Ian Wright says Martin Odegaard hardly had any time on the ball during Arsenal’s 1-0 defeat to Everton in the Premier League on Saturday, as he attributed Amadou Onana’s performance to that, as he told Match of the Day.
New Manager bounce. Sean Dyche in the dugout. Goodison Park. Was it a real surprise that Everton were able to take maximum points off the Premier League leaders?
A number of weeks ago, with Frank Lampard in the dugout, the Toffees would have been torn to shreds by the usually confident, free-flowing and free-scoring Arsenal side.
But when Sean Dyche is in the dugout and when Onana, who was linked to Arsenal during the January transfer window, is at the top of his game, then it’s a different ball game.
Despite those links last month, the hard-hitting midfielder stayed faithful to the cause on Merseyside, which would no doubt please his own supporters.
And at Goodison Park, against the best team in the land, he put on a wicked display against Arsenal’s captain, which was spoken about by Ian Wright, as he told Match of the Day.
“This is Martin Odegaard, arguably one of the players of the season, so far,” said Wright. “He didn’t have hardly any time (on the ball). Arsenal are still trying to play, like they play, because it’s got them where they are, at the moment.
“Look at Everton, every single one of them is right in their faces. All day this was happening. If Arsenal were going to get something, they were going to have to play very, very well.
“Onana, who was in and around Martin Odegaard the whole game – you look at Gana, reads it and they win it. I thought they were going to run out of energy, at some stage.
“This is Onana, again. Getting in front of Martin Odegaard. Then he has a bit of skill, and bam, bam!
“By the time it finished, this is just him running it down to the other end of the pitch and once it goes out of play, he gets the whole stand going with his rally cry.”
ONE OF THE PERFORMANCES OF THE SEASON
This was one of the performances of the season by Arsenal and one of the performances of the campaign by Onana.
You truly know what the team and you are about when you are down on the floor nearly hitting rock bottom because that’s where Everton have been.
Odegaard has been one of the best players in the Premier League this season, yet the £30 million signing (Sky Sports) was hooked after 77 minutes because he just couldn’t impact the game.
That’s a credit to the opposition more than anything else because this is probably the first off-day Odegaard has had all season long.
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