This topic stems from the scouting video the Arsenal Vision crew made on Osimhen. I looked forward to watching it as I hold them and Victor both in high regard. But I came out of it feeling conflicted about what I saw. I came out of it thinking he is a deeply flawed footballer that would be equally ridiculed as Darwin Nunez has been in the Premier League and that just didn’t sit right with me.
My suggestion to the AV gang was that I wanted a tailor-made scouting video rather than a overall scouting video. We have a really gifted CF in Gabriel Jesus but there’s a reason we are still talking about THE centerforward that is gonna take us to the promised land, Mr X if you will. Gabi does all the things you could ever want from a striker except for being clinical. And if we are going to buy a new one it’s because we need that pure goalscorer.
Now I respect the professional approach to not just get any youtube comp and only go by the players best actions but there’s a fine line between wanting the whole picture and not getting the most relevant picture.
I ask if it’s not more relevant to build our opinion on a player based on the things he would need to do in our team and in the game states he would mostly face playing in our attack? If Osimhen would end up being ”the one” would he actually be the one if we planned to use him as a target man and facilitator when he clearly has issues doing just that? Or would he be the one based on the fact that he is a powerful athlete that bullies defenders in the box and smashes goals left, right and centre?
When looking at just his box play it’s clear that he thrives when taking instant shots after seperating from his marker with devestating physical presence. He shoots with brutal power and scores bullet headers for fun. So if we are buying him I fully expect us to use these abilities and build our game around feeding him chances.
But now it’s all about asking yourself, can our team handle playing with a low touch CF or not? We have all seen how we struggle collectively when Nketiah plays but would we struggle if he put the ball in the net more often? Will Martinelli be held back with that type of striker as he has been with Eddie?
We know there are a few issues:
- Collective track record with Eddie up front
- Havertz another low touch off the ball guy
- Odegaard’s low creation numbers
- Lack of consistent crossing from fullbacks
But would all of these issues be irrelevant if we scored in critical moments of the game and could control game states better because of it?
If the answer is yes, then the next question has to be, as the AV crew asked, how many goals would Osimhen need to score to offset the things we would lack for it to be worth the change? My feeling is it would need to be close to 28. That’s about 10-13 goals more than Jesus is expected to score every season. Is that worth the 120m£ outlay?
There’s no right answer to that question. I think we have seen that it’s possible to win the league with Jesus up front, but also that we live on the margin considering his injury record and lack of clinical edge.
It’s my belief that we are missing out if we persist with facilitators at CF, at least while Saka and Martinelli are developing. And it’s not really a question of replacing Jesus as I think he is exactly the type of forward we need to hit the next level, just not always as the central hub. He is explosive and versatile and could be the alternative striker and rotational winger we have needed for a while.
I bet there’s a lot of people against the signing of Osimhen after watching that scouting video. But what this whole article is about is that we shouldn’t judge him by his shortcomings but instead by his strenghts, which are supposed to be the exact things our attack is missing, or else what’s the point?
Much love to the Arsenal Vision guys for being good sports and in my humble opinion my suggestion to them brought forward a really deep and interesting conversation in a second scouting video.
Hello! Im a 39 year old family man from Sweden, born in Gothenburg, living in Stockholm. Why Arsenal? I was 11 years old and didnt have a PL team yet, but was a big fan of the Dutch national team with Dennis Bergkamp up front. So when he joined us in 95’ it was a easy choice which team I wanted to support. It only felt better when success quickly followed and Freddie Ljungberg came in. My first and only live game was the Palace game at the Emirates when Giroud scored that scorpion kick goal. My biggest regret will forever be that I never got to visit Highbury. Most of my friends through life have been Man Utd or Liverpool fans but I have always been proud to be a Arsenal supporter. We are more than a club, with values I live by, and watching this Arteta revolution fills me with great joy. This beautiful club deserves to be at the top. Lets talk Arsenal!
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