Arsenal: Assessing Joe Willock’s debut against Newcastle

Arsenal are letting their youngsters have some chances, and it was Joe Willock’s turn against Newcastle. Here is an assessment of how he did.

Ranting and raving about the failure that occurred at St. James Park is getting mildly annoying, so let’s instead turn our attention to the Premier League debut of Arsenal youngster Joe Willock. Willock got the start at the No. 10 spot just a week after Reiss Nelson got his debut and it’s about time.

The important thing here is to take an inventory of how relevant these two can be before going into the transfer window.

Nelson was fairly anticlimactic. He didn’t exactly shake things up as he is used to doing in the U23s, but he wasn’t a liability either, which is always a good thing.

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Joe Willock was quite similar. Which, again, isn’t a bad thing. Reports indicate that he is more comfortable in an attacking role, but given the brief audition that he had there, I’m not convinced.

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Willock has one key trait that we’ve been seeing throughout his brief appearances, and that is the effort with which he plays the game. He is similar to Mohamed Elneny in that sense, as he may not always be the sharpest, but you can never question his effort. And, regarding that sharpness, he is 18, so there is plenty of reason to believe he will tone it up a bit.

Against Newcastle, Willock only had two glaring mistakes that left us shaking our heads. The first was his very first touch of the game, the second was the scuffed first-time effort he had in the Magpies 18-yard-box. Neither was something to be particularly proud of, but it’s not like we haven’t seen the likes of Alex Iwobi do similar on a regular basis.

Willock has the frame of someone who should be playing deeper, and his ability to hound the ball shown through. He was tied for the team lead in tackles won (4) and, when you factor in his one interception, he was tied for the team league in ball-winning plays with Calum Chambers and Rob Holding.

As such, statistically, he did as much as we could ask for. But the question that I have (still have) is whether or not he doesn’t belong deeper in the midfield, as he had been used in previous appearances.

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Whatever the case, it was a pleasant, if uneventful debut. Shame it had to end in such, well, shame, but ideally we can see more of him going forward, because there may be a rotational option in this young man.