Since Unai Emery succeeded Arsene Wenger at Arsenal, Mesut Ozil, the team’s highest paid player, has found himself out of favor. The £350,000-a-week midfielder has often been benched, with a fitness excuse for that decision sometimes being provided.
Other times, Emery has said little to nothing beyond “it’s tactical,” or other words to that effect. Today, however, Emery dropped Ozil entirely, and when pressed on why, didn’t even bother to give an explanation or justification. It’s pretty obvious now that Emery and Arsenal don’t even want to bother pretending anymore. Watch this pregame interview of the Gunners manager below:
Unai Emery's response to why Mesut Ozil has been dropped is a little worrying pic.twitter.com/q4zi3y39ha
— Football Daily (@footballdaily) September 30, 2019
There you have it- Ozil is simply just not in Emery’s plans.
Whenever a reporter has asked Emery if there is an issue between him and the player, he says there isn’t but it’s clear that he’s evading. There is obviously something going on here that’s causing some kind of rift. Given how some of the players ahead of Ozil have performed in games, it’s hard to imagine that Ozil is doing something that much worse in training.
This development has led to Ozil becoming a top trending term on Twitter, and there have been plenty of memorable takes on this situation. Here are a couple:
Emery's treatment of Mesut Ozil has been nothing short of disgraceful.
— Sash ~ (@ltarsenal) September 30, 2019
Mesut Ozil isn't in squad tonight…#afc pic.twitter.com/M4yeGmqKja
— AfcVIP?? (@VipArsenal) September 30, 2019
As for the game itself, United went into the break up 1-0 as Scott McTominay opened the scoring on the strike of half-time. The Scot’s third Manchester United goal was scored off a right footed shot from outside the box to the top left corner. He was assisted by Marcus Rashford.
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