Shkodran Mustafi arrived at Arsenal with a big price tag and a reputation as a ball playing centreback, so is he? Is that what we saw against Southampton on Saturday at the Emirates?

Let’s take a look.

Against the Saints, Mustafi made 96 passes, almost 25% more than Laurent Koscielny whom we all know loves a pass.

Debut nerves, perhaps, had his pass completion rate at 88.5% compared to his teammate’s imperial 98.6%.

If it was nerves, then they were good ones because his La Liga average was 73.5 and his career average 81.1.

mesut-ozil-shkodran-mustafi

As you can see in the image below, most of his failed passes came when he was trying a vertical, and, of course, there was that cross, but we’ll soon teach him nobody will ever be in the box waiting for him so he’d best not bother.

arsenal-shkodran-mustafi-debut-passing-stats

Hard to say he’s not a ball-playing centre back looking at that, stats that most defenders would be envious of.

Except Kos. Obviously.