Arsenal vs Napoli: Please make it be Henrikh Mkhitaryan

Arsenal have choices to make going into this crucial first leg against Napoli, but please let’s choose Henrikh Mkhitaryan instead of Mesut Ozil.

I’m trying not to blow the Everton loss out of proportion, but it’s hard not to, right? Everyone failed on Arsenal‘s side, barring a few, like Bernd Leno, making sure the match stayed somewhat manageable, and Sokratis snapping into rescue mode late on.

It just wasn’t a good match, almost entirely because it was an away match and all the usual stabilizers (Granit Xhaka, Laurent Koscielny) weren’t there to help stabilize.

It was a risk to start Mesut Ozil. We all knew that. He has not played in the gross majority of away matches for obvious reasons, and against Everton, we saw those reasons even more clearly. It’s just not his style to play like the match was played. Call it a byproduct of him being isolated or whatever, I really don’t care. He wasn’t good enough.

He gave the ball up six times and created nothing in return. At least Henrikh Mkhitaryan had the effort and ball security that Ozil lacked, even if he produced a similar lot of zilch.

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That said, home matches are different. With Napoli coming into town, it’s probably in our best interests to take the game in isolation, as Unai Emery does, and approach it as such. Meaning that Ozil has a really good chance at starting, but as for me, I hope that Henrikh Mkhitaryan gets a rare start in a central, No. 10 role.

And here’s why.

The midfield doesn’t have Granit Xhaka, and I really don’t want to see Mohamed Elneny out there. The best potential midfield pairing is a returning Lucas Torreira and Aaron Ramsey in to partner, to provide his usual versatility.

It’s still shaky without Xhaka, though, and the effort alone won’t save them, as was shown against Everton. The best thing Emery can then do is put someone in that No. 10 role who has the work rate to get back and help out with the dirty work in the midfield, and, no surprises here, that isn’t Ozil’s territory.

Ozil has thrived in between our marauding wingbacks, so Mkhitaryan can do. Don’t forget that he’s just as creative as Ozil on his day.

And even if that falls through and he struggles to create, the work rate is still there to buoy him and Ozil can always come on later.