Speaking on the Wrighty’s House Podcast, Ian Wright has been talking about Nicolas Pepe and Mikel Arteta’s decision to leave him on the bench at the weekend.
Arsenal faced Newcastle on Saturday afternoon, and sadly, in the second half, Bukayo Saka went down with an injury.
With Arsenal’s right-winger unable to continue, Arteta had to make a change, but rather than turning to his £72m man on the bench, he opted to bring Gabriel Martinelli on to play in a position that he isn’t all that familiar with.
Wright believes that this decision from Arteta is telling of Pepe’s standing in the squad, and the pundit believes that the Ivorian is slipping down the pecking order.
What’s been said about Pepe?
Wright spoke about Pepe and the fact he was snubbed at the weekend.
“Can I tell you something about us at the moment, Pepe has played five minutes in five games, with Martinelli coming on and scoring that goal, coming on on the right remember, normally you’d think that Pepe would come on, that says a lot to me about where Pepe is in Mikel Arteta’s standing. Maybe it’s because of AFCON, but you want them to do the business while they’re here, you don’t see Liverpool leave out Salah,” Wright said.
Not a good sign
The fact that Pepe is out of the starting XI is already telling of his standing at the Emirates, but his lack of involvement off the bench is quite simply damning.
As Wright says, Martinelli was brought on to play on the right, a position that he’s very rarely played, while Pepe, a natural right-winger, stayed on the sidelines.
Perhaps there’s a fitness issue that we don’t know about, but from the outside looking in, it looks as though Pepe is in a bit of jeopardy at Arsenal right now.
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