Arsenal star man needs his doubles partner back
To be perfectly honest, most Arsenal fans could not give a monkey’s about where the goals come from, as long as the Gunners start firing again. The scoring has slowed up dramatically since the turn of the year and the blame for that can be shared around, with Theo Walcott, Aaron Ramsey and the back from injury Alexis Sanchez all failing to do the business for Arsenal in front of goal.
But the man we really need to get going again is the France international centre forward Olivier Giroud. Until his last two goals, which came in the same Premier League game against Liverpool, the big striker was having a very effective season and was well on the way to netting 20 league goals and 30 in all competitions this season.
Instead Giroud has just set a record of a different sort, his longest run of games without a goal since signing for Arsenal almost four years ago. We should remember that in December we were talking about Giroud becoming the third fastest player to reach 50 goals for the Gunners and that these things do tend to go in cycles, especially for the Frenchman who went six without a goal in his first season, seven without a goal in the next and eight last season.
If that trend continues the Giroud is set to score against the Swans tonight and we really need that to happen, because Mesut Ozil has been doing his bit and creating the chances but unless the big man starts putting them away again there is little hope of us winning the title.
A report in The Sun today shows that the top two in the EPL for combined goals and assists are the Leicester duo Mahrez and Vardy but Ozil is level with Mahrez and Giroud is joint 7th despite his recent drought. If Giroud can start climbing that table again, will Arsenal climb the league table at the same time?
