Arsenal: Olivier Giroud Has Done Everything But Score

Arsenal have been at the whims of Olivier Giroud for quite some time now, but this year it all went wrong. Yet, bare bones stats show he did everything else right.

When you think of a disastrous year by Olivier Giroud, you probably think of numerous Monaco, first leg matches playing over and over again on repeat. Numerous shots are being skied over the net, balls are being lost and general agony is circulating all over the homeland.

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This year has the feel of an Olivier Giroud disaster. He has not scored in the Premier League in four months and he has only scored in one of his last twenty Arsenal appearances. It’s tragic.

Oddly enough though, that is where Giroud’s shortcomings end. Granted, that’s all his shortcomings really have to amount to – not scoring – but digging beyond the goals, we can see that Giroud has done everything we could have wanted. Except the most important thing.

For starters, Giroud has always been where we want him – in the penalty area. 83% of his shots this year have come from inside the small box, a higher percentage than any other regular starting striker.

Then there is the matter of accuracy. Giroud had roughly the same shot accuracy as Jamie Vardy, Romelu Lukaku, Sergio Aguero and Riyad Mahrez. Perhaps the biggest problem with Giroud is that he wasn’t shooting enough. Among all those names, Giroud took the fewest shots per minute played.

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Giroud also only used the goal-scoring instruments that he has the highest probability of scoring with – his head and his left foot. No one attempted more headed shots this year than Giroud.

The problem is the inexplicable drop off when it comes to goals. Giroud only scored five headed goals. Andy Carroll scored that many in half the minutes played and half the attempts.

We see the same thing on set pieces, one of Arsenal’s biggest bugaboos. Giroud attempted a league-leading 29 shots off of set pieces, yet he only netted four times.

Giroud also only scored ten goals from inside the penalty area, despite taking 78 of his shots there. Both Kane and Vardy took a similar number of shots from inside the box but had twice the return of goals.

Yet the shot accuracy is fairly similar.

Meaning that Giroud was not only the victim of some stellar/fortunate keeping (Ben Foster’s face), but he was also the victim of his own inability to put it where the keeper wasn’t.

I’m not going making excuses for Giroud’s sudden inability to score. But I will say this. All of these numbers line up with, if not improve upon, what he has done in the past at Arsenal. The Frenchman was in the right positions, firing accurate shots using his head and left foot and winning aerial duels. But he was being denied the back of the net.

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Call me an eternal optimist, but I’m not done with Giroud yet, and I don’t think Arsenal is either.

(All stats via WhoScored.com)