Arsenal: Henrikh Mkhitaryan is better than “good enough”

Arsenal brought in Henrikh Mkhitaryan to fill a massive void and he has done so masterfully, despite what some blowhards want to thin about it.

I try to ignore when pundits say something stupid for attention. But I make exceptions when I read something that is so ridiculous/biased/off the wall that I feel I have to do a service to the Arsenal community by refuting it openly (in an article).

Normally it’s Garth Crooks, but Tony Cascarino makes the occasional appearance and he has again today. I will cite the article here, but I would recommend only clicking on it if you doubt my summation of what he said. I would not recommend clicking on it based on my belief that he only said it for attention and clicking on it gives him that.

In summary, what Cascarino said was that Henrikh Mkhitaryan and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang haven’t been good enough. He said other things, all of which were dumb (like that the Watford win was dulled because Watford had nothing to play for), but I wish to only speak of that one, seemingly tame comment, because it wasn’t tame. Now, I won’t address the Aubameyang claim, suffice to say he’s brand-fricking-new, so cut him some slack.

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But I will address the Mkhitaryan ones and I will address them while censoring my desire to use colorful language.

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How in the hell has Mkhitaryan not been good enough? Cascarino says that the Armenian “floats” on the fringes of games. I find this to be an atrocity of the English language, and I don’t think I am over-exaggerating.

Mkhitaryan’s only really poor match came against Tottenham. He was similarly hindered against Manchester City, but the main problem I have with Cascarino’s criticism is his word choice. Mkhitaryan has been a tireless competitor since arriving at Arsenal. He has showcased a superb defensive work rate and works endlessly to recover the ball.

I have been praising Mkhitaryan like mad for his ability to grant Mesut Ozil some shelter from having to do too much. Even if it doesn’t always come off, which it doesn’t, he is still at the center of every match, not “floating” on the fringes.

It’s utterly ridiculous, not to mention the fact that he has two goals and fives assists since arriving, none of which were fluky or fringy.

What can you expect from someone that said that the AC Milan result was only “decent.” If someone can’t look at what Arsenal did at the San Siro and appreciate it for the massive victory that it was, then it’s never going to be good enough, and biases will shine through.

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Of course, this is also the same guy that recently said that Romelu Lukaku was suddenly a big-game striker. Embarrassing. Get real, Tony.