Arsenal: Mesut Ozil lays cornerstone for another one of “those” season

Arsenal needed Mesut Ozil to step up against Leicester City, especially with Alexis Sanchez out, but he did not such thing. Or did he?

Arsenal’s match against Leicester City was ripe with offensive prowess to pick out. Alexandre Lacazette was a functioning member with so much flash and bang. Granit Xhaka took over creative duties to perfection, Mohamed Elneny chipped (literally) in and even Danny Welbeck showed up.

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The wingbacks were influential on the match and the subs made the biggest impact of all, scoring within minutes of each other to notch the Gunners a win.

You could say that the power of the offense offset the fragility of the defense.

But what about Mesut Ozil? In the post-match player ratings, I was ruthless towards Ozil, calling him invisible and a nonfactor. I watched the game through from start to finish and didn’t see him making much of an impact at all.

It wouldn’t be the first time. I wasn’t that upset about it, because plenty of other people picked up the slack, but I wondered why it is he has to have matches like that.

Then I checked the match stats and saw that he created six chances. I didn’t really believe it at first, so I went back and watched the whole thing again and sure enough, I counted them. Six.

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I thought I had learned the art of truly seeing Mesut Ozil, but maybe I lack a bit of match fitness in that department myself.

He wasn’t great in the match. Not by a long shot. He had some stunningly wayward passes that were just terrible.

But as the creation center of the club, he created the most chances, despite looking far less influential than every other attacker.

Which makes me think that another one of “those” seasons may be in store for Ozil. One of those seasons where he is ridiculed for being invisible, yet he still does a big part of his job week in and week out.

Still, we have to expect more from him, especially being such a prolific passer as he is. There is always room for improvement and on an attack that is looking particularly inspiring, I have all the faith in the world that he will improve.

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Hopefully going forward I’ll be back in fine form picking out his effectiveness so that his player ratings don’t suffer. Because I’m sure the fact that I gave him a 5.4 is just eating away at him.