Arsenal: Is it really so hard to pull the plug on David Luiz?

Arsenal bought David Luiz to be a defensive solution, but to say he’s failed would be… apt. So why is it so hard for anyone to pull the plug on him?

I give immense credit to Freddie Ljungberg for changing the Arsenal defense against Norwich City. he understood that what was happening wasn’t good enough and that change was needed to move forward.

And go easy on the guy. He literally had three guys to choose from—David Luiz, Sokratis and Shkodran Mustafi. He chose the best two of the three, even if that’s not saying much.

Now that Rob Holding is back, and Konstantinos Mavropanos is healthy, and Calum Chambers can move centrally again, Ljungberg has the chance to do something that Unai Emery was never able to do—bench the whole lot of the three stooges.

Emery had no trouble benching Mustafi and Ljungberg had no trouble Sokratis. That’s well and good, but who is going to bench Luiz?

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Here’s the thing. I get why Luiz is called on. He’s a veteran. He’s won things. But there’s no hiding from the other thing: He’s not a good defender. And let’s be honest, he never has been. He’s one hell of a player, and incredibly talented, but he can’t defend. He couldn’t defend at PSG. That’s his thing. He doesn’t defend, he does a lot of other cool things, though.

If you want this defense to improve, it won’t happen with David Luiz. It won’t happen with Mustafi either. They’re too similar.

That means either you pair Sokratis with someone like Chambers or Holding, like Emery did in our last (perhaps ever) away clean sheet in the opening week of the season. Or you start from scratch, choose between Mavropanos, Chambers and Holding, and work forward from there. Those are three defenders that have either proven potential, proven experience, some combination of the two or, if nothing else, they aren’t Luiz, Mustafi or Sokratis.

And there’s a certain value to that. A value that I don’t think is taken into consideration enough. As I keep saying, if we’re going to keep failing on defense, I’d rather fail in the name of helping the young guys find their footing. Not fail in the name of hoping that incapable defenders will find themselves capable.

It’s not rocket science, really. At least it shouldn’t be. So let’s shake things up, no? Give someone else a chance.