Arsenal: Why can’t creative players survive at this club?

Maybe it’s bad luck, maybe it’s an epidemic, but for some reason, creative players at Arsenal just never seem to work out.

According to numerous reports, Dani Ceballos has been ruled out until Decemeber, which shouldn’t even be that shocking anymore. There was a time when everyone at Arsenal got injured. All the time. But we were supposed to be passed it. If you ever truly can be.

Nowadays, the only players that get hurt, or become ineffective, are our creative players. Which is part in parcel why we can’t find a way to create consistent chances anymore.

Mesut Ozil was supposed to fix all of that, but 19-assist season and all, he’s struggled to find consistency since his arrival, and he’s never struggled more than he is now, when he can’t even get onto the pitch consistently.

Then came Henrikh Mkhitaryan, another proven veteran creator, and he fell so far from success that he’s now lambasting Unai Emery for his own ineffectiveness.

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We tried to find solution in Denis Suarez and now in Dani Ceballos, but what have they amounted to? Suarez got hurt and jumped ship before we could even get a sense of what he was going to provide, and Dani Ceballos has given us one outstanding match against Burnley and a whole lot of mixed results ever since.

Which leaves us with a disgraced Mesut Ozil and… that’s it.

The only exception to this curse of the creatives is Santi Cazorla, who thrived in his time at Arsenal, but even his time was curtailed by an injury that nearly cost him his foot. Literally. Maybe that’s where the curse began, but whatever the case, the curse needs to end before we can effectively move the club forward, because without consistent creativity, what are we? We’re a blocked up digestive track, constipated for chances, with two strikers dying to get more involved.

The problem is, this is like the prior injury curse. What can you actually do to fix it? Do you try more new players or hope to find salvation in the ones that you already have? The ones that are struggling and/or hurt. Hell, maybe you can even bring Cazorla back. It’s not like anyone could find that much beef with such a decision.

Call it a curse, be a little superstitious, and put on your patient boots, because we’ve got some mud to trek through before we find the grass on the other side.