Former Leeds United man Noel Whelan believes Eddie Nketiah has earned the right to remain Arsenal’s first-choice attacker and should keep his place in the team even when Gabriel Jesus is fit again.
The Englishman stepped up after Jesus returned from the World Cup with an injury and has been one of the best players at the club.
Nketiah is a man on fire and it is hard to see him sit on the bench in his current form, but Jesus is one of the best men in the group and some fans will want him back.
Speaking on the issue, Whelan told Football Insider:
“They’ve kept a really good, young, promising striker around – and that decision is paying dividends.
“Jesus is going to have to fight for his place. He might be the big name, but Nketiah has done everything he was asked to do.
“He deserves to be the first choice in that striker role now. It’s a great problem to have for Arteta.
“This is exactly what he needs at this point in the season. It’ll be massive to have Jesus back.”
Just Arsenal Opinion
One of the best problems to have is a selection headache and Arteta will be happy when Jesus returns.
Nketiah has been solid and the Englishman deserves to keep playing, but Jesus brings something different to our game and might be the best man to start up front in certain matches.
Arteta is a smart manager and we can trust the Spaniard to start the right men for each game.
CALLING ALL ARSENAL FANS! Anyone who would like to contribute an Article or Video opinion piece on JustArsenal, please contact us through this link…
WATCH – Arteta disappointed in defeat, but talks about Partey’s injury and Arsenal still looking for new players…”
WATCH EVERY ONE of Mikel Arteta’s and Jonas Eidevall’s Full Press conferences by subscribing to our YouTube Channel – JustArsenalVids
The competition is good and keeps everyone on their toes. Talking about competition Sambi failed to compete on Friday. Hence Arteta forging forward for midfielders.
Arteta shouldn’t favour any player, when jesus comes back, he has to fight for his place like Nketiah did
Surely the whole truth is that they BOTH are first choice players ,even though only one will play, more likely than not – though its certainly not impossible for BOTH to play at once.
I maintain that a deep squad, full of no lesser standard players – meaning NO Holding, Lokonga, Elneny etc -has NO second choice players but only first choice level players, even those who are not chosen in that game. Reserves is an outmoded concept in the modern squad game.
The now way out of date conception of a “reserve ” player ONLY applies when such “reserves” are the likes of Holdings Lokonga and co. We are steadily and remorselessly moving towards a deep squad with only ALL FIRST CHOICE PLAYERS. REALITY!!
Very interesting Jon.
In a way yes, having all players at the same top level sounds great. That being said I’m not sure it’s ideal.
A team like Man City play all 4 competitions to win them so there are plenty of matches but I suspect there’s frustration in their squad. They have so many top players that some of them must be frustrated with their game time.
Look at Jesus or Zinchenko for instance, when they joined us it was seen as a club downgrade. They probably joined Arsenal because they wanted to be central part of a club rather than spend half the available minutes on the bench. Apparently there’s another few Man City players willing to leave the club and I wouldn’t blame them, if they’re good enough for Man City they want to be on the pitch.
If we exclude goalkeepers, having 20-22 top class outfield players could be too many.
Perhaps having 17-18 top outfield players and a couple of players like Elneny, Holding and promising youngsters keeps a better balance in the squad, as long as these lower quality players have the right mentality and accept not to be playing much.
Do we really need 4 top class CB? If you have 3 and the 4th choice is Holding that kind of works for me.
Anyway it’s an interesting question
I love nketiah but once Jesus is back he should be the main man…u can’t compare Jesus strength with nketiah
Every coach or manager assess their players according to statistics with Edie you gotta lots of goals from him while with Jesus u gotta lots of composure around him