Fair enough - you’ve explained your thinking clearly. We do not have to agree.
Feel that’s a bit harsh on Ozil. We won our first trophy in 9 seasons with him in our team and he broke the league’s assist record. He tried to make Giroud and Welbeck better but they’re hardly Muller, Klose, Ronaldo and Benzema.
Fabregas over Odegaard for me easily.
Maybe I am harsh on Ozil, maybe Fabregas too, maybe with a better team around them I would have seen more in them. For that 2006-2021 period we had one or two world-class players at a time and they must have struggled to play their true game while surrounded by dreadful signings. There’s a old phrase that goes something like “It’s hard to soar like an eagle when you’re surrounded by turkeys.”
I can tell you it was very difficult putting aside my hatred of Cashley.
Probably my least favourite ex-Arsenal player. That’s a category in itself.
Nah he started stropping in that final year cos he wanted to leave.
Loved him until then, was glad to see the back of him and even happier to see him flop harder at United than henrik did here. Looked unhappy from the get go and hopefully regretted his choices.
Not even close.
There is no player I could accept over Fabregas and Vieira in an all time Arsenal midfield. Gilberto is the closest and why I went for all 3.
Love Odegaard, loved Ozil. Neither get close to cesc as an overall player and impact in the club.
Martin can get close on impact and Ozil can even beat cesc on technique but I would undoubtedly have fabregas as a legend and the other two a tier below.
Ozil and Fabregas are 2 tiers above Odegaard, its not even close.
What Odegaard has over them both is work rate/pressing, that’s about it.
I love Odegaard at his best, but you will never see him do this:
I rate Cesc over Ode but it’s not like Cesc did that regularly either lol
Odegaard isn’t? Odegaard has less of the Hollywood assists in comparison with Fabregas and Ozil, but everything we do starts and ends with him tbh.
Yes, work-rate won it for me. When you’re 1-0 down at United, I trust Odegaard to kick the others up the arse. Cesc was world class and an Arsenal great, but he wasn’t a great captain and he wasn’t anywhere near as good as stealing the ball off the opposition. Defensively Cesc was weaker.
The stats are close, Odegaard having played only 138 games v 303 for Fabregas
Cesc 0.19 goals per game, 0.31 assists per game.
Odegaard 0.23 goals per game and 0.19 assists per game.
Cesc had better strikers in front of him, Odegaard spends more time starting attacks from our defensive back-line, whereas Cesc would make himself available to defenders from deep midfield, also we don’t know how many of Odegaard’s key passes were sitters that don’t get counted that our forwards should have converted. Odegaard takes more penalties so that’s skewed the figures a bit too.
I think we should revisit the Cesc/Odegaard debate after a full season of having proper strikers in front of him. I have a recipe for Humble Cake if needed.
Better strikers in front of him but a worse midfield and set of defenders around him for the latter half.
Can’t do this hypothetical ‘insert rvp here’ and say Odegaard would do better without considering Cesc would have more freedom in this current team and probably rip these low blocks to shreds.
Tbf we kinda had the same issue back when he was here
I feel Fabregas could single handily win us a game on his back. I haven’t seen that from Ødegaard
Remember the game vs Villa where he was injured but came off the bench for a cameo scored two free kicks? then got subbed again 
Odegaard isn’t anywhere remotely close to Fabregas lol
I think there’s a lot of revisionism wrt Fabregas and Ozil.
They walk into this team as #10s, no question.
Odegaard would have to be the #8 or would be benched as wild as that may sound.
Let’s take out the numbers cos Odegaard doesn’t really play as a 10 anyway and cesc was far from your traditional 10 although wenger gave him more of that role later.
Cesc was a central midfielder playing from deep and also good around the box when he was up there. Needed a more defensive player alongside him as he was pretty weak early on, got more feisty as time went on but his game was all about looking forward.
Ozil was a proper CAM and one of the best the game has ever seen (come at me 
). Again defensive side was never his game and wenger knew not to try and make it, this was still a time where you had luxury players and not everybody had to defend. Ozil’s pressing was always underrated, he actually always did a lot of mileage and was often furthest forward/first one there like we see Odegaard now. Odegaard is just better at it.
Martin is a new age hybrid between the traditional CAM (10) and attacking CM in a 3 (8) that combines technique and vision with energy and physicality. He’s great and the absolute heartbeat of this current team but I don’t think he’ll ever surpass Cesc for me and it would take a big trophy for him to pass Arsenal Ozil. Madrid and Germany Ozil is another story.
He’s more like de bruyne than either of those two anyway, let’s see if he can achieve anything like what KDB has.
I’m absolutely certain that Odegaard will have a statue outside in about 25 years. Or maybe Nwaneri will take his spot and he ends up leaving. Either way, we win.
I guess we all hope he does, he’s got to step up for the next month and not just carry the team but create chances on a plate and score some goals too.
The traditional eleven:
I’m sorry, you have to remove Roger Waters for being an utter twat both while he was in Pink Floyd and beyond.
Rick Wright was the only actual musician in the band and was a really lovely fella. Very underated.
Osama and our Queen are both non-existent so will be adequate cover for Sterling.
Edit: Not tempted to stick Elon in? Admittedly he’ll take the credit whenever someone else scores and he might pick-up a lot of injuries with his famously thin skin.
