In a recent interview with Arsenal World, former Arsenal ‘invincible’ Robert Pires described Mesut Ozil as a maestro within the team very much like another Arsenal great Dennis Bergkamp. Arsene Wenger has always relied on playmakers in his team to get the work done and set a record for the club in 2013 when he signed the German midfielder for £42.5 million from Real Madrid.
The French manager has a number of star players to choose from nowadays with injury concerns at bay for the present, but it is surely Ozil who is his chief orchestrator after a change in role for Alexis Sanchez who has been deployed as a centre forward so far this season.
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Unfortunately for the North London club, Ozil’s performance is not always consistent, and he does some of his best work in limited spells implying that Arsenal too can be inconsistent themselves. This season, however, has been different with both the talisman and the club getting off to a promising start.
The German World Cup winner has had a solid start to the campaign, and it is best exemplified by his solo effort against Ludogorets in the Champions League which just goes to show that he can score the occasional goal when he doesn’t restrict himself to creating them.
Arsenal is at their best when they allow their game to flow through the German playmaker and Pires, who himself played alongside some of the best in his generation, is convinced it puts him in the same bracket as another Arsenal legend Bergkamp.
“Something has clicked. What’s happened in the head is like a click because he’s scored a lot of goals. This is a difference between the last season with Mesut Ozil and now because he’s thinking just for himself and sometimes when you are in front of the target it is very important to score a goal,” quipped the Frenchman.
Ozil has already scored seven goals in the 2016-17 season but will have to do much better if he is to get near Bergkamp’s career best at Arsenal of 22 goals during the 1997-98 season.
"Mesut Ozil has very good qualities, he can normally score a minimum of 12 goals during the Premier League so in my time the maestro was Dennis Bergkamp, and now it is Mesut Ozil. I love them both because they play very good football but they play for the team. Not for himself, they play for the team. This point is very important for the future and of course for Arsenal," Pires added.
Video Courtesy – NLD Sports 2
