Arsenal’s longest serving player, and also one of our top earners, Theo Walcott, looks set to be a peripheral bench-warmer this season unless Olivier Giroud suffers a long term injury. The England international has made it clear that he wants to be the main centre-forward, so it looks like Arsene Wenger has decided to punish him by not playing him on the wing alongside Giroud either.
Aaron Ramsey, who has also announced many times that he doesn’t want to play on the wing, is now seemingly first-choice for Walcott’s place, and Theo admitted that Wenger had spoken to him about it. “It’s obviously frustrating,” Walcott said after spending the whole of the Palace game on the bench. “What’s good is the manager has pulled me to one side and spoken to me about my role – It’s no secret that I want to play up front.”
Readers often mention that it can be counter-productive to play Ramsey on the wing, as he is hardly a prolific goalscorer especially from that position, whereas Walcott has proven stats and ability to knock them in on a regular basis. In fact Wenger recently gave this as one of the reasons he does not intend to buy Benzema.
He said: “You do need somebody to score goals and I think Olivier Giroud will not be far from 20 this season. Theo Walcott will be up there too.
“We have to develop our game and depend less on one player.
“I truly believe we can win the league. We look like we can score plenty of goals.”
Far be it for me to question Wenger’s logic, but can anyone explain how both Giroud and Walcott can both score 20 goals a season if only one of them is on the pitch in any given game?
Walcott is not a CF he needs to admit this to himself and accept that he’s a winger
in a scenario where all available strikers have been Loaned/sold out with lil or no striker options and no certainty of wenger bringing in one……. It won’t be out fault to consider walcott in the striker role……… I know walcott is likewise efficient on the wings…….but Just anybody to compete with Giroud for now!………anywayz WENGER IS TO BLAME
He’s a modern forward, nowadays top teams use three strikers up front, he’s playing as an RF instead of a CF.
It seems that Wenger AND the board prefer having a second choice striker/winger in Walkott on the bench and paying him the astronomical amount of £120K/week, than splashing some serious cash for a WC striker. How can you put one of your biggest earners on the bench? If he is a sub-player then he can’t be paid almost as much as our best players (Sanchez, Özil). If I were Wenger I wouldn’t have renewed his contract and would have cashed in some serious money (from Liverpool for instance) and bought us the WC striker that me trully miss. Nevertheless, the OX seems unstoppable going forward this year, he reminds me a bit of Hulk at his prime…
So you would let Walcot go without having bought in a replacement? IMO the boss has done things the right way , should we now get someone in , the sell on value of Walcot will be so much higher with 4 or 5 years of his new contract to run.
wenger doesn’t like players who excel or those that show promise…he tries his best to make ozil bad by playing him on the wing, same with ramsey, plays giroud instead of walcott which to me is a mistake and all the other players that have been destroyed by these old crooked man…and if you excel then you are sold asap!…alexis is an exception to these as he can play comfortably in multiple positions…arshavin was a WC player until wenger laid his arms on him…gervinho seems to be better now and so does a dozen others…i know giroud lovers will be all over me but try to remind me the day that we lost a game with walcott as our main man!!!!…..
the day wenger leaves is the day we become champions again!!
@WENGEROUTKLOPPIN
i’m not a Giroud lover,but im not a big fan of Theo either,normally Wenger only plays Theo upfront against weak teams but a few years ago he played Theo upfront against Bayern Munich in the Champions league,an we lost 3-1,Theos a winger
We all know why English players like Jenkinson, Walcott, Welbeck are always kept for the home grown rule than anything else. That is why an inexperienced defender like Stones is fetching 40m pounds! Its so easy to make money in England, groom young British players and sell them exorbitantly! I am geeing my hands for Hayden, Akpom, Iwobi, Crowley etc!
He isn’t punishing anybody. Walcott is yet to earn the right to play ahead of Giroud. He just needs to work hard and fight for his place just like Bellerina, Le coq, Monreal and santi did. And it isn’t only Giroud he has to compete against, there’s welbeck too.
But how will you fight for your place when you do not get played, even as a sub?
He played against Chelsea and came on against Westham when we really needed his energy and in both occasions he failed dismally. Wenger will play him in games where pace is required as it is his main weapon.
@wizardly and why did he decide to start giroud first instead of walcott???…is giroud his favorite son or what?…walcott has always played well in the cf position just that giroud fans expect him to play like messi there…we win and score more with him up there and thats a a fact…and why then did wenger not replace giroud with walcott after his horror westham game??…these old twart must leave the emirates for good for us to succeed!!!!
i have gone through a lot of your comments and i want to have whatever you are smoking
10Yrs without title needs burnt sacrifice in the first place, to exorcise demons,even proven winners like Ozil,sanchez and Cech cant win title In arsenal shirt.Fans have cursed wenger and some died,he needs cleansing or sacking to end misfortune.Am ready to offer my bull
With comments like that your bloody scary, Voodoo anyone?
@season ticket holder
Totally agree with you mate,but we have too meny wengers love childs in this club as a supporter,they rather see Arsenal not win anything than wenger losing his job.theres only hand full of few of us who care abt our great club, wants to see reach its full potential.but them akb ass licker wont let it be.
