Lee Dixon said that Olivier Giroud ‘wouldn’t get a kick’ or be able to ‘score a goal’ for Arsenal now because of Mikel Arteta’s style of play.
Whether he is playing in the Premier League, or he’s representing his country on the world stage, Giroud has always been a marmite-like striker.
For some, he just doesn’t score enough goals, but for others, his ability to link up play in the final third and get the best out of the players around him is of high quality – that was proven when France won the World Cup.
But when the talk was around Arteta’s style bringing the best out of the poacher Eddie Nketiah, Dixon then made this claim.
“It’s horses for courses,” Dixon said “It’s certain body shapes. It’s certain attributes that you need to play in different ways.
“I go back to Liverpool and the way they play. That link-up play around the number 10 area is so key to them in order to get the ball wide at the right time so their fullbacks can go past their wide players. And their wide players can come in. You need that fulcrum to knit all that together.
“Arsenal don’t play like that. If you put Giroud in the Arsenal team now and he wouldn’t get a kick. He wouldn’t get a goal and he wouldn’t get a kick, a bit like when he was playing for France.
“The way Arteta wants to play and the way we see the team involving around his [Nketiah’s] style. You always need a goalscorer, whether they’re the wide players, Mane or Salah. Or it’s your central striker.
“if you have someone who’s naturally good at it, which he [Nketiah] is then you have got half a chance in saying let’s keep that the main point. I wouldn’t say that Giroud, he’s got lots of qualities, he’s certainly not a poacher goalscorer like those guys.”
During the January transfer window of 2018, Chelsea signed Giroud from their London rivals Chelsea, as he would, later on, help them win the Europa League against his former club.
Arsenal did get some form of revenge over the summer when Arteta guided them to an FA Cup final win against Frank Lampard’s side, with the Frenchman in the side.
It will be interesting to see how both teams fare during this campaign because Arteta’s side have started the season strongly so far.
