Nicolas Pepe has earned criticism from Alan Hutton for his performance, as Arsenal was knocked out of the FA Cup against Southampton today.
The Ivorian has been missing in the Arsenal starting XI for much of the last two months as Mikel Arteta’s side returned to form.
He was brought back into the starting XI alongside Willian for the game against the Saints as the Gunners sought to progress to the next round of the competition.
He, however, put in another uninspiring display that shows why he may be benched by Arteta for the rest of the season and no one will complain.
He is one of Arsenal’s set-piece takers, and he has sometimes delivered good ones.
But in the match against the Saints, he put in a terrible show and his set-pieces were well off when the Gunners needed him to be at his best.
Hutton was unimpressed by what he had seen and said the winger was poor and wasted good chances for the team with his deliveries.
He told BBC Radio 5 Live: “Pepe’s corner was so disappointing, it’s a chance when they get up the pitch and he hits the first man – it’s so poor. The delivery from Arsenal has been poor all day, he just lifted that over the bar and he needs to do a lot better than that.”