Pain in the Arsenal
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Arsenal’s Stoke City Win Solves Nothing with the Striker Conundrum

By Josh Sippie

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Arsenal downed Stoke City with relative ease to the delight of their supporters. After so many frustrating games, Arsenal finally compiled one 90 minute stretch where they looked competent and in control. Stoke fought back bravely for a stretch but the defense was composed enough to see it through.

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Of course, questions still remain about our striking corps. With both Olivier Giroud and Theo Walcott scoring goals in their token style, who will Arsenal turn to next? This match against Stoke did little to help resolve our striking situation.

Theo Walcott started the game with Olivier Giroud still licking the wounds of the past few weeks. Walcott was given 74 minutes to stake his claim and Giroud was given the rest. In the grand scheme of things, both had just about the same impact. Essentially that puts the pendulum in Giroud’s favor, as he was given less time.

Theo Walcott managed a season-high 24 touches. For the style that he plays and his track record, that is a lot of time on the ball. He did not look completely incompetent on the ball either. He made some educated moves and utilized his winging ability at striker. His goal was settled magnificently from a gorgeous Ozil long ball and he deserves massive credit for it. However, the chances he missed are hard to forget. He had a chance in the opening minutes after Alexis smacked the post (the first time) and he skied it. Then, with an open header, he skied another.

It was frustrating and with a clinical finisher (like Walcott usually is) Arsenal would have been up 4-0.

Olivier Giroud came on in the 74th minute. Immediately he was gifted with a golden opportunity and he skidded it wide. The social media world erupted. But Giroud rebounded. He set himself up in perfect position to take a Santi Cazorla set piece and headed it home.

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Both strikers had their impacts with their goals but the bigger picture is that we still do not know who is better for the team. What does not help matters is the tactics that Arsene Wenger deploys with each striker on the pitch. Walcott played the majority of the game. Through all the parts where Arsenal controlled matters (essentially the whole game), Walcott was the front man. Crowding the goal and sending in crosses is not something you can do with Walcott at striker, yet the Gunners do it.

Likewise, on the counterattack, Giroud has very little purposes other than to hold up and release. He does that well, but having Walcott on the counter attack makes so much more sense, as we saw in Arsenal’s few counterattacks all game.

Next up for Arsenal is Dinamo Zagreb on Wednesday and I would bet that Giroud will be starting. It should be a game that Arsenal control so hopefully Giroud will see plenty of crosses flying into his area. Each day is like an experiment. We just don’t have any real results yet.

Next: Arsenal's Central Midfield Mass Makes Sense

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