Arsenal Erring In Handing Alex Iwobi Starting Job

Arsenal clearly has every intention of handing Alex Iwobi the starting right wing job on a silver platter, but this is not the best course of action.

Arsenal has blocked Alex Iwobi from competing in the 2016 summer Olympics in Rio. Nigeria will have to fight on without the talented attacker. The implications are clear – Alex Iwobi will be handed Arsenal’s starting job on the wings.

Iwobi showed what he could do last year with his direct play and his no-nonsense attack. He showed creativity and a superb ability to instigate attacks no matter his position.

The young Nigerian played all four forward positions and he did them all justice. After some initial nerves, he looked like he fit in rather well with the star-studded cast surrounding him.

But it wasn’t all fun and games. Iwobi started to run into roadblocks towards the end of the year, as his novelty was wearing off. There is still plenty to be excited about with the kid, but in my humble opinion, I don’t think that blocking him from the Olympics, and therefore handing him the starting job, is the greatest plan of attack.

For starters, it essentially tells Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, Serge Gnabry and even Theo Walcott that they are starting the season as back-ups. Walcott should absolutely be fine with that, but the other two are where my worry lies.

Our beloved Ox was given the start in the FA Community Shield against Chelsea to start the 2-15/16 season. He looked magnificent and scored the only goal of the match on an absolutely stunning opposite corner floater.

And then he was dropped. For no reason at all. And just like that, his season was put on hold. It never restarted.

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Serge Gnabry should be equally perturbed. He needs a good opportunity to take that starting role because the Arsenal man has had one hell of a runaround since his breakthrough season in 2013/14.

Both of these guys deserve a fair shot at that role and they would have been given a damn good chance if Iwobi was off at the Olympics. I’m not advocating against Iwobi, not by any means, he’s an incredible talent, but you can’t just take a small chunk of minutes (632) and call it a done deal. And by blocking him from the Olympics, isn’t that essentially what they are saying? Asano is going and we know he isn’t starting.

The Ox and Gnabry have to be given a fair shot in preseason. That’s what it’s for. You can’t just judge these two off substitute appearances or wait for an injury to get in the way, because we’ve seen that doesn’t work either. The Ox is not a good substitute, but give him a solid string of games and he will impress.

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I guess it could be worse. Arsenal has options, they are all young and they are all incredibly talented. So I’ll just shut up now.

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