Arsenal: Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang an incomplete signing

Arsenal’s signing of Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang has to be thrown into question when the team continues to prove that he isn’t fitting in.

When a club signs a new player – even Arsenal – there is a general unspoken understanding that there is a plan regarding how that new player will fit in and how he solves a problem that the club has.

So when Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang joined the club, that same unspoken understanding was had. Surely Arsene Wenger had a plan for the new man. Surely he had something we didn’t have before. Speed, obviously; superb runs, definitely.

But this is now two matches on the fly against two teams that are looking to be much better than us, that Aubameyang has been rendered helpless at relatively little fault of his own.

Against both Tottenham and Manchester City, Aubameyang was given a chance over the top maybe a handful of times combined. He is finding himself isolated and alone for large portions of the match and when the game does turn in the opposite direction, the Gunners either dink the ball around in the midfield or lose the ball too quickly and any benefit that Aubameyang would have brought to the team is lost.

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This team has not changed to accommodate a World Class striker being thrown into their midst. They are still playing – and losing – in the same exact ways that they always have. This was the same when Alexandre Lacazette joined. He would go matches where the team floundered in the middle of the pitch and essentially left the Frenchman with nothing to do.

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The only person that I saw trying to get Aubameyang involved over the top against City was Granit Xhaka. No one else seemed at all interested in what he had to offer. They’d pass it to each other, dink it around, and by then, the momentum was lost.

Either Wenger never wanted Aubameyang, or he’s expecting the Gabonese hitman to learn to play – and lose – the way the Gunners have been playing – and losing – all year. Perhaps it’s a combination of the two.

Signing a player makes absolutely no difference if that player isn’t allowed to play the way he has always played. It’s common sense. If you sign a player and don’t make any changes, it’s an incomplete signing. The team hasn’t been altered.

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That is what the situation with Aubameyang is looking like. He was an incomplete signing. A great name, but a name that Wenger either doesn’t know how to properly use, or won’t adjust to use him.

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