At the beginning of February, Arsenal’s form dropped, losing to Everton and Manchester City and drawing with Brentford. This dip in form put Arsenal players in the spotlight, with Gabriel Martinelli emerging as one Gunner who seemed not to be at his best.
Many felt Martinelli was lost without Gabriel Jesus, and it was costing the team. About Martinelli, Ian Wright said on PL productions (as quoted by the Mirror), “Yes, we have Jesus coming back, which will then hopefully fire up Martinelli even more because our left-hand side has missed Jesus.
“Jesus would interchange with Martinelli, and he would get inside, and we would get a little bit more going on our left side. That has been a bit redundant, even though Martinelli has scored some goals; he’s had to come off the bench to do that. It feels like a whole side of Arsenal is not working.
Thereafter, there were calls for Arteta to bench the Brazilian for Leandro Trossard, but Arteta didn’t entertain these calls. Instead, the Spaniard opted to drop Nketiah and, in turn, play both Trossard and Martinelli alongside Bukayo Saka in attack, which has worked well.
For a few games now that Arteta has opted for this attack, Martinelli has shown glimpses of brilliance; he not only scores as he used to but he looks dangerous too whenever he has the ball in his hands. Wright believes that we can credit Martinelli’s newfound form on Trossard’s influence on his game, saying on the Kelly and Wrighty show, “I think we have to mention Trossard because of the fact he came in when he came in and remember, he wasn’t even the first choice.
“But he’s somebody that came in and is ready to go. From the first game to now, he’s just got better and better. Like I’ve said, with Gabriel Martinelli—you saw with him and Eddie [Nketiah]—as much as Eddie came in and plugged that gap for a bit, scored some goals, it just got us to the next phase.
“What was happening was people started to work us out a bit because what we found with Gabi was he was kind of isolated on that left. When you look at Saka, he’s got Ben White coming round, he’s got Martin Odegaard coming across.”
Nketiah is a fine finisher, but when he came on, Martinelli’s form suffered, but Trossard injected fresh energy into the wingers’ game. Trossard has been an Arsenal revelation; he is the gift that keeps on giving.
Darren N
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