Diop – grabbed the vital equaliser
Issa Diop grabbed his first goal in claret and blue last night and then rattled the woodwork with a thunderous header.
After his nightmare own goal against Arsenal at the weekend it was the perfect response for the young Frenchman and one which looks almost certain to see him keep his place in the team to play Wolves at the weekend.
However, there was far more to his game than a goal and near miss as show on Twitter from Squawka Football
In fact his stats over 90 minutes were nothing short of extraordinary and here’s his game in numbers last night.
O 85 touches,
O 100% tackles won,
O 69 (92%) passes completed,
O 7 aerial duels won,
O 6 clearances,
O 2 shots,
O 1 interception,
O 1 chance created,
O 1 goal
It really doesn’t get a lot better than that.
COYI
The best thing about Diop, same as Declan Rice, is he’s still only a kid who If he continues to learn and improve with age and experience will end up as one hell of a player.
Shows that in this instance he has responded well to adversity which is a good sign, the own goal was unavoidable these things happen, if we play a back four I think Ogbonna should be left out his whole career with us he has looked average in a back four but very good in a back three, Cresswell is a better defender than Arthur and looks better also in a back four so we should persist with those imho in the league, each game we do something better and in a month or two we should see an improvement at both ends of the pitch the worry is central midfield we need to win more balls in that area hopefully Sanchez is half the answer but can Wilshere find his feet, I hope so because I really rate him he just has to up his work rate and combativity COYI!!!
Agreed Diop looks the part.Have never fully trusted Ogbonna.Countless mistakes already.Balbuena and Cresswell in defence for Saturday surely.