Former Chelsea assistant, Ray Wilkins, has some rather unusual advice for Arsene Wenger regarding Mesut Ozil.

Wilkins believes that Wenger should only play Ozil at the Emirates because he doesn’t work hard enough, which is what the team needs when they’re away from home.

“I don’t think he will get back in the team. The way Wenger set things out at Stamford Bridge – he did it remarkably well,” Wilkins told AskFans.

“I would only play Ozil at the Emirates, personally. Away from home, you have to fight and you have to fight to eleven. You can’t fight as ten.

“Ozil is a wonderfully gifted footballer, don’t get me wrong. I love him to pieces, but you have to work for the team.

“When you lose the ball – get yourself back and start working the for team. If you look at the team on Sunday, they were fantastic. They had a fantastic work ethic.

“(Granit) Xhaka never left the front of the back four, (Aaron) Ramsey went off and did what he did – they didn’t play Sanchez, they didn’t play Ozil and it worked.

“Ozil has to conform to what’s happening with the team. As an attacking force, he’s wonderful but when you lose the ball, you need to lose it as eleven, not ten and that’s what happens.”

Ozil was left out of the squad to play Wilkins’ former team on Sunday with a slight knee injury. While the 28-year-old is back in training, it’s unclear whether he’ll be fit enough to feature against West Brom on Monday.

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Wilkins is right: Arsenal did well against Chelsea and despite drawing 0-0 could easily have nabbed a winner on a few occasions. In fact, the Gunners had 11 shots (two on target) to the Blues’ 13. While that’s obviously fewer, that’s hard to do at Stamford Bridge. Especially for a team who many predicted were in for another thrashing.

Instead of playing Ozil behind Alexandre Lacazette, Wenger put Alex Iwobi and Danny Welbeck behind the ex-Lyon man. Rather than having one forward and one playmaker behind the striker, we had two forwards. Therefore, it’s hardly surprising that Arsenal had a bit more zip to their play going forward as Ozil is more about creating chances for others than for himself.

We then also had Aaron Ramsey, who was given the creative freedom to roam forward himself. The Wales international had one of the best games of his life.

This isn’t to say that putting Ozil back into the starting line-up will negatively impact the team. The German just influences play in a slightly different way.