Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang is the best player that Arsenal have in their squad right now but on Wednesday, the forward was perhaps the most underutilized during the Gunners’ loss to Man City in the Premier League.
Arsenal lost the match 3-0 and according to pundits Ian Wright and Michael Owen, the Arsenal manager and players failed to put Aubameyang to good use.
Ian Wright said, as quoted by Metro: ‘If you’re going to have Aubameyang, the thing with Aubameyang is he’s not somebody who’s going to get involved in the play too much, but there’s opportunities like this: now that is him perfect.
‘Put that in there because that’s what he does, he gets in that situation and he’s going to punish you. Loads of space to run into but they don’t give it to him.
‘And then we see another one where you think, “Okay this is what you want”. Arsenal break up the move and then you give it to Kieran Tierney and you’re thinking, on his left foot – his very good left foot – just bend it in round there and look at that space in there.
‘City are absolutely petrified of that. And you see his [Aubameyang’s] reaction there, he knows.’
Michael Owen also supported the fact that the Gunners failed to work on Aubameyang’s strengths which is why the Gabon international looked a frustrated figure all throughout the game.
Owen added: ‘Well I think me and Wrighty can both do that because we’re both players that played on the shoulder. We liked the ball into space, liked running onto it.
Feel sorry for @Aubameyang7 pic.twitter.com/xe7BUU5DXG
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‘And if you’re going to play Manchester City, think of the teams that have come to the Etihad and beaten them: Wolves who are great at counter-attacking, Leicester counter-attacked them to death as well.
‘I think that’s what you’ve got to do. Defend in numbers and blast forward with pace. And they’ve got all the attributes to do that, but then they’re not setting their main weapon free. It’s criminal really when you’ve got pace like that upfront.’
As per Whoscored.com, Aubameyang had a passing success rate of just 77% and all throughout the game, the forward made only 13 passes.
Despite being the most important player on the pitch for the North London side, he managed only 22 touches off the ball which just goes onto show how detached the 31-year-old was during the match.
