Arsenal’s Midfield Conundrum

Article by Rajiv Nair

Midfield is arguably the most decisive aspect in football. You may drill a world class backline but without an organized midfield it counts for nothing. Field a midfield that provides close to no service to those upfront and even the Barcelona front three may find it difficult to score. It comes as no surprise that a midfielder like Pogba who is supposedly “the whole package” ends up being the most expensive player till date.

Right from Vieira to Flamini, we’ve seen them all at Arsenal. You could almost create a timeline from the transitions the midfield has undergone under Wenger. The early Wenger years saw the Arsenal midfield dominated by the likes of Petit, Gilberto, Vieira and Freddie which saw us add a host of major honors including 3 league titles and 4 F.A Cups to our name. This was then followed by the signing of a certain La Masia academy graduate who went by name Fabregas. For Arsene though, this wasn’t just another instant of him unearthing yet another midfield maestro. What he saw was a highly technical and not-so-built 17 year old causing the opposition’s midfield to run around in circles, in a league which was supposedly meant for the tough and physical.

The signing of Fabregas eventually changed Arsene’s approach of recruiting midfielders. He now began to target players who were much more technical, players who needed fewer touches before releasing the ball, players who could move around the pitch with greater ease. This saw us sign the likes of Rosicky, Hleb and Nasri. Although these players fulfilled the creative requirements of the midfield, what was missing was the defensive solidarity that was associated with the Arsenal midfield for so long. Wenger tried to re-establish the lost balance with signings like that of Alex Song and even Abou Diaby but clearly none worked out.

In the end, many of these players were sold to clubs who wanted them more during the repeated summer exoduses that would haunt fans and club alike. Soon there came a time when we were left with a midfield with Arteta and Flamini as our only defensive midfielders, the creative yet injury prone trio of Wilshere, Rosicky and Ramsey and an almost always injured Abou Diaby. Horrible times, no? But credit to Arsene and the board because a few summers later, we now have a midfield that collectively has everything. Deep lying midfielders in Elnenny and Xhaka, creative maestros in Ozil and Santi and box to box ones in Ramsey and Coquelin. Yes, Coquelin, box to box, you read that right. Watch him again this season maybe if you disagree.

The question though is, apart from Ozil, our creator-in-chief, what is our best midfield pairing? It’s November already and though we have midfield pairs for certain situations in the game, I don’t think Arsene has come across the pair that would give us the right balance in all situations. Santi paired with one of Xhaka/Elnenny/Coq has shown some success but obviously you can’t expect Santi considering his age and Achilles problems. Again, Xhaka seems to be another deep lying option from whom you can get the best out of when paired with Ramsey or Coquelin.

But Arsenal have hired a man to find solutions to such problems and he has been doing exactly that at our club for the past 20 years, so let’s leave this to him, shall we? Let’s just hope that like many in the past, he finds a solution to this conundrum as well over the international break after which the games keep pouring in thick and fast.

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