A tale of two very different debuts from Arsenal signings

There may have ben a few eyebrows raised among the Arsenal fans and the watching football media when they saw the Arsenal team selected by Arsene Wenger for today’s Premier League home clash with Southampton. After a slow start to the season it was important for the Gunners not to drop any more points and so even though we have a big European match on Tuesday it was expected that the boss would play as starong a side as possible.

I can understand why Wenger felt the need to leave Alexis Sanchez on the bench after his long and tiring international break with Chile, but I cannot see why he left Olivier Giroud out as well. I can also understand why he wanted to hand a debut to Lucas Perez, but surely not without Giroud or Alexis to help him on his debut.

As it was our new striker looked lost in the central striker role and before he was replaced just after the hour mark he had touched the ball just 31 times. Only Walcott had touched it less and he was at least making some good runs and affecting the game.

I don’t want to be too harsh on Lucas. He did look a bit better after the break but it was hardly a great debut and will not do his confidence much good. I blame the boss really, who threw him to the lions a bit and will hopefully ease him into life as a Gunner from now on.

The other debutant Shkodran Mustafi was always likely to play due to the club’s defensive injury crisis and his fuirst game for Arsenal went a lot better. Unlike Perez our German defender looked right at home and ended up having more touches and playing more touches than any other player on the pitch.

One early mistake apart, Mustafi looked calm and composed on the ball and sharp in the tackle and he looks to be a great addition to the squad. I am not writing the striker off but the two debuts could hardly have been different couild they?

Bob.

Tags Lucas Mustafi Perez

13 Comments

  1. Our back line and the Mid field are the best we got since the invincible days. Welcome Mustafi.

    Lucas had an impact in the 1st goal, he was not entirely out of sort, remember that long ball from him to Ozil and follow it up to take the shot.

    He will come good soon, I think he need a goal to kick start him.

    1. Agree! Mustafi is confident and has a good personality. Some of our defenders (or former one) are not (were not) tough enough. Hope he can go head to head with someone like Ibrahimovic.

      For Perez, well we should give him some games and supports!

  2. Happy Birthday to Kos and Perez. Perez assisted to his fellow birthday mate for the first goal.

    Mustafi grew into the game and he gave the pass that led to the penalty.

    I like Perez. Ozil had an off day. There link up play wasn’t there today. We saw some good runs from Perez but no good linkup play between him, Walcott and Ox. I want Ox to grow. I want him to really do well but seems like he can’t improve beyond his current play.

    The new boys will be so good with time. It’s just their first game and we got the three points. Can’t complain…

  3. Mustafi was great today. Didn’t look like he was having his debut game for the club.

    He was aggressive with and without the ball. We were able to keep a really high defensive line.

    Perez had a typically quiet debut, yes. But a lot of it was down to the fact that we weren’t creating as much chances through the middle.

    The guys on the flanks -OX and Theo- didn’t help much with the low quality of their passing. I reckon Perez would’ve had a better game if he played with Alexis.

  4. Perez will come good.
    How much did we buy him?
    The was a certain 100 M that dis appeared in the Manchester derby today.
    Perez being new had no guide on the pitch.

  5. we played with Perez like he is the same player Giroud is. Give him space to run into, we were giving him headers and passing him into traffic. We’ll need to get used to not having a target man.

  6. leaving Giroud out was very good in fact taking Perez off in the 2nd half for Giroud was the bad decision. should have started Walcott-Perez-Alexis

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