamed Elneny, Francis Coquelin and Aaron Ramsey have been sharing the central roles in Santi’s absence, and we have climbed up to second place since the Spaniard fell foul of injury, and are now the biggest challengers to Chelsea in the hunt to lift the Premier League title.
Cazorla currently has no return date having had a number of setbacks, after initially being expected to return after the international break back in November.
Granit Xhaka got himself sent off unnecessarily at the weekend, while Elneny is off at the African Cup of Nations at present, which will likely leave us with Aaron Ramsey and Francis Coquelin for the next couple of league outings, but I expect one of our younger squad members will get called up for the FA Cup match with Southampton next weekend.
As much as the stats claim we haven’t really missed him, we most certainly do with the extra numbers with the lack of options available in the centre at present, although the balance between Le Coq and Ramsey may well prove to work well.
Do we really lack something when Cazorla is out?
Pat J
Stats are great but sometimes don’t show the full picture. I’m not sure about you guys but our midfield has given me a mix of several mini strokes and mini heart attacks without Santi so far.
I miss Cazorla A LOT.
He and Ozil are our best creative central midfielders. Coquelin is our best defensive central midfielder.
Missed Cazorla last season too
If Carzola was available, we wouldn’t have lost to Everton and Man City. We would have probably be about 9 points ahead of Chelsea. Most of our midfield pairings play like a group without pre-season. They lack that understanding that exist when Le coq, Carzola and Ozil play together. There is a creative gap in the middle resulting from playing with caution and depending on individual brilliance.
Who is Carzola? ?
aren’t you the admin? you should have known him by now
I know a midfielder called Cazorla but never heard of Carzola!
There’s other factors to consider also. Alexis.
Mustafi giving players in front confidence and sometimes support.
Ozil Walcott Ox Iwobi Perez chipping in with Giroud, whom does not have the burden of being the 20 goal player.
Bigger squad, fresher legs.
I’d say if augmented the stats a little, you could find out more. Ball possession in midfield, passes astray v intended target. Chance creation from the mids, although Xhaka’s is better than I thought it would be.
Carzola, is our only midfielder who pulls off the duel duties of attacking and defending well. He is also our only midfielder who has mastered the art of turning defence into attack at the drop of a hat..All the others are too 1 dimensional. They either attack or defend well.
We’ve missed Cazorla a lot, no question about it, which is why we should be concentrating on finding a replacement as soon as possible.
I don’t like the idea about replacing him, but we have to be honest, he’s getting older, which means he’s likely to pick up more injuries,and the older you get, the longer it takes to recover. And let’s face, his injury record is pretty appalling.
I’m not sure where we’re going to find a replacement, some who can play with both feet, pass long and short, score goals, assist, see spaces and passes that others don’t, the only thing he doesn’t excel at is tackling.
Such a complete player is going to be very difficult to replace.
Stats sometimes neglect possibilities but i beg to differ from the writer’s view in as much as we are not sitting at the top of the league.
If i may ask what is Arsenal playing for second, third or fourth? Because i’m sure it’s not the first spot.