Arsenal: Henrikh Mkhtiaryan has all the things Mesut Ozil doesn’t

Arsenal decided to pin creative duties on Mesut Ozil against Atletico Madrid, which proved to be a pitfall. Henrikh Mkhitaryan would have been better.

I was completely set on Henrikh Mkhitaryan doing exactly what he did against Atletico Madrid – sit and wait until you are really needed, and then come make a difference. Arsenal needed Danny Welbeck out there and as such, there was no great cause to sit him and put two creators out there when you needed threats to goal.

Only, what turned out to be the case was the exact opposite, but not because of Danny Welbeck. It was because of Mesut Ozil.

The criticism of Ozil is rightly placed. He played poorly, almost relegating Arsenal to 10-men from his complete lack of involvement. And naturally, this is producing a lot of questions from pundits around the globe.

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Not least of all because of how much Mkhitaryan was able to do with just 14 touches. That’s an easy situation to answer for though, because Mkhitaryan is everything that Ozil isn’t.

From the moment Mkhitaryan came on, there was an added energy. He provided a threat, an immediate threat, that Ozil just was not providing. But that is part of who Mesut Ozil is, and that is something that we accepted long ago.

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Ozil is someone who ebbs and flows. You can’t force him into any particular mindset. He often sits back and bides his time until it is the right time to lash out and make a difference.

Against Atleti, that difference never came. He, like many others, were suffocated, and he had nowhere to turn to to alleviate the pressure. That is a role that Mkhitaryan normally fills. This, in turn, let to indecision on Ozil’s part, as he passed up a couple opportunities to have a crack at goal, most likely because he was not confident from the tides of the match.

Mkhitaryan is not like that, as we saw. Fault Mkhitaryan for being a bit rash at times, but when you need someone to make snap decisions, you can find no one better. That isn’t Ozil. Ozil is calculated, but he didn’t have the time or the space to be that way in this crucial match.

And that, again, comes down to not having Mkhitaryan there to take the spotlight away from him and do his own thing. Because Welbeck sure wasn’t doing it.

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It’s a tough loss to stomach, but in the end, the benefits of having both Ozil and Mkhitaryan are immense going forward, as they serve as each others’ foils, to excellent affect.