Dixon urges Arteta to keep Arsenal star on the sidelines
Lee Dixon thinks Arsenal should keep Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang on the sidelines while the Gunners are playing well and hopefully he can “come back firing”.
After finishing as the club’s top goalscorer last season, the Gabon international has only bagged three Premier League goals this term as he’s struggled for form.
Aubameyang was left on the bench at the weekend as Arsenal produced arguably their best result of the season, beating Chelsea 3-1 at the Emirates Stadium.
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Gabriel Martinelli, who has returned from injury, looked lively as he filled in for Aubameyang in the left-wing position.
And Dixon wants to see Aubameyang given a rest while the Gunners continue to win games and perform well.
“Nobody is bigger than the club,” Dixon said on talkSPORT, “and maybe Mikel Arteta might look at the game at the weekend and say, ‘we did create some chances, we did this’.
“It might just do him [Aubameyang] a bit of good to have a little step out of the team and just look from the sidelines.
“When you watch a game from the sidelines you can sometimes learn more than you do when you’re on the pitch.
“Your brain is so full of information when you’re playing; you don’t always see everything, you don’t always feel everything.
“Sometimes when you just step back and you sit on the bench for a bit and you look…
“He’s obviously a hugely talented footballer and we need his goals, but it might be a time for him just to look and assess the team.
“You can actually see little ways of improving your own game when you’re sitting on the bench, because you’re watching other people and you’re seeing gaps appear from a different angle.
“You go, ‘I can make that run next week’, or, ‘I know how the full-back does this’.
“When I was playing I didn’t analyse Ian Wright’s runs because they just happened.
“But if you were sitting on the sidelines and watched Thierry Henry or Wrighty or Dennis Bergkamp, you saw an awful lot more and it gives you a bigger and more colourful picture of that player.
“So it might do him a bit of good to step out.
“If they win their next two games and he doesn’t play then he [could] come back firing. That rest might do him good.”