In the premier league for arsenal:
Pepe 10 goals 6 assists in 51 games (goal/assist per 3.2 games)
Saka 6 goals 8 assists in 51 games (goal/assist per 3.6 games)
Smith Rowe 4 assists in 15 games (goal/assist per 3.8 games)
Willian 0 goals 5 assists in 21 games (goal/assist per 4.2 games)
Odegaard 1 goal 0 assists in 7 games (goal/assist per 7 games)
And I would suspect that a higher % of Pepe’s games were limited minutes/cameo appearances than the others.
Of course this is a limited sample and there are other things to consider than just goals and assists, but as I said before I’d rather someone who looks frustrating but gives you the output than a flashy player who scores a wonder goal every 10 games.
I don’t need stats to know what’s the pecking order of wingers at Arsenal.
Pepe has had an inferior season than Saka & Smith Rowe, and doesn’t deserve more games than them.
There is a third option, someone who is a consistent performer, contributes to the play; and on top of it have tangible output to show for it as well.
Saka & ESR fall in that category. You yourself showed that with the stats provided by you. Similar output as Pepe but with more consistency in overall performance.
Besides that, Pepe is more of a flashy player who scores a wonder goal every 5 games.
So what’s the excuse for him not playing when Saka’s been out? (Given he doesn’t generally play on the same side.position as Smith Rowe).
It may be similar but he’s still getting the best output per game when he’s on average playing the least number of minutes per game of every comparable player.
There’s nothing wrong with scoring a good goal I’m talking about if that’s all the player does and they only score rarely, and you can clearly see from the above stats that’s not the case with Pepe, (or at least he’s doing a lot better with scoring than every other option we have).
He should really be getting more game time as Saka is reaching red zone and there’s a lot of nothing games left for us in the league before the Slavia games.
Should he have dived over/made more of it and asked the question for a penalty with that late chance or am I being a biased cunt? Looked like he was tugged back to me
Yeah, had a couple of occasions like that. He needs to be smarter in the box.
When his killer instincts kick in he’ll be unstoppable. Still waiting for it though.
Too timid and lightweight for this league. He hardly ever uses his two biggest assets (skill and pace) to do anything constructive on the pitch. Also get the feeling he lacks clarity of thought on what he wants to do with the ball. Just feels like he keeps assessing his options right till the time he has no option left and either gives the ball away or makes a nothing pass.
The strange this is that we signed someone who thrived in a team that was setup to play on the counter and allow him to thrive running at players but when he plays here he barely runs at players anymore. His biggest strengths have been taken away from him so Arteta can have him defending most of the game then being ponderous with the ball whilst he tries to pick a pass you’d probably never see him try to make.
I can’t defend many of his poor performances but he is another example of how poorly we manage what should be a talented player.
I remember his first start against Liverpool where he looked dangerous every time he got the ball. He looks a totally gun shy now and barely seems to want to take players on with the same confidence.
Nah we weren’t, we are just stupid. He had one massive season, and a lot of his goals for them were penos. He was the hype player in the moment and Arsenal are a reactionary club at every level. We are the stupid ones, Lille just complied with us, and of course Raul and his broskies using the transfer as a money laundering operation.
I’m talking about if that’s all the player does and they only score rarely, and you can clearly see from the above stats that’s not the case with Pepe, (or at least he’s doing a lot better with scoring than every other option we have).