The removal of Viktor Gyokeres from the Champions League quarter-final, after 56 ineffective minutes, could be viewed in two ways.
The first is that Mikel Arteta wanted to save the striker’s legs ahead of Sunday’s match against Manchester City, which is arguably Arsenal’s biggest league game in two decades. The second is that he wanted to give Kai Havertz half an hour of action, to prepare the German and keep him fresh, because he has no intention of starting Gyokeres at the Etihad.
On the evidence of this showing, and indeed other recent performances by Gyokeres, many Arsenal supporters will be hoping it is the latter. Gyokeres is Arsenal’s top scorer this season and he has produced some promising moments since the turn of the year, but he is currently struggling badly to have any sort of positive impact on his team’s attacking play.
No player could have been as motivated as Gyokeres for the quarter-final against Sporting CP, his former club. But over the course of the tie he offered none of the threat he so regularly displayed in Lisbon, where he scored 97 goals in 102 matches. In the first leg in Portugal, Gyokeres touched the ball 18 times and had one shot. In the second leg he touched the ball 14 times and again had one shot.
Gyokeres has played almost a full season with Arsenal but he is still yet to build a strong on-field relationship with his attacking colleagues. In a nervy goalless draw against Sporting, which secured a 1-0 aggregate victory, he never found the same wavelength as Gabriel Martinelli, Noni Madueke or Eberechi Eze. Too many of his passes were either overhit or totally misdirected.
One of the glaringly obvious issues with Gyokeres is that he is far better when facing the opponent’s defence than when he is attempting to hold up the ball with his back to goal. Long passes into his body so rarely stick, and therefore so rarely result in another Arsenal forward being brought into the game.