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Arsenal: 3 reasons why we should all believe in Eddie Nketiah
By Josh Sippie
Mikel Arteta has been giving the starting nod to Eddie Nketiah as Arsenal charge up the table. Here are three reasons we should all believe in him.
It felt incredible watching Eddie Nketiah score his first Premier League goal against Everton. Arsenal had surrendered that early goal in rather horrifying fashion within the first minute and it came to the young striker to answer back.
Coming off a fantastic delivery from Bukayo Saka, Nketiah rose up to meet the cross and turn it home. He made it look easy, and the announcers mentioned how “all he had to do” was put it on goal, but if you look at the athleticism in the moment, you will see it was no easy finish.
Against Newcastle, he looked nervous. He couldn’t put the finishing touches on anything. So to see him do so against Everton was huge. And what made it even better was him nearly notching a second on a venomous curler that hit the crossbar.
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Right now, it looks like Nketiah is the man in the Premier League. And while that may make some a bit hesitant, I’m here to give you three reasons why we should believe in his ability to hold down that starting roll.
It starts with No. 3.
3. He’s a natural goal scorer
No denying this. From the moment we landed Eddie Nketiah for the youth outfit, he’s been scoring goals. He just can’t stop.
Let’s look at his goal scoring record.
With the U18s, he made 16 appearances, scored 15 goals and three assists. Impressive, no? So bump him up to the U23s and look what happened—38 appearances, 28 goals and seven assists. That’s downright ridiculous. It equates to exactly a goal contribution every single game. And it’s not a small sample size either. 53 appearances, 53 goal contributions.
For the senior club, he’s made 24 appearances and only managed five goals, but that last leap is just finding his feet at the senior level. Translating a sick youth goal return into the senior outfit won’t be easy, but he’s shown what he can do and we have no reason to believe he can’t replicate at least a fraction of that at the senior level.
Next up, No. 2.