Arsenal: Bernd Leno something we haven’t had in years

Arsenal haven’t had much of anything that could be considered “stress free” in recent memory, but that’s what makes Bernd Leno so wonderful.

Arsenal and stress go hand-in-hand. I’d say that if you took the collective blood pressure of all fan bases in the Premier League, Arsenal would be top of the table. (Insert joke that I don’t want to make about the Premier League table here.)

This defense has been stressing us out for a decade. The least stressful it’s been was Per Mertesacker and Laurent Koscielny, and that was far from capable of winning a Premier League title. Though they did do a decent enough job.

This attack? Oftentimes the one thing that keeps us going. Which just makes the stress levels skyrocket all the more because when it doesn’t work. Like Burnley, for instance. The defense is always going to be stressful, even when its going well, but for the attack to fail? Double the stress.

I don’t know about you, but Bernd Leno is the only thing that doesn’t stress me out about this club. Not at all.

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It feels funny. Not more than a couple years ago, our keeper situation was one of then biggest stress-inducers on the team. Petr Cech? David Ospina? Lord help us all. Don’t even get me started on Manuel Almunia.

But Bernd Leno? Cool as can be. Bernd Leno has saved us more points than Petr Cech ever did, and he was supposed to save us 12-15 points, remember?

Leno has the safest hands of any Arsenal keeper of the past decade and then some. And in a world where we are riddled with a new stress every week, knowing that we have safe hands in such a vital position is a nice little reminder from time to time. Even though he wasn’t tested hardly at all against Burnley, I still smiled amidst the hectic nature of the match simply because I knew that if things got testy, we had a guy in goal who could bail us out of just about anything.

If we’re talking about the ‘next era’ of the club under Mikel Arteta, then it has to be said that we can build confidence out of the back with Bernd Leno.

Also, can you imagine how good he will be when he gets a sturdy defense in front of him? No more Leno island, that’s all I can say.