Player focus Archives: 10/2016

It was a case of Arsenal’s most notable loanees in action against each other on Saturday as Middlesbrough hosted Bournemouth.

Ainsley Maitland-Niles was rewarded after an encouraging display in the previous round against Nottingham Forest with a further starting berth, this time alongside Mohamed Elneny in central midfield as Arsenal hosted Reading in their EFL Cup tie.

Carl Jenkinson made his senior return for Arsenal after being sidelined for the best part of nine months.

Arsene Wenger recently spoke about how Lucas has potential but needs to transfer what he does in training onto the pitch and Arsenal’s match against Reading proved this.

The midfield configuration in Carlo Ancelotti’s great Milan side had the technical prowess and brains of Andrea Pirlo at the base, Gennaro Gattuso as the pitbull ballwinner slightly ahead of him, and then the creative spark of Kaka as its number 10. Arsenal have Francis Coquelin

Francis Coquelin gets a hard time from a lot of Arsenal supporters for not being good enough but for what he is employed to do, the Frenchman is pretty darn decent at it.

Laurent Koscielny was probably Arsenal’s best player against Middlesbrough.

Petr Cech was pretty much the main reason that Arsenal managed to escape our clash against Middlesbrough at the Emirates with a point.

You never really need an excuse to watch Mesut Ozil play football, but you need one even less when he’s just scored his first ever professional hattrick.

When Francis Coquelin was included in the starting lineup on Wednesday night, the overwhelming response was ‘WAAAAHHHHHHH GRANIT XHAKA!’

In what was a weird evening, Arsenal were outpassed by Ludogorets and Mesut Ozil saw his passing stats drop, but he still left with the match ball after grabbing a hattrick and his first assist of the season.

When the team news was announced before the game, most people wanted to know why Arsene Wenger had turned to Francis Coquelin instead of Granit Xhaka, so how did the Frenchman do?

During Arsenal’s game against Swansea I pondered if some imposter had murdered Theo Walcott and has been tearing up the Premier League this season wearing a Theo skin suit.

Carl Jenkinson started and played just under 70 minutes in the u23s’ goalless draw at home against Southampton on Friday evening.

Theo Walcott is a changed player but he still seems to hold the ability to frustrate, especially against defences which give him little space as Burnley did on Sunday. Is Theo just a ‘big game’ player as we all assume?