Arsenal: Who’d have thought it’d be the strikers wetting the bed?

Arsenal played a truly stoic match against Tottenham and deserved three points, but it was the elite striking corps that wet the bed.

All season long, there has been one thing that Arsenal has been able to rely on – their strikers. When you have Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang and Alexandre Lacazette, you are among the world elite in terms of finishing off attacking plays and the numbers back that up, with Lacazette and Aubameyang teaming up for as many goals as Salah and Mane.

That’s why, going into Wembley to face Tottenham, I had no concerns about the strikers. Why be concerned over something that hasn’t been concerning all year? Lacazette got the start and Aubameyang was the reinforcements.

I’m not sure it could have gone any worse for arguably our two best players. Although, I guess if it wasn’t for Lacazette’s assist to Ramsey, it could have been much worse.

Aside from that assist, Lacazette had two fantastic chances, one in the opening minutes, and one on a tremendous cutback from Nacho Monreal. He didn’t just miss his opportunities, he missed everything.

He even missed the ball on the first whiff, and on the second one, he missed the far post by some margin.

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Lacazette is a clinical finisher. One match won’t change that, but it was startling how bad the misses were. And it wasn’t at all surprising to see Lacazette bury himself in his own shirt when he got subbed off. He had not done well.

Aubameyang did even worse. The no-confidence penalty was just the tip of the iceberg. He also failed on the follow-up from Iwobi and, on a perfectly played ball from Henrikh Mkhitaryan from quite a distance, Aubameyang lost out yet again.

These two elite strikers absolutely wet the bed. There is no other way to look at this. They are both too good to miss that many chances, and thus the only logical explanation is that they completely and utterly soiled themselves in a big match.

Thankfully, it’s never happened to this magnitude before, and chances are, it will never happen again. It’s just another cruel fate where the Gunners were so close to having everything come together – and what a perfect time it would have been – only to have one aspect of play let them down.

But for the life of me, I’d have never thought it’d have been the strikers. They’re too good for that!