Gyokeres rescues dreadful Arsenal as Arteta welcomes next season’s Champions League ban
If Mikel Arteta felt comfortable telling PFA Team of the Year member and Player of the Year nominee Declan Rice that “I can do more in this shirt and for this club” after a season in which he played the most minutes of any outfielder for the title winners and Champions League runners-up, it doesn’t bear thinking about the pre-season message Viktor Gyokeres might have received.
Of course, the great mind-reading, dossier-collecting, pickpocket-employer likely knows when and on whom to deploy either carrot or stick.
After a 21-goal debut season largely tinged by deceptive flattery, it could be argued that Gyokeres deserved both and neither from Mikel Arteta.
He remains a conundrum of a centre-forward, even in light of his goal and assist to sink Slavia Prague – arguably specifically because of it. Moments of wonderful ingenuity, timing and technique though they were, coming against a Czech side equalling the record for longest winless run in Champions League history matched the underlying flat-track bully narrative.
This can often be a farmer’s league phase, and Gyokeres is wont to feast appropriately.
His chest control and excellent swivelling hook of a bouncing ball to release Noni Madueke, and neat link-up play half an hour later before a sublime finish, granted Arsenal a lead they spent much of the second contriving to try and surrender.
Some errant finishing, a spot of impeccable goalline-guarding from Gabriel and one fine David Raya save meant that while the defence is likely to be gaslit by some Arteta Methods™ in the coming days after Wiktor Nowak’s late spoiling of their clean sheet, Arsenal maintained the only unbeaten record of all English teams in the Champions League.
That was the lowest possible bar to clear. The second half, in which Sparta Prague had 14 shots to four, was remarkably sloppy and loose from the error-strewn visitors, who slipped absurdly far below their usual standards.
Keeping a tired Rice on for the full 90 minutes, more than 30 of which were on a booking, spoke to Arteta’s lack of trust in the team seeing it through.
Arsenal might not be too displeased that this fixture in Prague will be precluded next season, having taken place in both of the last two seasons. It seemed the comfort of the 3-0 cruise exactly 365 days prior would be repeated, yet the performance level of Gyokeres and Madueke could not be met by their team-mates and both struggled to exert the same influence as a result.
The early one-touch play from Gyokeres in particular was, however, an encouraging sign of his more polished game.
Three assists in 13 appearances this season already matches the haul from his debut campaign, and the variation points to the work being done to improve his all-round play: the penultimate touch in a goal-mouth scramble Ezri Konsa finished against Everton; the gloriously effective touch for Rice at Bayern; the occupying of two defenders here before releasing Madueke to run through and score.
Had Kai Havertz and Bukayo Saka capitalised on the chances created by Gyokeres’ unique brand of slightly cumbersome but undeniably potent back-to-goal playmaking, the new string to his bow might be more defined and appreciated.
As it is, it helped guide Arsenal to an important win, as Gyokeres’ contributions to the scoresheet tend to. With Madueke threatening to “explode” as Arteta theorised he might with a run of games, the Gunners were pulled through by their misfits.
