Arsenal: Henrikh Mkhitaryan makes it a trifecta

Arsenal had a clear prerogative in who they sent out against FC Vorskla and Henrikh Mkhitaryan made it a clean sweep of successes.

When you talk about the objectives that Arsenal had going into the FC Vorskla match, beyond the obvious objectives like ‘winning’ and ‘keeping a clean sheet’ (whoops), there had to be some pretty clear ones. Mainly individual ones. Let’s talk about the ones in the attack.

First of all, we needed Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang to score some goals. This struggle bus that he had been riding was rather uncharacteristic of him and it was time to kick start him with some quality goals against fairly easy opposition. Check.

Second of all, we wanted to see Alex Iwobi at the top of his confidence too. He’s scratched the surface a bit in his two surprise starts in the Premier League, but we needed to see some sticking power, and he gave us that and some.

Thirdly, rounding off the individual attacking goals, we needed to see Henrikh Mkhitaryan not droopy and sad. I don’t think he has been given a fair shot to keep his place in the Premier League starting XI, but it didn’t seem to be effecting him at all.

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Either that or he recognized how wonderful of an opportunity he had to stand out from the bunch against lesser opposition.

I was perhaps the most impressed with Mkhitaryan. He was given the keys to the No. 10 position, something he hasn’t had in ages, and never at Arsenal, and he really ran with it. But it wasn’t even that he was individually dominating. It was just that he knew exactly what his best option was and he kept going back to him. That, of course, being Aubameyang.

Their partnership has not taken off in the Prem this year, but seeing it work so well against Vorskla is going to be a nice reminder to Emery and the fans that they have something special together, and something that benefits them both.

It goes beyond that, too, though. Mkhitaryan was a driving force. One thing I always admire about him is his ability to make quick decisions. He doesn’t dwell on the ball, or take time to see over-analyze. He just acts.

In the end, Mkhtiaryan completed the trifecta. Three players, all in need of a chance to prove things, and they all three proved them. It couldn’t have turned out much better.