In his pre-match presser for the Chelsea game, Mikel Arteta provided a positive update on Bukayo Saka, much to the delight of Gooners around the world. Even though he didn’t give any guarantees about a return sooner than later, the prospect of having our best attacker back is exciting. Why not? We do have a small matter of a quarter final clash against Real Madrid to attend to, so having him back will go a long way in improving our frontline, and that will increase our chances considerably of going through to the semi-final of the Champions League.
Bukayo Saka’s injury seriously affected us and I could go as far as saying it changed the trajectory of Arsenal’s campaign. Regardless of how good Ethan Nwaneri has been or the efforts Gabriel Martinelli and Raheem Sterling to provide cover there, our right hasn’t quite been the same therefore affecting us in attack. Due to his brilliant understanding with Ødegaard, we have seen the Norwegian struggle to click in his absence, furthermore we have struggled to score frequently from set pieces – corners specifically – after losing his wicked deliveries on the in-swinger.
As he nears a return, I can’t help imagine the stats he would’ve put in individually this campaign. For the past four seasons – excluding this – Saka has been consistently improving his goal and assist tally at pace. This season was to be no different as he started like a man on a mission. In the Premier League exclusively, this was the case as he had a total of 15 G/A from just 16 starts before his injury. Only five of that tally were goals with a bulk of it coming from assists, 10 of them in just 16 games in the competition.
That astonishing tally meant that he was well on course to shatter the Premier League record for most assists in a single season. registering assists in five consecutive matches at the beginning of the season equaled Thierry Henry’s record set in the 2004/2005 season but he failed to pull clear when we faced Leicester in matchday 6. He was however, on the path to shatter the League record when he registered his tenth and last assist back in November. Your money would’ve been on him to do it too when considering the variety of ways he was laying on the assists.
From balls into the box, lay-offs and mostly corners – he was firing on all cylinders! Speaking about the latter, his absence was a major factor in our mini corner drought in the PL before Marino’s strike against Chelsea. He was well on his way to beating the tally of 20 assists held by Thierry Henry (2002-03) and Kevin De Bruyne (2019-20) however tearing his hamstring in late December basically ended it. No one knows for sure if he would’ve been anywhere close but considering that he had 21 more games to register 10+ assists – had he stayed fit – my best guess is he probably would’ve.
This claim carries more weight considering his placing in some key metrics. Even after being out for three months, the England international still leads the way for expected assists per 90 (0.40), ranks joint second for big chances created (19) and also jointly in second place for assists overall (10). That is astonishing to say the least! Stats via FotMob.
In my opinion, his injury has played a massive role in our struggles in the latter stages of this campaign, well injuries to multiple players particularly has been the case, but one player we would’ve done well in having is certainly Bukayo Saka.
He could still yet make it back in time to salvage something from this campaign. Early April is the target but I can’t help but feel apprehensive ahead of a potential Madrid showdown. Don’t get me wrong, having him back in time for that first leg will do wonders, but my fear is putting too much pressure on a player who would’ve been out for just under four months at the time. There’s a collective hope from Gooners for him to come back in time for the game but where does that turn to asking too much of him? Also, him dropping a 9/10 performance is not guaranteed even if he makes it so it might be wise to temper our expectations.
Coming back to the season that might have been for Bukayo Saka, what are your thoughts on the record gooners, would he have broken it?
BENJAMIN KENNETH.
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If we’re going to be using assists as a serious metric for evaluating players, I really think set pieces should be a separate category. Same with penalties wrt goals scored. An open play assist or goal can be “unearned” at times due to good fortune (someone scored a worldy off a simple pass or the GK drops a basic catch in front of the striker), but at least it’s coming within normal play. Only one person in a team can take corners or penalties, so it gives a massive advantage over others who don’t take them and pads the stats of certain players over others.
They are both legitimate and meaningful skills, just think they’re so specialised, it’s not really fair to use them to compare between players.
I agree Davi. Nothing against Bukayo of course but as the writer points to, injuries have played a role in the past (quite frequently in my memory) in looking at any season’s numbers. The injury doesn’t even have to be directly to the player himself. imo, a good example involving a Gunner was when Ozil had 17 assists before the end of December, 19 by February, and then Cazorla who was the absolutely vital linchpin for us in progressing the ball went down. Ozil’s assists virtually disappeared and all hope of making it more of a race with Leicester evaporated as well.
I looked it up and the numbers were actually 16 and 18 by December and February, respectively, but the example still holds.
That’s very interesting. I’m not a big ozil fan, but that says a lot – if you get him the ball in the right areas, he made stuff happen. Take away his “supply” and he’s not going to be effective. Makes sense. I suppose he was the sort of player who could make a good team better, but wasn’t going to lift an underperforming team. I guess my criticism of him is that such a big name, big money player should have done more to find a way to be effective, but that’s just who he was, and it’s not his fault we opted to pay so much for him really.
👍 Playing the #10 was really different back then compared to today when you have much greater physical demands imo. I do believe he could have been easily been worth the money at he time in a fully functional setup and later with the proper motivation. It’ll be interesting to find out (assuming we do) the whole story of what went on to cause what we saw in his later times with us.
Running the risk of possibly rushing Saka back could harm the team in the longer term should he break down again.
I want us to progress to the latter stages as much as anyone, but not at a cost of losing a key player in the longer term, by gambling with his fitness. Not a good idea in my opinion.😉👍