Martin Odegaard is more than just Arsenal’s Mesut Ozil

Just over a year ago Arsenal pulled off an almighty coup. Desperately hunting for a No. 10 with the emergence of a young Emile Smith Rowe all there was to assume creative duties, the club signed Martin Odegaard on loan from Real Madrid.

It is fair to say not all were smitten by his arrival and resulting presence. Dashes of elegance were intermittent with the expected teething issues one would expect from a player moving to a new side and league, in the middle of the season, in the middle of a global pandemic, having been shunted off to numerous clubs around Europe previously, and who’d been carrying the weight of expectation on his shoulders since he was 15 years old.

To have expected all to run smoothly was doing him a disservice.

But it was shrewd business bringing him in nonetheless. He captured the hearts of many Arsenal supporters, left some with a sneaky crush, and others happy to seek new relationships.

https://twitter.com/Arsenal/status/1497115396343676930

Martin Odegaard is more than just Arsenal’s Mesut Ozil – he has all the traits that Mikel Arteta’s side have been lacking for years

Nobody, not one, is anything other than head over heels for him now.

Real Madrid parted with the then 22-year-old for £30m, a fee that could rise to £35m with add-ons. This wasn’t a bargain, this was daylight robbery. Even Tottenham supporters are reluctantly dazzled. They see him as the new Christian Eriksen.

Naturally, from this side of the fence, parallels are drawn to Mesut Ozil. He’s the creative linchpin in the team, arrived in north London from the same Spanish club, and possesses a wand of a left foot. Comparisons are so tough to avoid, no matter how much of a cop out they may be.

But his vision is out of this world. He knows the pass two touches in advance, then has the technical aptitude to put it on a sixpence. The weight of everything he does is divine. When you have a playmaker at your club for seven years the man to follow in their footsteps will always have that cloud of expectancy hanging over their shoulders.

Odegaard isn’t there yet. What Ozil achieved has longevity. He was the best on the planet – at least the Premier League‘s finest of his kind – for more than just three months. The Norwegian has a way to go but you’ll be d*amned to begrudge him coming close if not matching him. Not in this form. Not at this age.

There is more, though. Arsenal may have unearthed the true heir to Ozil’s prime, but they’ve recaptured the brilliance of another player who was never sufficiently replaced.

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