Arsenal: What on earth is going on with Alexandre Lacazette?

Alexandre Lacazette was maddeningly dropped for Arsenal’s trip to Liverpool on Sunday. It didn’t go well. Here, I try and get a handle on what on earth is going on.

High profile, big-name, expensive signings are expected to make an impact on the team. That is natural. Otherwise, why would you commit resources to investing in their services? For many years, this has been the crucial restriction that has seen Arsenal fail to progress as hoped; they have been unable to further the development of their squad because of an inability to spend.

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However, as the move to the Emirates Stadium retreats another year into the rear view mirror, the purse strings ever loosen, with Arsene Wenger able to be increasingly aggressive in his recruitment. Players like Alexis Sanchez, Mesut Ozil, Granit Xhaka and Shkodran Mustafi were all acquired for north of £30 million, with Ozil setting a club record at £42.5 million.

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This summer, though, that club record was broken once again. Ever since the departure of Robin van Persie in the summer of 2012, Arsenal have been lacking a prolific, clinical goalscoring centre-forward. After many years of spurning chances to sign one, Wenger finally took the plunge and added Alexandre Lacazette to his squad for a reported fee of £52 million, depending on certain incentives.

The signing is, undoubtedly, a statement of intent. Lacazette is a player of real and genuine quality that had garnered attention from many of Europe’s elite clubs, most notably Atletico Madrid. But it was Arsenal who were able to complete the deal. And his start to the season, a glanced header to open the scoring against Leicester City on the first Friday of the Premier League campaign, suggested that he could vindicate his rather hefty price tag.

But, just two games later, after the 4-0 dismantling at the hands of Liverpool, such a statement now seems a little naive and misguided. With Alexis Sanchez returning from an abdominal strain that kept him out of the first two games of the year, Wenger decided to drop Lacazette, persisting with Danny Welbeck to join with Mesut Ozil and complete the front three.

Such a decision simply seems ridiculous and it leads to a question that does not have a positive answer. Either Wenger was wrong in his evaluation of Lacazette when he first signed him and has since learned that he is not good enough, or Lacazette is good enough, and for some tactical reason that evidently backfired, Wenger decided to drop him from the starting line-up. There is a chance that a slight knock or injury forced Wenger’s hand. But he was willing enough to put him on the bench and did bring him on late in the game in a desperate search for a goal.

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Ultimately, Wenger was either wrong in signing Lacazette or wrong in dropping Lacazette. Whichever way you put it, Wenger was wrong.