Arsenal: Does Rob Holding have a fatal flaw?

Rob Holding struggles when defending in space against quick opponents thanks to his lack of athleticism. Is this a fatal flaw for the prospective Arsenal centre-back or can it be managed?

When John Terry broke into the Chelsea team, there was little concern regarding his lack of speed and athleticism. It was his biggest flaw, by some distance, but such was the game in those days, speed at centre-half was not nearly as valued a commodity as it is now.

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What has changed in the 20 years since Terry’s Chelsea debut on October 28th, 1998, as a substitute in an EFL Cup tie against Aston Villa, is the very fabric of the game, the very manner in which it is played, and thus the demands of each and every position.

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For centre-backs, it means that they must deal with and implement the high press, a defensive strategy that rippled through every league throughout the world, and most pertinently, the Premier League that predominantly played without a keen eye on possession and pressure. The game, when Terry emerged, centred on width, tempo, crosses. Centre-backs did not need to position themselves on the halfway line with much regularity and defend vast spaces against mobile attackers.

The reason I tell write about this is Arsenal defender, Rob Holding. Holding is a defender comparable to the style of Terry. He is excellent in the air. He defends crosses very well. He is positionally astute. He is an intelligent, poised, aware defender. And he also lacks the same critical weakness as Terry: a lack of speed.

For Terry, because of the way the game was played, it was not fatal. He was a good enough player to adapt to his lack of speed. But for Holding, it might well be. For Holding, the absence of a skill that cannot be taught or developed or coached or fine-tuned could be the thing that undermines his career.

This is not to say that Holding is a bad player, or that he has played poorly this season. In a growing number of appearances this season, the now 23-year-old has impressed, with some even suggesting that it may be time for him to replace the inconsistent and mistake-riddled Mustafi.

But as teams look to press high up the pitch and play on the counter-attack, with Unai Emery demanding his centre-backs cover a whole half of the pitch at times when turnovers are committed, Holding’s simple lack of speed may an unconquerable hurdle.

Is it harsh? Perhaps. But as the sport changes, the players and the positions they play must change with it. Holding still has time to prove otherwise, but, if he is to fulfil his talent, he must find a way, like Terry, to accommodate for his absent athleticism.