Peter Crouch told Amazon Prime Sport that Arsenal duo Willian and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang have been ‘off it’ following their draw against Southampton last night.
Added with that, Alan Shearer felt that Arsenal have been ‘dreadful’ in recent times and pin-pointed their ‘lack of creativity’ in the middle of the park as a problem.
After suffering four home defeats on the bounce, Arsenal ended their dreadful run at the Emirates by securing a point against high-flying and in-form Saints.
Following the conclusion of Wednesday’s match, both Crouch and Shearer shared their thoughts on Arsenal this season.
“Looking at Arsenal for a lot of this season, the lack of creativity in there,” said Shearer. “It’s very difficult to score goals. He [Arteta] will have to take the positives. So, from that point of view, they showed some character [coming from behind and going down to ten men].
“He [Arteta] will want them to kick on now and they have to because they have been dreadful.”
Crouch added: “It’s been a real lack of confidence. It’s hard to understand with the cup final last season. I watched them in the Community Shield and they were fantastic. Even at the start of the season against Fulham, I thought they would have a good season. But it has fallen away.
“It looks like there is a real lack of confidence. I think some of the big signings like Willian, Aubameyang have been off it recently, even though he got his goal tonight.”
Whilst Mikel Arteta hasn’t been able to secure the much-needed confidence-boosting win he needs, at least he has stopped their rot.
Added with that, Aubameyang got on the scoresheet and that’s important because if he’s putting the ball into the back of the net then Arsenal are picking up points, most of the time.
It’s now a case of stopping their ill-discipline and using this point to boost themselves up by securing all three points against Everton at the weekend.
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