There’s no shame in losing to Bayern Munich. They are, after all, the best team in Europe at the moment. There is, however, blame. And it appears that amongst a section of Arsenal’s fans and in the media the blame lays squarely at Mesut Özil’s door.
Now in terms of the penalty miss that’s understandable, it was possibly the worst Arsenal penalty I’ve seen since the Henry/Pires debacle, although at least Özil managed a shot on goal. However, in terms of the game as a whole I think we can all agree the real turning point was the sending off. Personally, I believe Wojciech Szczeny has done more than enough this season to justify the lack of blame being laid at his feet, but if we’d still had 11 men on the pitch for the second half we may well not have rued the penalty miss quite so much.
So why is everyone so quick to turn on the German playmaker? In terms of the media it’s because he’s an easy target, and in the build ’em up to knock ’em down world of the press a £42m flop is a rare gift indeed. But for us Gooners to do the same seems strange to me.
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think we’ve seen the best of Özil by a long chalk, but I think all this talk of him chronically lacking form is a little premature. In all the games I’ve watched him in I can only think of one where he hasn’t produced at least one moment of sheer class that has created a great chance for Arsenal to score. His turn in the box to win the penalty against Bayern is just one example, or his pass to Oxlade-Chamberlain for the second goal against Liverpool. These things are barely mentioned because he makes it look so simple but the timing and precision needed to pull it off is something special. Last season we often lacked someone to play the killer ball in behind the defence, in fact we’ve lacked it since Fabregas left, but Özil does it pretty much every game, regardless of form. The one game he didn’t manage to create a chance was the drubbing at Anfield but to blame Özil for that shambles is like blaming Police Academy 7 on the guy that does all the wacky sound effects. It’s just picking on the guy you recognise. Perhaps in recent weeks the amount of times per game he pulls these perfect passes off has slackened but that could well be because he hasn’t had Walcott or Ramsey making the runs. He does now seem to be developing an understanding with Oxlade-Chamberlain though so don’t be surprised if the rate picks up again.
Another accusation levelled against Özil is that he’s lazy, and at first glance it’s easy to see why. He plays with a laid back style that belies the work he’s putting in. He doesn’t have the hustle and bustle of a Rosicky or a Wilshere, nor does he seem to cover every blade of grass like a Ramsey or a Flamini but against Munich he had the third highest distance covered during the game, so you can’t say he doesn’t put a shift in. (Incidentally, Flamini was first by a couple of kilometres. How does he do it? Does he do laps of the pitch at half time or something?) Another point to make is that he’s Arsenal’s number 10. If he’s having to drop back and make tackles in defence something has gone very wrong with our game plan. He shouldn’t be doing as much running as our other midfielders quite frankly, he has a job to do defensively but ultimately he shouldn’t be judged on it, the same way Pires wasn’t.
I think the main problem for Özil at this point in time is that he is our one bona fide superstar so everyone looks to him when things are going wrong, and I think he does his best work out of the glare of the spotlight, as he did at Real Madrid while Ronaldo took all the glory. While I don’t advocate big money signings just for the sake of it, it could be beneficial for him if in the summer we bring in another marquee name to deflect a bit of the attention. Someone to be the Henry to Özil’s Bergkamp if you will. Then I believe we’ll see the true Mesut Özil, but until then let’s remember that he is a character who needs to be loved and get behind him. He’s a player who even when he’s not playing well can do things that the majority of footballers can only do when everything clicks, and that’s someone who deserves a little bit more faith and lot less criticism in my book.
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