5 Arsenal Players Whose Stock Tumbled in 2015/16 Season
Despite their highest league finish for 11 years, last season was one of underachievement for Arsenal.
Much of that can be put down to the failure of certain individuals to perform to the expected level. In fact, certain players saw their reputations take a real hit due to the nature of their performances.
In this piece, we identify the men who will want to forget about the campaign as quickly as possible.
Go to the next slide to discover the first of five Arsenal players whose stock fell in 2015/16.
Kieran Gibbs
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It’s hard to believe that there was a time when Kieran Gibbs was once considered Arsenal’s first-choice left-back ahead of Nacho Monreal. Over the past two seasons, the Englishman has been comprehensively relegated to to being back-up.
Gibbs made just three Premier League starts in 2015/16, and only one of those came in his preferred position at full-back. In the other two games, he was used as a defensive winger. The player has become a useful utility man, but he struggles to offer more than that.
When he did occasionally get game-time, he understandably looked rusty. Gibbs is 26 now, but he does not appear to have developed into the defender Arsenal once hoped he would become.
Gibbs’ campaign did have one great moment: he scored a vital equaliser in the north London derby against Tottenham Hotspur. How vital that snatched point would prove to be come the end of the season, when the Gunners leapfrogged their rivals on the final day.
However, this will go down as a season in which Gibbs’ status as second-choice was confirmed. If he wishes to get more first-team football, he may have to leave the club where he was reared.
Theo Walcott
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2015/16 began positively for Walcott. Having signed a new long-term contract with the club in the summer, he was afforded the opportunity to establish himself in a role he had long coveted as the side’s first-choice centre-forward.
The initial signs were good. Walcott starred in wins over Leicester City and Manchester United and appeared set to dislodge Olivier Giroud as the spearhead of the Arsenal attack.
However, the goals soon dried up, and familiar bad habits began to creep back into Walcott’s game. The aggression and drive that had characterised the early-season performances faded, and Walcott would disappear from matches for long spells. The bigger the occasion, the quieter he would seemingly be.
Eventually, even Arsene Wenger was forced to admit to ESPN that Walcott’s transition to playing as a striker had gone “not as well as you could have expected”.
After Arsenal’s 3-2 defeat at Old Trafford in March, Walcott did not start another Premier League game. It seems Wenger may have finally run out of patience with a player who has been with the club for a full decade.
Mathieu Debuchy
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It’s easy to forget that Mathieu Debuchy is still an Arsenal player. The France full-back grew so frustrated with life as the back-up to Hector Bellerin that he left the club in January to join Bordeaux on loan.
In fairness, when he was given the opportunity to stake his claim in the first half of the season, he was consistently disappointing. Debuchy has struggled with injuries in the past couple of years and was obviously struggling to recapture the form he had showed at Lille and Newcastle United.
Now it seems there is no way back for him in north London. Bellerin continues to excel, while Arsenal have two young English right-backs coming through in Calum Chambers and Carl Jenkinson. Debuchy’s services are no longer required at the Emirates Stadium.
The 30-year-old's disappointing campaign was compounded by the fact that injury has forced him to miss Euro 2016. He’ll now be hoping he can recover in time to find a new club before the closure of the summer window.
Per Mertesacker
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At the start of the season, Per Mertesacker and Laurent Koscielny were the clear first-choice central defensive partnership at Arsenal. However, by the end of the campaign it was unclear whether Arsene Wenger preferred Mertesacker or Gabriel Paulista as the Frenchman’s partner.
Wenger has presumably grown impatient with Mertesacker’s limitations. His lack of speed means Arsenal can be vulnerable on the counter-attack, and he was caught out on a couple of high-profile occasions last season. His sending off in the Premier League match against Chelsea for dragging back Diego Costa was particularly painful to watch.
It’s possible that Wenger has begun the process of phasing Mertesacker out. The former Germany international is 31 and losing whatever vestiges of pace he once had.
Perhaps the Arsenal boss has decided it is the time for a younger man to play alongside Koscielny. It will be interesting to see if Wenger names Mertesacker as the successor to Mikel Arteta as club captain. The gentle giant is currently the vice-captain, and if he is overlooked for promotion, it could be a sign that Wenger no longer considers him a regular starter.
In truth, Gabriel did not enjoy a particularly convincing 2015/16 either. If Wenger wants to build a new partnership at the heart of his back four, he may have to enter the transfer market.
Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain
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2015/16 should have been a big season for Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain. The former Southampton man scored the only goal in the Community Shield victory over Chelsea, smashing a powerful shot into the roof of the net to give Arsene Wenger his only victory to date over Jose Mourinho.
Oxlade-Chamberlain was subsequently named in the starting XI for the first game of the Premier League season against West Ham United. However, he committed a major defensive error to hand the Hammers their second goal in a shock 2-0 win.
That kind of irresponsible play characterised the early part of Oxlade-Chamberlain’s season. Whether by ill-fortune or poor decision-making, he frequently found himself culpable when Arsenal conceded.
If he was firing on all cylinders going forward, that might have been forgiven. However, over the course of the Premier League season, he contributed just one goal and zero assists. Throw in a host of injury problems and this was a thoroughly disappointing campaign for the England international.
