Arsenal: What the hell, Sokratis? What the actual hell?

Arsenal were flying with confidence against Rennes until Sokratis went off and did something literally impossibly daft. What the hell happened?

Sokratis has been one of the most pleasant surprises this Arsenal season. I was not thrilled when they signed him, I was not happy that he was being touted as a solution to our defensive woes when he clearly wasn’t. He was past his glory days, out of favor, and we were essentially trying to recycle him.

Funny thing – it worked. Sokratis has been fantastic this year, barring a bit of growing pains when he first arrived, but at different points this year, he has served as the massively effective baby sitter of Shkodran Musafi and the dynamic defending mate of Laurent Koscielny.

I was surprised that Unai Emery went with the stone wall partnership of Sokratis and Koscielny against Rennes, simply because I figured you could spot one of them a break going into Manchester United.

But I was happy. Because this is a dynamic duo that can and has defended fantastically against some of the best – like Tottenham.

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So when Sokratis, the no-nonsense Greek bruiser, commits three senseless and downright awful fouls in a row, culminating in a second yellow that got him sent off in the 40th minute, right at the Gunners were hitting their attacking stride, nothing made sense.

Sokratis is a bit rough around the edges. He’s been known to make hard tackles, but he has equally been known to have steely composure and understand the situation. That was not the case as he was shown red. His positioning was awful, his mind was somewhere else and it looked like he didn’t quite understand what he was doing.

It was the first, and hopefully last, time that I’ve seen Sokratis look so woefully unequipped for play. Like he’d had bad tuna salad before the match and was just determined to get off the pitch and get out of there. Because honestly, bad tuna salad is more believable than that this stoic defender was capable of making so many rash decisions in a row.

All I can say is “what the hell?”

Like, Alexandre Lacazette elbows a guy in the face. I get that. he was frustrated. But Sokratis doing this? Inexplicable.

Thankfully, beating Rennes 2-0 at the Emirates shouldn’t be too difficult, and then we can stop talking about this and pretend like it never happened.