Why Wenger must play Lacazette and Aubameyang together

The final score at Wembley on Saturday, a 1-0 defeat for Arsenal against Tottenham Hotspur in which Harry Kane scored the winner, implies a tighter contest than the one we saw.
The 13-time English champions were completely outplayed by our north London rivals, which goes to show that the divide in north London is becoming bigger with every passing season. Arsene Wenger got his tactics wrong: in a game that we had to win, he should have risked partnering Alexandre Lacazette with Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang together.

Since the latter arrived at The Emirates, he has played as the first choice striker with Lacazette dropping to the bench. While Aubameyang is obviously the better striker, Wenger should find a system to play the pair to strike fear into the hearts of opposition defenders. Aubameyang lacked support on Saturday, as the pair of Mesut Ozil and Henrikh Mkhitaryan struggled to get into the game as Spurs completely dominated them, he was unable to impose himself. Lacazette came on and changed the dimension of the game by pegging The Lilywhites back in their own half.

He may have spurned a glorious chance to level the game late on, but it says a lot about his confidence. On a normal day, he would have buried the chance. Lacazette is not a bad player, he only needs more chances to impress regularly. Lacazette and Aubameyang compliment each other and have reportedly struck a good friendship off the pitch.

To get the best out of his front men, Wenger must tweak his formation: perhaps to a 3-4-1-2, with either Mesut Ozil or Henrikh Mkhitaryan in the hole. Against ultra-defensive opposition, he could even fit the aforementioned quartet into a 4-2-2-2 system with Hector Bellerin and perhaps even Sead Kolasinac pushing on to provide width and Jack Wilshere driving forward from deep.

Defences are so used to playing against one-striker opposition, that facing two provides the element of the unknown. Lacazette and Aubameyang, who have scored 335 club goals between them, would provide the finishing quality to take advantage of any hesitancy in opposing rear-guards.

In not having them both on the pitch, Wenger risks wasting potentially one of the best goalscoring partnerships in European football.

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Comments

  1. Who ever wrote dat write up i will gladly say God bless u 4 dat. U re a true gunner bcos playing dem 2geda wil be d best

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