@bereal. Fans like u will face reality when Wenger finally leaves this club. U haters refuse to realize what Wenger has done for this great club. How many of u saw the recent additions(Ozil,Alexis, Cech etc) coming before they were made. Even the coaches u guys were tipping to replace Leprof, Where are they today? Laudrop? Marthinez? etc Some are still calling for Klopp who could not qualify for UCL after losing just one class player(Lewandosky) in a year. Anyway keeping blaming…
Well said mate
LOL
man watevea, all I know is we ar in de right path to success and i beleive arsene knows best
pls quit smoking coke!
The facts arte there for yu to see but yu simply ignore them.
Thats why yu think coz yu smoke coke everybody does. Yu shld
be in rehab man
i also believe that arsene knows what’s best for him and his family…not arsenal fans or the club…earning more than $14m a year doing the same thing over and over again is really genius…these old man clearly knows best!!
Um’, I don’t think Wenger is Punishing Him. That’s far from it. We have only played two games so far and we don’t know if Walcott will be our striker competing with giroud and welbeck this season or a Winger competing with Ox and Welbeck… In Wenger’s recent formation, he loves deploying Ramsey on the flank to get that extra man in the midfield and Ramsey gives you energy and goals too’ So He isn’t necessary playing on the flank.
Having said that, I believe Walcott is part of the team big time. He is fit and healthy and you don’t pay a player that much to sit on the bench…
Ramsey on the flank make so predictable, winger on the wing I said.
I believe Wenger and Walcott are working on something in the training pitch which we might not see at the moment. Time will tell. As for playing Ramsey on the wing, it is not fixed that a team must play two out-out wide players at the same time. In modern football, coaches tend to use one natural CAM player at one flank for technical balance because using two wide players may affect the defensive aspect of the team.
Maybe a goal celebration for when Giroud is playing up front and scores!?
@Prince, you are right nothing is fixed, you can play 3 CAMs if you want, but when you have a squad that has Theo, Ox, Sanchez and Welbeck it is a shame not to play with two wingers.
Look at City Sterling and Navas on the sides and how well its working. If you dont have two speedy, skillful wingers then I understand but when you have what Arsene has at his disposal and still play with a cm on the wings, it just doesnt make sense.
Maybe Giroud is striker for first half of season and Theo is striker for second half of season. We don’t really know how these things work ?
An all round skill set
seems to be the go.
Attack and defend.
Possession football.
Giroud can hold the ball up, score goals
and is valuable in defense.
Theo is one dimensional and has to be spoon fed
the perfect pass to run on to. He can’t hold
up the ball and rarely defends.
After the WH loss the gaffer reverted to
the 11 players he trusts most.
When Arsenal becomes more settled
and more fluid Theo will get his chance
i hate the term “WORK HARD and FIGHT”………..it just doesn’t explain why players like Gabriel are still on the bench…….wenger will always have his favourites!
Wenger does punish him. With a paddle before games.
He asks him as he lays strewn over wingers knee:
“Where is your favourite position”
Theo: “Centre Forward!”
SMACK!!!!!
AW: “WHERE, Is your favourite position Theo???”
Theo: “ahhh, CENTRE FORWARD, master”
SMACK, SMACK!!!
AW: “WHERE….IS YOUR FAVOURITE POSITION, THEO????”
Grabs paddle even harder
Theo:” the bench master, THE BENCH!!!”
First of all, Walcott actually can be played as a LW, RW or Striker. The problem is he isn’t the best in our squad for any of the 3 position. Sanchez, OX and Giroud is ahead of him. Yes he may be more clinical to Giroud but the problem is our style of playing currently isn’t suited for the clinical striker. We also need someone who can create chances and space for others. More like a Benzema than a Higuain (i know we won’t get any of them but just stating the style of striker we need). Now Wallcott is also not the type of player who is good as a CF. He is very good as a winger but again the modern football needs a winger who defends well which is something he lacks. So it isn’t punishing when he isnt played because in the Crystal Palace game we need someone who defends well thus why I think Wenger didnt put him on.
explain why a natural right winger like The OX didn’t start the game against palace!
Because his blunders are costly! If it wasn’t for his mistake against Westham, we could have recovered.
@wizardry…..i hate the term “WORK HARD and FIGHT”………..it just doesn’t explain why players like Gabriel are still on the bench…….wenger will always have his favourites!
Any rumours … need some rumours
Kanye West is reportedly said to be releasing an album of chamber music early next year entitled ‘my b@llocks be gold, biatches’
I cannot wait to read all your comments once benzema signs. Again benzema is gunner 100%. He will wear the number 9 shirt. It is a done deal.
Deal will be announced next week. That is the last week of the window. Benzema is a gunner!
Two games in. Really?
I wonder why Sanchez hasn’t reached last seasons total yet. He’s underperforming!!!!!
It’s a bit tabloid saying ‘punishing Walcott’ because he was on the bench…it’s a squad and Wenger plays who he thinks more likely to score based on the opposition.
Wenger knows best,he can’t punish our golden boy at any time only that he want to manage him well and use him when needed.I am sure the boss selects his team according to opponent’s style and approach hence every player will get his time to play at the right time and not all at once.
Or ya know – there was tactical reasons to play Giroud over Theo in those games. The issue is when he chooses to play no wingers…but that’s a whole different ball game. If we are playing with 1 CF then it comes down to which 1 is best suited for the game and if Theo is going to play on the wing. Nothing more to it then the fact both players are competing for the position. No punishment.