Unfortunately some people tend to do this. So far we don't have an Eboue type player that people can abuse, and i hope that no one becomes one!
It's obviously not a good thing Ozil getting injured, but the point I was making about it possibly being a blessing in disguise is that he's not been at his best and has been getting a lot of stick. He's too good (expensive) to drop, so Wenger keeps on playing him out of position (I don't think this is good use of our squad). Now the issue has been forced, it will allow Cazorla (who has been playing well) to play in his preferred position in the middle.
Nail on the head. He should have been dropped and one of Cazorla or Wilshere should have taken his place. The purpose of a squad is to replace players who are injured or off form. Why have a shed load of midfield playmakers if you don't chop and change. The last player we had that couldn't be dropped in midfield was Cesc, and that was down to him being so damn consistently good!
I understood it fella I think there might have been an attempt to try and make it into something that it wasn't.
Tbh, ozil should of just continually been played through the middle and any other player who plays that position tough ****. Ozil is on a different level to Cazorla and jack.
I'd say Cazorla did more for Arsenal in the CAM position when played there two years ago than Ozil has in the last 13 months.
Cazorla got 12 goals and 14 assists in 50 apps in his first season with us and ozil got 7 goals and 15 assists in an injury hit season in 40 apps. If you take out cazorlas 3 goals against reading he has basically the same stats as ozil in 25% more games (ten). Don't think there was much between both of there first seasons except that everyone sang cazorlas praise and everyone got on ozils back. In that first season with Cazorla we also struggled far more than we did last season with ozil to create chances against teams that sat deep. Ozils passing, particularly in the first half of the season, totally opened up teams we otherwise wouldn't have had any luck against. So I'd agree there is a case to be made for Cazorla doing similarly well in his first season with us to how well ozil did. But I think the more talented player is Ozil and he should be playing in the middle consistently to get the best out of him.
I get the feeling Wenger put Ozil on the left as he wanted 2 CMs with one DM/DLP behind in a 4-1-4-1 formation, rather than a 4-2-3-1. This helped pack the midfield and improve us defensively, and changed tactics. When Ozil plays he tends to play across the width of the pitch anyway, but the problem with the 4-1-4-1 is that he was restricted a bit by needing to track back. SO IMO it didn't work as well as a 4-2-3-1. I don't think it was an attempt by Wenger to play anyone else in the '10' role.
I'm not sure whats happened with our corners this season - when Bould 1st came on board we scored a few goals with a flick on at the near post, or Merts flicking on to Kos or vice versa. It reminded me of Adams and Bould (among others) back in the day. This season there seems to be no movement, no targets, no variation and a difficulty to even beat the 1st defender!
Other than Mert-Kos-Welbeck, we lack height in that area to do real damage. And plus we're even always putting Mert near the goal posts rather than in the middle to be able to do the damage. In this regards, you can say we're like Barca, very very **** at set plays, you know when Arsenal-Barca get a set play, you need not worry 9 out of 10 times.
But you could say the same last season when we only had Kos, Merts and Giroud with any height - and usually Merts would stand on the post and either flick it in, or flick it into the middle for Kos to put in. I suppose we've lost Giroud and I doubt Welbeck commands as much attention from the defenders as Giroud.
Giroud is the missing link IMO. He's a real threat both offensively and defensively on set-pieces and he really did most of the movement on our corners last season which would free up Kos or Mert.
Ozils injury record: Schalke 7 days, Werder Bremen 29 days, Real Madrid 0 days, Arsenal 133 days inc. present injury. Now tell me there isn't a problem at the club.
Thats horrendous! I remember vermaelen coming to us and having a rep for not getting injured, his 1st season i dont think he missed a game, 2nd season je missed the whole season!
Very telling. Seriously, it's really no longer bad luck and I'm sure even the most positive of us must be thinking that something is not right with our training methods. Wilshere is perpetually injured, Ramsey is now becoming injury prone after missing a large portion of last season and the beginning of this, Ozil was out for significant chunks after having a very good record for Real and it goes on. It's a miracle that our only two CBs haven't sustained any significant injuries yet! What is worse is when they give you a return date, they most often than not, come back after the date and not before. We really need to look into this.
I'd say what's more telling is if you look at our players over the past 10 years, the amount that have lost huge amounts of their potential due to niggling or major injuries, or both - Sagna, Rosicky, Gibbs, DIABY!, RVP, Walcott, Ramsey, Wilshere, Vermaelen, Eduardo, clichy to a certain extent, djourou, I mean even Toure had malaria! All (or most) of these players could have been epic if they hadn't had huge set backs because of injury!
