Arsenal: Mkhitaryan and Mesut should flourish together

Arsene Wenger has revealed that it is his intention to play Mesut Ozil and Henrikh Mkhitaryan together for Arsenal. Two players of such intelligence and awareness should flourish together.

The Alexis Sanchez saga is finished. Thankfully. It took a long, long time, but, eventually, the Chilean departed and Arsenal were able to secure their replacement. That replacement is former Manchester United midfielder Henrikh Mkhitaryan, who arrived in a straight swap for Sanchez.

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And now the focus turns away from Sanchez and the ramifications of his exit, and towards the impending impact that Mkhitaryan’s arrival will have. In particular, there are questions swirling about whether Mkhitaryan can flourish in the same team as Mesut Ozil, a player of similarly creative qualities.

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Well, the question was put to Arsene Wenger in his press conference on Friday morning, which is especially poignant given that Ozil is yet to sign a new contract and can leave the club for free at the end of the season. Here is what he had to say:

"“Yes, our intention is [to play them together]. As I have said before, we signed Mkhitaryan on a long-term contract and our intention is to keep Ozil at the club and hopefully, we will manage to do that very soon. You see straight away that he’s [Mkhitaryan’s] a great football player, which we knew before we got him here. It doesn’t look like there will be any problem [in integrating him].”"

Now, obviously, Wenger is going to play Ozil and Mkhitaryan together. They are both excellent players who are, in terms of sheer talent, deserving of regular football in a squad that is bereft of top-tier attacking quality. The real issue is whether they will play well together, and that is a very different question altogether.

The key hurdle to overcome will be the space that they occupy. Both are players who prefer to play centrally with pace around them — Mkhitaryan at Dortmund, Ozil at Real Madrid are prime examples. Even when they are officially fielded as wingers, they still like to roam into central zones of the pitch, influencing the game wherever they feel they can, unshackled by defensive or width-providing responsibilities.

Thankfully, at Manchester City, there are two players in David Silva and Kevin de Bruyne who also like to play with nous and guile in the middle of the pitch who are excelling beside one another. The reason is two-fold: they have blistering pace around them in two traditional wingers, Raheem Sterling and Leroy Sane; they are extremely intelligent and aware players who can adapt to those that they are interlinking with.

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In a similar way, Ozil and Mkhitaryan can flourish. They are both mentally astute players with an acute understanding of their position, of the impact that the collective movement has on the space that can subsequently be exploited. And in Alexandre Lacazette, and potentially Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, they also have pace in the team. They can, and perhaps should, flourish alongside one another. Only time will tell.