Arsenal: Eddie Nketiah pulled off Martinelli-esque Aubameyang impression

Arsenal have a crop of forwards on their hands, and they’re all managing the same thing—which is a good thing. Eddie Nketiah is just the latest.

You know me, I love straight forward titles that make complete and total sense. Which is what I went for with this one—transparency. What this title should have read, if I had the space, was “Arsenal: Eddie Nketiah nails his impression of Gabriel Martinelli’s impression of Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.”

Crystal clear, right?

When Aubameyang got suspended, I was thrilled. In the least saboteur way possible. I wanted the youngsters to prove that we didn’t need Aubameyang anymore. And our best candidate for that was Martinelli.

The young Brazilian promptly went out and had two subpar games, each with a heroic goal that saved the club from certain doom.

In other words, he did a perfect Aubameyang. Aubameyang always goes matches where he’s lackluster, but then chips in a goal to gloss over how lackluster he was. Martinelli was always too invigorating to do that, but he was going to have off games and we needed to see how those looked.

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Well, they look good.

With Eddie Nketiah’s return, we had another chance to prove that Aubameyang isn’t needed anymore, this time at the feet of another young striker desperate for more playing time.

Against Bournemouth, Nketiah got his start. He wasn’t tremendous. He wasn’t a dream. But he did a Martinelli doing an Aubameyang. He scored a goal for being in the right place at the right time, he led the line, he stretched the Cherries’ defense with his speed and pressured the back line and keeper. It was the kind of match that makes you wonder if we really need a better striker at all.

I know that this is just one match. Just like Martinelli is just on a few months. That doesn’t conclusively prove anything related to Aubameyang. But it’s a start. I have to believe that with these two combined, assuming they can keep up this level of play, and this level of ‘bad match? Here’s a goal’ then we can move on from overpaying superstars that may or may not want to be here.

It’s a long shot still, but hopefully the rest of the season can help us better assess if our attacking situation can carry on without the Golden Boot winner. Martinelli is the ace in this situation, but Nketiah is the wild card.