Arsenal legend, Ian Wright, has expressed his disappointment at the performance of Nicolas Pepe in the match against Crystal Palace.
Pepe was a surprise starter as Mikel Arteta attempted to get the best of a well-drilled Palace side.
However, the Ivorian didn’t give his manager enough reason to start him in another match after his terrible show.
Like most Arsenal fans, Wright expected more from him and other Arsenal stars, but he was left disappointed as Palace pocketed a number of the players and limited the damage they could do in the game.
Wright says Palace effectively shut out the likes of Kieran Tierney and they forced Pepe to put in yet another poor performance as he continues to struggle to justify being the most expensive player at the club.
‘I think Palace totally capitalised,’ he said as quoted by The Daily Mail.
‘They did their homework on Arsenal, they closed down the right people and shut down the left side. Kieran Tierney didn’t do anything.
‘Pepe was very disappointing again and once they scored, Arsenal did not take it to Palace.
‘We’ve seen Palace come back a couple of times and there’s no way they were going to rest on their laurels. They were going to go for Arsenal and they did and they were unfortunate not to win.’
Pepe is yet to score and he has provided just an assist in 6 Premier League matches this season.
If he doesn’t improve, he may not be trusted to start matches again in this campaign.
As a pundit Ian Wright was a fine player.
I missed the article on Arsenals best Black defenders. I would like to mention a player I saw in action back in September 1982.
Chris “Chalky” Whyte started when there were very few black players and those that did play in the league were often racially abused..
Whyte was born in Islington, London. He made his first appearance in the football league against Manchester City on 17 October, 1981 and went on to start all but one of Arsenal’s remaining league matches that season, partnering David O’leary in central defense.
The arrival of Tommy Caton and the emergence of Tony Adams ended Whyte’s Arsenal career. No English club offered him a contract and he played in the USA but eventually at the age of 30 Whyte joined Howard Wilkinson at Leeds. He was nearly ever-present for the next three seasons, during which time Leeds won the last first division title 1991-1992 before the intro of the Premier League era. 40 years on forgotten by most remembered by few. Nevertheless a trail blazer.
Play Pepe LW where he is clearly more comfortable and get him running hard at defenders…tell him to leave his 37 step overs at home.
MA seems to have a knack at trying to force things that don’t work as well.
-Playing out from the back
-Leno being a ball playing GK
-Pepe at RW
You can add odegaard as partney midfield partner. Odegaard is a 10, morr advanced. Last year we had Xhaka as LB too (ol some will argue that tierney was injured) but he could also have perfectly put saka at LB as he played there quite a while. We have a decent team, not the twelvth one in term of talent. So why are we struggling being stuck in 12 and devlopping bad goalless football. Take out the tottenham 1st half. It means in 7,5 games we scored 4 famelic goals. Very very sad. There is a problem there. Especially when you have 180m trio pepe laca auba and england star saka there ! Something is wrong.
Pepe is not good enough! He will never be good enough at Arsenal anyway! There will be flashes of brilliance that will have people singing his name but nothing on a consistent basis.
That’s the reality!
You may be right but surely it’s worth playing him on the left flank where he can cross on the run with his stronger foot?
Yes absolutely, he night not be that superstar 70m player but he still can do some damage probably. At least, play him, in the same position (omg how can we have to wish that evidence), with regular minutes.
I see so many people insisting that Pepe should be playing on the left.
I could not disagree more. I feel this would simply make that side weaker and he would end up lacking any kind of impact. Putting him on that side would only work if there is a specific identifiable weakness to exploit on that side. He is not a left winger.
The right is where his impact can be felt the most but his current form is subpar.
i thing that arteta should be in “left out” position
Loooool. He is in a process of total rebuild. Just be patient !