Arsenal: Konstantinos Mavropanos partnership ready-made

Arsenal sent Konstantinos Mavropanos back out into the starting XI, and while the team failed, it’s clear where his future lies.

For the first time in my life, I was right in my prediction of Konstantinos Mavropanos starting for Arsenal. The only problem was that I was negligent in my other predictions and assumed he would start with Sokratis who… of course… was suspended.

Silly me. But I blame my over-eagerness to see Konstantinos Mavropanos playing alongside his countryman. Because isn’t that the ideal partnership when you look at the differing skillsets?

Truly, Mavropanos’s future is clear-cut, and it looks damn good. Especially now that we know that he isn’t being unfairly ousted for no reason, and was instead actually just hurt off-and-on throughout the year.

Mavropanos plays the game very aggressively. He goes after the ball and whoever may or may not be near it like it’s his God-sworn duty and he’s pretty good at it too. Of course, given that he is young, he still has his issues.

In the back three against Crystal Palace, the big problem was that all three defenders were gung-ho-style defenders. Shkodran Mustafi, Laurent Koscielny and our dear Mavropanos, all ball attackers, and it left them exposed.

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We were missing our absorber – Sokratis. The man who plays the game differently. He sits in his spot, waits for the approach to be made, then reacts accordingly, but very rarely will he lash out, take unnecessary risks, and leave himself or his defensive mate exposed. He even got a nice reputation as Mustafi’s baby-sitter early in the season, making the partnership look pretty feasible.

Mavropanos and Sokratis are a ready-made partnership, either in a duo, or expanded into a trio that includes Koscielny.

We’ve seen this before. When Per Mertesacker was the pairing to Koscielny. Mertesacker was the sit-back-and-wait guy and Koscielny was the go-out-and-get-him. It’s a formula that works, and it’s a formula that can be replicated.

This doesn’t even take into account the defenders we’ll be getting back. Calum Chambers has become outstanding at absorbing pressure and Rob Holding hits the middle ground of being someone who can dabble in both.

Mavropanos may get there as well, where he’s able to control his rashness, but for the time being, he inherently fits well the Sokratis. It’s just a matter of getting them out there together so we can see it in action and stop all the hypothesizing.