Arsenal: Riyad Mahrez solidifying fate all by himself

Arsenal has been hot and cold with Riyad Mahrez all summer, but after we faced him on the pitch, his fate is all but solidified.

Arsenal’s pursuit of Thomas Lemar has taken up so much of the summer that it’s hard to think about many other transfer links. But just behind Lemar, seemingly as a back up in case they couldn’t land the Frenchman, was Riyad Mahrez.

I always saw Mahrez as the cop out signing; the guy on deck in case we couldn’t get the guy we actually wanted. And that is what always rubbed me the wrong way about him. It felt like settling; like we were getting something other than our first choice.

And this is Arsenal, where there is no time for that.

Thankfully, interest in Mahrez has almost entirely died down. Roma have supposedly backed out of the race too, so that leaves the Gunners, one of those “top six” teams that Leicester City’s Craig Shakespeare says the Algerian wants to play for.

Mahrez had an excellent opportunity to shut up both myself and all the other doubters out there. He was playing against a battered defense on the team he was linked to the strongest and all he had to do was prove why we should be interested.

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And he couldn’t do that. Despite registering an assist, the Algerian was underwhelming. Mahrez was dispossessed four times, took two poor touches, attempted just two shots, neither of which were on target and created one lowly chance (it was, however, an assist).

That is hardly the type of display against a broken defense that would change many team’s minds. As I keep saying ad nauseum, the guy had six fantastic months in the Premier League in 2015 and since then, he has done next to nothing. His numbers match the team he is on, sure, but there has to be some sort of next level from him to prove that he is better than this team and we just haven’t seen it.

Which makes life a bit easier. Mahrez sealed his own fate with this performance, as the Gunners are unlikely to bite on him after such a display. However, with Lemar also now off the table, the question we must now answer is whether or not to exercise patience until next summer in an effort to finally land Lemar, or make a silly move for someone we don’t need.

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With Arsene Wenger in charge, I think we all know the answer to that question.

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