Absolutely every Arsenal fan knows that Olivier Giroud and Theo Walcott suddenly became aimless in the second half of the season, but luckily Danny Welbeck came to our rescue in the last couple of months nudging us into the Top Four.
But despite the fact that between all three of them they only scored 30 goals, most people on JustArsenal seem to blame Arsene Wenger for not bringing in extra competition to our strike force. But the fact is that if they were as clinical as they should have been, especially with the amount of chances the Gunners create, we should have been well clear in the title race.
Jack Wilshere, who just played for an hour when Arsenal faced Man City last weekend, has been giving his verdict on the season on Arsenal.com and he is quite clear that our problem was putting the ball in the back of the net. “I was obviously watching as a fan for most of the year so it was tough to watch,” Jack said. “I think of the games that didn’t go our way like Swansea at home.
“We used to struggle against the big teams, but this year we were alright. In games [like the Swansea one] we start quickly in the first 20 minutes and have chances but we need to make them count. There are a lot of chances we create with the likes of Ozil, Alexis and Welbeck, we just have to be a bit more clinical.
“I think [we are moving in the right direction]. We put up a big challenge this year, and OK it didn’t work out, but after we beat Leicester at home we thought this was our year and we have to push on. Unfortunately we didn’t, but we put up more of a fight than previous years.
“A big thing we worked on this season was when we lose the ball, we straight away have to defend and win the ball higher up. I think we have done that well and we improved a lot on that.”
How many times has our game report made it clear that Arsenal had the lions share of possession but just couldn’t score? I should think most of the Arsenal players will be well aware that we blew a very big chance this season. Surely the only solution is for Wenger to buy an upgraded hitman in the summer so we don’t have the same problem in the next campaign?