Arsenal must nullify Unai Emery’s secret weapon at Villarreal

Gerard Moreno is Unai Emery’s Secret Weapon vs Arsenal

How can anyone with a goal or assist every 1.25 matches (not counting actual minutes on the pitch) in all competitions across the past two seasons be a secret weapon? Those are outstanding numbers.

Yet Gerard Moreno’s name hasn’t made its way across Europe with the praise it rightfully earns in Castellón. 20 goals and five assists in 28 La Liga matches, as well as six goals and three assists in nine Europa League matches. He is the star man, and bizarrely underappreciated.

The Spaniard is a positionally flexible forward, ideal for a manager who loves to be experimental with his formations. Whether setting the team up in a 4-4-2 with Gerard up top, a 4-3-3 with Gerard wide right or even as the right-sided midfielder of a 4-4-2, Gerard is an interesting blend of centre-forward and inverted winger.

All the fine work he produces for Villarreal is made more impressive but his lack of blistering pace or commanding physical presence. None of which is to say he wouldn’t be cut out for Premier League football, as he does every element of the game neatly and tidily.

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A great deal of that comes down to his on-field intelligence: knowing which spaces to run into, when to come short and invite runners beyond, where to take his next touch and how long to keep the ball. As a connective piece, Gerard drops into the right half-space regularly, cutting in on his lethal left foot and utilising vision to pick out teammates who move centrally.

For someone with as many goals as he has, clocking the fifth most through passes in La Liga this season illustrates his creative qualities. The 29-year-old also has the fourth most live passes directly leading to a shot and the sixth most goal creating actions in the division.

This is all before even discussing scoring ability. Naturally left-footed, what aids Gerard is his absolute comfort on his right. An accomplished finisher, the unpredictability he has in the box can buy him that split second or half a yard he needs to finish, so too can his delightful ‘chop’ skill move, something that has almost become a trademark for him.

Do you man-mark him or double up and try to limit whatever spaces he picks up? A variation of the latter has to be implemented, but one that is careful in transition, because, of course, Gerard is excellent on the counter-attack as well.

The forward is a secret weapon that, by all accounts, should be anything other than a secret. Knock a few years off him and in this form he could dance with the very best in Europe. That is not an exaggeration.