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It could have been so different for Wilfried Zaha heading into tonight’s Premier League battle between Arsenal and Crystal Palace.
The Eagles talisman has long been linked to a move to the Emirates, but will once again take a place in the locker room when the Palace arrives at the stadium, putting on his boots while receiving last-minute instructions from Roy Hodgson.
Just meters away, Mikel Arteta will deliver a tactical briefing of his own, knowing full well that the main attacking threat from his opponents could have been wearing his own team’s red and white.
By his own admission, Zaha has been ‘very close’ to a step at Arsenal in the past, before the club’s hierarchy opted to sign Nicolas Pepe in the summer of 2019.
The jury is still out on whether it was worth the £ 72 million they paid (and that might be kindly to say), but many are now relying on their opinion that Zaha would have been the best buy.
Both Ivorians, both valued in a similar amount, and the Arsenal board grouped the then Lille player in place of Zaha. A coin toss in some respects, but it turns out Ligue 1 isn’t the Premier League and Zaha is still flying high.
This season, Arsenal’s money men will have been watching with some envy the incredible season Zaha is having with Palace.
Although the team has been far from impressive in recent weeks, Zaha is thriving in his new center position, regularly drifting away from his place on the left flank to fill a center-forward position alongside a rejuvenated Christian Benteke.
After years of experts urging him to add goals and assists to his game, he is now enjoying the most successful season of his career, peaking with eight goals and two assists in his first 15 league games.
And due to the change in position, it is not enough to compare him with Pepe. Indeed, the likes of Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, Alexandre Lacazette, and Bukayo Saka are to be rated along with Zaha, and the man from the Palace pulls them all out of the water.
In terms of goals, his eight is better than every Arsenal player, with Lacazette closest to him with seven. The Frenchman, however, has no assists, so Zaha strays further away from him in terms of goal participation.
On the other hand, Aubameyang and Saka each have three goals, while Pepe himself has only two in his 11 Premier League games this season.
In assists and only Willian beats Zaha’s two: the former Chelsea player has three, but he cannot claim to have scored a single goal so far this season.
Zaha has had 92 touches in the opponent’s area this season, a not inconsiderable feat given Palace’s tendency to sit back and play on the fast break.
Arsenal, of course, would expect to enjoy much more power in half of their opponents, but the reality is that none of Arsenal’s front-line members come close to Palace’s superstar.
Saka is the closest with 72, while Aubameyang has 62 and Lacazette 59.
On ‘dribbles completed’, a Zaha metric that she might have expected to drop slightly in the pecking order, given her new role in the middle.
He is no longer lifting the ball inches from the touchline and passing his opponents on the wing, but he still easily outshines all of Arsenal’s men again.
Zaha has 26 successful dribbles, meaning times he has beaten his man, with all but one Arsenal attacker still in unique numbers.
While Saka is 24, a total close to Zaha, Aubameyang, Lacazette, Willian, Eddie Nketiah and Pepe have six, nine, eight, six and eight respectively.
The most harrowing part of this for Arsenal fans is that Zaha really wanted to play for them.
He is a man who idolized Thierry Henry as a child, dreamed of donning the Arsenal uniform and scoring the goals of the North London giants.
In 2019, when Unai Emery was the coach, the club was looking for him and they wanted the move. Everything was seen until the Gunners board intervened.
‘I had a conversation with the manager. [Unai] Emery said, “We really don’t need to go through much,” Zaha said recently on the Jamie Carragher podcast.
He said he saw me play, he knows I can switch games at any time and things like that. He was like, “Yes, we would love to have you,” and I was like, “Yes, I would love to come.”
“The conversation was quite simple because I played against him when he was coach of Arsenal. He saw what I could do, he saw my work rate and what I could contribute to the team.
“Obviously, it depended on the club who they chose and they chose Pepe before me.”
However, all the credit to Zaha for her response to the blow. He has shrugged at Palace, well aware of the love and support that fans and the club have given him, and moved to the next level.
On a Hodgson team famous for its structure and rigidity, he is the free-flowing attacking talent that fans pay to see.
A club legend with nearly 400 appearances under his belt, the fan favorite more than ever in his eleventh season in red and blue.
As Zaha enters tonight’s game, more than most will be aware of the comparisons being made between him and the Arsenal players. And you will be aware that you are overshadowing them in almost every area.
What better motivation can there be for him than to prove it once again inside the Emirates stadium. A victory for Palace would also see them overtake Arsenal on the table.
During Arsenal’s fighting season, Zaha will be desperate to show them once again what he can do. Mikel Arteta, this is what you could have won.
Source: m.allfootballapp.com
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