Thierry Henry may well be Arsenal’s greatest ever goalscorer, but Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang is scoring at a rate not seen since Ian Wright was at the club.
When Thierry Henry arrived at Arsenal he scored 25 goals by the time he had played 45 games for the club.
Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang has, however, scored 28 in the same number of matches.
Neither of these, though, match Ian Wright, who scored 34 in his first 45 for Arsenal.
Ahead of Arsenal’s first leg against Napoli in this season’s Europa League, it was claimed that the Italians had tried to sign Auba twice but couldn’t afford his wages.
Oscar Damiani, Auba’s agent, told Radio Kiss Napoli, “Napoli first wanted Aubameyang when he was at Saint-Etienne and then at Dortmund. He’s a fast player, [they] should be very careful.
“His 12 million net [salary] per year is too much for Naples.”
On Monday night, Auba scored one of the best goals of the season. How often do you see a striker close down a keeper only for his run to be wasted as the keeper clears the ball? On Monday night at Vicarage Road, Ben Foster thought he had time.
Had Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang been most other strikers, he would have.
But the Arsenal man was on him before he could get the ball away and the timing of his block was so perfect the ball ended up in the back of the net.
Speaking after the game, Ben Foster revealed that Leno had spoken to him after the final whistle.
“To be fair, he’s absolutely rapid,” Foster said. I spoke to Bernd Leno at the end of the game and he said ‘it’s not your fault, he’s too quick’. I’m gutted for the lads, though.”