Arsenal: Alexandre Lacazette officially acquainted with “that” Wenger

Arsenal were inexplicably left without their record signing Alexandre Lacazette, which marks the all important first meeting between him and “that” Arsene Wenger.

I challenge anyone to defend why Arsene Wenger decided to sit Alexandre Lacazette. Bring it. Because there is no possibly argument as to why you would deprive this Arsenal side of the record signing who also happens to be one of the few guys that hasn’t had his inner fire completely stamped out and pissed on yet.

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This after Lacazette delivered a bit of an uplifting message to Gooners about scoring the goals we’ve been missing in the past.

Wenger’s reasoning? “Lacazette is still in an adaptation phase.”

“Adaptation phase” is a contrived mechanism that Wenger uses to justify making poor decisions. Alvaro Morata isn’t in acclimation phase. Why not? Why is he starting and scoring and assisting and having a grand old time.

When Mesut Ozil was in “acclimation phase” why wasn’t he dropped? Wenger wouldn’t drop him if the German had a fence post through his foot.

But Lacazette, the guy he paid a record amount of money for, can’t play because he is busy acclimating. So we go with a disgruntled “Meh”lexis Sanchez, a goal-blind Danny Welbeck and Ozil.

Mr. Lacazette, you have now had the pleasure of meeting the Arsene Wenger that thinks himself into deep, dark corners that will take him weeks to emerge from.

This is just a classic case of overthinking. What is he trying to do, protect Lacazette? Protect him from what, a poor performance? Lacazette is a professional, he has done this exact thing for years and he has done it well. You don’t have to protect him.

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Are you trying to protect the team from someone who isn’t ready to be here? Why would you spend a record amount of money on someone who isn’t ready to be here and someone who is only going to learn how to “be here” by playing?

It’s utterly daft. Completely nonsensical. This guy is one of the few players who doesn’t fall under the umbrella of despair that has covered the gross majority of Gunners and he’s been left out because Wenger feels the need to protect him.

If I’m Lacazette, I’m scratching my head, asking Olivier Giroud if Wenger does this often. And, when Giroud shoots him a sideways look that says “you don’t want to know,” I’d start wondering just what the hell I’m actually doing here.

It’s embarrassing. From the moment that starting XI was released, the outcry was unanimous. Wenger did such a good job landing both Lacazette and Sead Kolasinac early on and he’s benched them both because they aren’t “acclimated.”

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So rather than use two players that can help you, that you bought specifically to patch up some missing pieces in the club, you send out the exact same team that saw us to sixth place last year. Brilliant. What could go wrong.