The last week or so has been nothing short of a disaster for Arsenal.
Mikel Arteta’s side first dropped points away to Brighton & Hove Albion in the Premier League, then lost the first leg of their League Cup semi-final 2-0 to Newcastle United and then, to round things off, they were knocked out of the FA Cup by Manchester United, despite having a man advantage.
There have been poor performances from across the entire squad in the last few games, but it’s hard to ignore, particularly last night and during the week, the dire displays of club captain Martin Odegaard and Kai Havertz.
The Norwegian has looked a shadow of himself in recent weeks and missed a penalty in normal time against United, while the former Chelsea man missed a mountain of chances in both cup defeats, so recent reports linking the club to a player who could replace the latter and revive the former shouldn’t come as much of a shock.
Arsenal continue their striker search
According to a recent report from the Independent’s Chief Football Writer, Miguel Delaney, Arsenal want to sign RB Leipzig’s Benjamin Šeško.
The report does not mention a price, but a story from last month claimed that the German club would demand at least €70m for their star attacker, which comes to about £59m.
However, while that isn’t an egregiously high price tag for a promising forward in the modern game, Delaney also claims that the board would ‘rather spend in the summer.’
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That said, with the club’s season hanging by the smallest of threads, they might have to take the leap and spend more than they want to this month, as not only would Šeško be an upgrade on Havertz, but he could also revive Odegaard.
How Šeško would make Arsenal better
So, if Arsenal were to stump up the cash needed and bring Šeško to the Emirates this month, he’d be in direct competition with Havertz for a starting place up top, and from how they have performed this year, we reckon it’s a competition he’d win.
For example, in 24 appearances this season, totalling just 1683 minutes, the Slovenian “monster,” as dubbed by analyst Ben Mattinson, has scored 12 goals and provided three assists, meaning he’s currently averaging a goal involvement every 1.6 games, or every 112.2 minutes.
Whereas while the Gunners’ number 29 has scored and assisted as many goals this season, he has done so in 27 appearances, totalling 2232 minutes, which comes out to a goal involvement every 1.8 games, or one every 148.8 minutes, which is a significant point of difference.
In fact, it’s this difference that could see him help get the best back out of Odegaard, as despite being some way off his mercurial best in yesterday’s game, the Norwegian still created two big chances for his teammates, suggesting that with a more clinical forward ahead of him, he’d start chalking up assists for the team.
We can see that the Leipzig ace is a far better finisher through Understat’s underlying numbers, as according to them, he has scored seven league goals this season from an expected goals figure of just 4.61 and was even more effective last season when he scored 14 league goals from an expected goals figure of 8.60.
League Appearances
31
37
Expected Goals
8.60
13.47
Actual Goals
14
13
League Appearances
16
17
Expected Goals
4.61
9.46
Actual Goals
7
7
In contrast, the former Chelsea man has scored as many league goals this season, but from an expected goals number of 9.46 and, while he was a little less wasteful last season, he still underperformed, scoring 13 goals from an expected tally of 13.47.
Ultimately, Havertz has been a useful player for Arsenal over the last year and a half, but it is now undeniable that he’s a poor finisher, and as the numbers suggest, the opposite is true for Šeško.
So, if Arteta and Co want to improve their attack and help get more out of the chief creator in Odegaard, then signing the Leipzig star this month would be a great start.
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