Ozil became accustomed to special treatment from Wenger. When Emery arrived he expected Ozil to pull his weight like anybody else. There were plenty of stories about how players didn’t like that he was treated differently and I imagine the resentment was spread out across the squad.
There’s also the fact he was earning £350k a week but not producing performances to befit that salary.
After Emery left, Arteta wanted a culture shift at Arsenal and a more hard line approach to effort. Ozil was already past his physical prime by this point, couple that with his ineffective performances and outrageous salary it was a recipe for disaster to keep him in the squad.
I loved Ozil, an elegant and talented player on his day but his decline was rapid and even hindsight tells us the management made the right decision even then
I will buy Arteta’s desire to create a culture shift but I don’t buy Emery’s expectation from Ozil to pull his weight.
That’s a narrative we were fed and nothing about the football Emery has generated required the level of intensity or dedication we were all fed with.
I don’t know how you could say that when Ozil was benched all the time.
I would say spending 2 and half-season on the bench accelerated his decline, which Arsenal did to him.
If not performing in a stop start Arsenal career signifies decline, I would say Pepe has declined rapidly at the age of 26
From the day after that transcendant performance against Leicester in the fall of 2018 until the end of his Arsenal career, Ozil played in 49 matches and had 3 goals and 5 assists. In the 44 games across all comps previous to that point, he had 10 goals and 15 assists.
Emery’s treatment of him probably did accelerate his decline but he also just stopped producing anywhere near his previous level. It was a dramatic drop-off. And if a player like that isn’t producing in the final third, he’s not bringing much to the team. At that point you’re playing like 350k per week for a lazy, tactically undisciplined, rebellious Alex Iwobi.
Your way of looking at stats are misleading.
Ozil’s 2018-19 season saw him play 2420 minutes in a side managed by Emery, not designed to bring the best out of Ozil. Scored 6, Assisted 3.
That is 35% fewer minutes than his usual season playing time.
Whereas Ozil’s 2017-18 season saw him play 2953 minutes despite not playing group stages of Europa & missing out on the tail end of the season with an injury. Scored 5, Assisted 14.
Ozil’s 16-17 season, he played 3,746 minutes. Scored 12, Assisted 14.
There isn’t anything definitive out there to say Ozil declined rapidly. Signs are more towards sporadic minutes, the needless drama created by Emery & board and Emery’s playing style.
Even at his peak, Ozil was always invisible in games & often languishing around rather than sprinting out there so I don’t know what metrics are you guys using to call it a decline.
Ozil actually started fairly brightly under Emery, up through that Leicester match, then fell off really badly and that continued into the 19-20 season under both Emery and Arteta.
We can debate the reasons but there is no way around the fact that his production from October 2018 to the end of his career in March 2020 was complete shit.
The thing is emery’s style did not compliment any attacking football. We just got battered for 90 minutes by all teams good or bad making shit teams look like prime Barca. No attacking/creative player can play under that. Same goes for the start of arteta reign we look like a Jose team just parking the bus
As the saying goes, if you get into a fight with an asshole you’re unfortunate and if it happens again you’re really unlucky but if it keeps happening over and over then you’re probably an asshole.
Shock horror football fans involved in rewriting history to defend their cuntish club behaviour.
The president of Germany’s football federation wishes he had given Mesut Ozil more support against racist attacks following the controversy over the player’s photo with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
DFB president Reinhard Grindel, who previously conceded making mistakes in handling the controversy, told Sunday tabloid Bild am Sonntag that he had not sought to make Ozil the scapegoat for Germany’s disappointing first-round exit from the World Cup.
“In view of the racist attacks, I should have positioned myself more clearly in one or two areas and backed Mesut Ozil,” Grindel said. “I should have found clear words. Such attacks are totally unacceptable. I’m sorry that Mesut Ozil felt abandoned by the DFB.”
Ozil retired from Germany’s national team last month when he defended his pre-World Cup meeting with Erdogan and was scathing of Grindel, the DFB, fans and media for what he said was racism in their treatment of people with Turkish roots.
So @JakeyBoy is it Ozil’s fault when DFB president himself is conceding his mistake?
Its his attitude more than anything that ends up causing trouble wherever he goes. He’s actually not doing too badly this season, he’s currently on 8 goals and 2 assists in 22 appearances and was the captain in the last few games. So can safely assume he has been excluded (again) for non footballing reasons.
