Arsenal Vs Burnley: Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang just does what he does

Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang scored twice in Arsenal’s 3-1 win over Burnley, despite only touching the ball 31 times. The striker just does what he does: score a whole lot of goals.

Arsenal righted the wrongs of the past week with a solid 3-1 win over Burnley at Saturday lunchtime. It was a consummate performance from the Gunners, who were tested by a feisty and fiery Burnley, scoring early, defending stoutly in the second half, and wrapping up the contest on the counter-attack.

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At the heart of the victory was Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang. Well, technically, that isn’t really true It depends what you mean by ‘heart’. Aubameyang scored the first two goals and essentially won the game with his clinical finishing and intelligent movement. But he only had 31 touches in the whole 90 minutes. Hardly at the ‘heart’ of the action.

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But this is just what Aubameyang does. These two strikes, an angled finish into the far corner from Sead Kolasinac’s clever pull back and a thunderbolt that fired past Joe Hart, taking a nick off Ben Mee in the process, brought the Gabonian up to 12 goals in the Premier League. No other player in the league has more, such is his prolificacy in this campaign.

Throughout the season, Aubamayeng has continually scored goals without being even close to the centre of the action. He regularly sees fewer than 30 touches in a match, he does not take lots of shots like his partner, Alexandre Lacazette, or Mohamed Salah and Harry Kane and Sergio Aguero, the other top goalscorers in the Premier League, and almost likes to play in the shadows of the game, as if he is daring the defence to forget about him, only for them to remember as he sneaks in behind at the far post to slide yet another cross into the gaping net.

Lacazette, for instance, in 13 fewer minutes, had ten more touches than Aubameyang. If anything, you could say that he was at the heart of the action, not the man who actually won the game with his goals. This is the Aubameyang conundrum, the juxtaposition of business and production, of activity and effectiveness, of action and goals.

For Arsenal, this is an ‘issue’ that they must embrace — it isn’t really an issue, unless if you want to make it one. They must not force Aubameyang into the forefront of matches. Instead, they must allow him to flitter, to drift on the edge of the game, to float, unchecked, only to burst into action with the final touch of a free-flowing move.

Aubameyang has had just 19 shots on target this season. Salah has 30. Kane has 27. Aguero, in 400 fewer minutes, has 19 also. To score 12 goals is illustrative of his threat from the peripheries. He does not like to be the centre of the attention, specifically because the attention can stifle. He wants to slip the attention, sneak into space, and score goals. And he is an absolute master at it.

Aubameyang is the Premier League’s top goalscorer. He is Arsenal’s match-winner. He is a world-class centre-forward. He just keeps doing what he does best, and that is quite alright with me.