Honestly, what would have happened if they'd said he was fit? I wonder how this whole topic was as handled between Gaz and Mick...

    Don Pacifico if they say he's fit then they can play him. Arteta has no way to stop it, if we push the issue we could be fined and player could be suspended.

      Clrnc I don't think he technically can. I remember someone getting in trouble with their nation over it, think it was Kante, the French threatened him with some sort of sanction. Most nations wont call out their players like that. Roy Keane always did it to Ireland, Giggs to Wales, etc but I think they can pursue punishment if they want.

        Hasn't Southgate effectively banished Sterling and Pope for the same reason?

        But yeah, nations have a right to inspect the players themselves when clubs claim they're injured.

        2 months later
        7 days later

        8 goals and 10 assists already this season a third of the way through, that's crazy. The scary thing is I think he's only now just hitting form.

        He's come up trumps this season after some questionable form. Stylistically, he leaves a bit to be desired but goddamn is he effective.

        It must be hard to express your style if you're hacked down the moment you receive it, and pretty much doubled team.
        The times he did have air, he was too basic and predictable. Whole front line poor so it's not all on him.

        25 days later

        Interesting bit of writing, although it might be more enlightening if they'd compiled some stats about Saka's output versus his cumulative minutes, or versus some sort of moving average of minutes played.

        The main argument it makes is that Saka's dropped off in form since the start of December, which sounds about right.

        Last season Saka experienced a steep drop in form midseason, one that turned into an extended trough. That happened hard upon the brilliant performances for England which saw him finally properly anointed as a national superstar by the pundits.

        20 days later

        He has been nowhere near as good as last first half of the season but his stats suggest otherwise...

        Felt like the more touches we have in the box was due to hesitancy and extra touches don't help us score more but rather delayed attacks and allowed defenders to get blocks in

        With Saka he dropped off a long way after Feb last season. I think we tend to compare his best last season with his worst this season (same goes for the team as a whole).

        Any gooner who isn't instantly suspicious of a stat like "accumulated penalty area touches" obviously hasn't been paying attention since the 90s anyway. Just a sign we don't get our shots away and we play against extremely deep and organised defences.

        Surely they're not counting literal touches in the box? They should call it possessions in the box, or something.

          I want a stat for how many times you're found in a good shooting position per match. That's vs how many shots they manage would interest me.