Mathieu Debuchy
The Frenchman has had a frustrating start to life at the Emirates, but now he’s looking to become a huge part of this Gunners side.
Since returning in April from his near three-month injury, Debuchy has featured just once at a competitive level, playing the full 120 minutes in the FA Cup semi-final.
Other than that, the former Newcastle defender has had to watch on as Hector Bellerin takes to the field, after the youngster was rewarded a place in the 4-0 FA Cup final victory.
But after an impressive pre-season of conceding just one goal from five games, there is plenty of talk surrounding the return of Debuchy.
Wenger initially bought the defender to replace Bacary Sagna, and it was expected he would play the next three or four seasons whilst he was still playing at his peak.
And now, as talk turns to the new campaign, it has been argued that Debuchy deserves to return to his first team status, after proving himself as one of the clubs best defensive options.
However, when you sit back and analyse the contributions of Debuchy, you’ll see that he has a long way to go before he can feel comfortable in this squad.
At 30 years of age, his wealth of experience has given the right-back a massive amount of confidence in his positioning, meaning that he is capable of actually defending against some of the leagues most challenging wingers.
That’s all well and good, but when you have a side like Arsenal who are pushing their opposition backwards throughout the game, you have to rely on our right-back also working as an attacker.
And unfortunately that’s where Debuchy is lagging behind, with his poor ability to get forward and back being one of the main reasons Arsenal fell short at the beginning of last seasons Premier League.
If Debuchy stands any chance of getting back into this side, it’s his work effort down the right hand side that will convince Wenger he is the best option possible.
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But when it all comes down to his improvement in the long run, this competition is exactly what Debuchy will need.
He now faces a fight to get back into the starting eleven, rather than simply returning straight back into the squad, something we were used to during the last few seasons.
Debuchy is not at all past his day, and you can bet he will feature to compensate the hectic schedule Arsenal are bound to have.
Whether he should actually start the season is another question entirely, and that’s where you have to look at his competition in Hector Bellerin, which you can see by clicking below.