Arsenal: Phil Neville barfing ignorance all over Granit Xhaka

Arsenal are used to having their players unfairly scrutinized, but Phil Neville is going to a whole new level with his recent assessment of Granit Xhaka.

Arsenal should be used to “experts” barfing all over their players. It happens to Mesut Ozil all the time. If Ozil breathes wrong, at least one of the talking heads goes firmly up Ozil’s arse and can’t seem to find the sunlight.

This time, it’s Phil Neville’s vomit-spout that has gone on the fritz, spewing garbage all over Granit Xhaka (and Xherdan Shaqiri) in the worst possible way – ignorantly.

Rather than quote much of anything that Neville had to say, because I will literally lose my mind if I have to read it again, I’ll let you do the reading here, but brace yourself, there’s a lot of upchuck.

In short, Neville called Xhaka fake because he doesn’t do what his positions suggests he should do – defend. Not just that but he claims to see this “week in and week out” at Arsenal, which is an outright lie, and the stereotypical argument of “fans” who dislike Xhaka because he isn’t Patrick Vieira. It looks like that gaggle of “fans” has their patron saint – Phil Neville. Congrats to them, they are well represented.

Xhaka had one poor moment against Sweden when Forsberg crossed him up and that was all Neville needed to pin it all on the Gunner midfielder. Of course, Neville also pinned it on Xherdan Shaqiri because, let’s be honest, the only two players on the Swiss team that Neville knows are Xhaka and Shaqiri, so if Switzerland loss, it must be because of them and only them.

More from Pain in the Arsenal

How do I know this? Because every piece of evidence that Neville used was based on their performance for Stoke and Arsenal, respectively. Not on their World Cup run at all.

So, despite the fact that Xhaka and Shaqiri were massive throughout the World Cup, it is obviously solely on them that the Swiss were unable to win against Sweden. It wasn’t the gobs of misses from the forwards, or the poor deflection from Akanji that even allowed Forsberg to score in the first place (Sommer had it covered if it didn’t get deflected).

“It was Xhaka!” spews Neville, who is taking that baseless, expired, downright stupid argument that all Xhaka does is pass sideways, another thing he sees “week in and week out” with Arsenal. Even though Xhaka had the highest percentage of forward passes of any Gunner midfielder.

But I wouldn’t want facts to get in the the way of Neville’s puke fest.

Oh, and in regards to calling Xhaka “fake,” because he is a holding midfielder – uh, what? Neville is actually getting paid to say that a player plays his position differently than everyone else, so he must be fake. Top stuff, Phil. Valon Behrami is the enforcer in that midfield, but he obviously isn’t familiar with whoever that is, and oh, by the way, when does Neville even watch Arsenal?

Next: Arsenal Complete 2017/18 Player Ratings

If you want to criticize a player, fine. It was not a good moment from Xhaka. But what business does Neville have spewing baseless bullcrap, for which no one will hold him accountable? It’s pathetic. Try to actually make a point next time.

Home/Arsenal News