‘Didn’t suit’: Pundit says £65m Arsenal player was used in the wrong position vs Atalanta
Arsenal drew 0-0 with Atalanta on Thursday evening as their Champions League campaign got off to a rather uninspiring start. Arsenal will be hoping to...
Arsenal drew 0-0 with Atalanta on Thursday evening as their Champions League campaign got off to a rather uninspiring start.
Arsenal will be hoping to genuinely compete for the Champions League this season, but their first European performance of the season wasn’t the best.
Arsenal really missed Martin Odegaard’s creativity against Atalanta, and speaking on Off The Ball, Nedum Onuoha noted that Kai Havertz was rather ineffective as he dropped back into a midfield role.
Kai Havertz in midfield didn’t work
Onuoha spoke about Arsenal’s attack and Havertz’s performance in midfield compared to the attack.
“They were missing the attacking side of things. I thought at half-time he would change something, but he didn’t do anything too obvious,” Onuoha said.
“Sterling was a change, but the one for me, I know some people have been hard on Havertz, but in terms of playing number nine for Arsenal, he does it better than anyone at this moment in time. Having Havertz drop into midfield at times didn’t suit Arsenal when they wanted to go long, so bringing on Trossard and having Havertz higher felt more familiar and very dangerous.”
Kai Havertz isn’t a midfielder
Four years on from arriving in England, the same conversations are still cropping up around Kai Havertz.
The German has struggled to nail down a position for both Arsenal and Chelsea in recent years, but one thing is clear now, Havertz is not a midfield player.
The £65m man has been brilliant over the past eight months or so playing in an attacking role, but he looked like his old self again against Atalanta as he was asked to play in the midfield.
It’s clear that the midfield position doesn’t suit Havertz, and while Mikel Arteta is lacking options when he looks for a Martin Odegaard replacement, Havertz certainly isn’t the answer.
Havertz should be played exclusively as a striker from now on.
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