The Express carried a story where Patrice Evra, suggested that Frenchman Olivier Giroud, was the scapegoat for his country’s failure, just as he had been in North London.
Arsenal’s inability to mount a serious challenge in the Premier League was blamed on Giroud’s lack of quality and to be completely honest, Evra has a point on this occasion.
Giroud was incredibly underrated by many, yet he could always be relied upon to score important and game-changing goals. Even though Arsenal’s main problems could be found elsewhere, pundits and the media suggested that the club needed a recognised goal scorer to perform.
Supporters will have noted that Giroud wasn’t at fault, his style and Arsenal’s were slightly at odds and if Arsene Wenger had made a few tweaks, the Frenchman may have been even more potent and would have silenced the unnecessary criticism.
Giroud is an almost old-fashioned center-forward, that holds the ball up and brings others into play. His brilliance is, that after doing so, he makes his move into the box to await a feed, which he tends to dispatch with ease. Imagine what Giroud could have become in an Arsenal shirt, had Wenger believed in him and had he been used in a different system.
Instead, he became a kind of super sub, trying to bail Arsenal out of trouble when all else failed. It became annoying, at one stage, Wenger seemed to lack belief in Lacazette and Giroud, so both were interchangeable in the hope that one or the other would find the net.
Giroud deserved better. True, he was no Thierry Henry but he did exactly what was required of a striker and when he wasn’t chosen, he dug in, rolled up his sleeves and maintained a dignified and respectful silence. Many Arsenal fans were disappointed when the club decided to sell the Frenchman to Chelsea, but at the time, with the World Cup looming, Giroud needed regular playing time and Wenger couldn’t guarantee that.
That decision is reaping dividends for France, as Giroud looks essential to the national side, providing the link between himself, Griezmann and Mbappé. Yet, French supporters are critical when Giroud starts and complain when he doesn’t. It appears that he is just one of those players that never gets the praise he deserves.
Arsenal’s own failure was at the opposite end of the pitch. Giroud did what he was employed to do and showed his quality from time to time, in the form of a series of instinctive goals, none more so than the infamous scorpion kick against Crystal Palace.
A goal so sublime, that it instantly moved into my top five Arsenal goals of all time , sitting quite respectfully at number three behind the genius of Henry and Bergkamp. Not bad for someone who apparently wasn’t good enough to lead the line for an Arsenal side.
