Alexandre Lacazette was the only one not involved in some sort of tug of war this past summer.
£183 million was spent in total on three star forwards by Premier League clubs.
Romelu Lukaku and Alvaro Morata were targets for both Manchester United and Chelsea, with Lukaku eventually joining the former and Morata heading to the latter. Reports remain that each club would rather have had the other.
Lacazette, meanwhile, quietly made a £52m move to Arsenal, seemingly the only one nobody else wanted, with a source in the Man Utd camp reportedly briefing that the France international was ‘too slow and couldn’t finish.’
Arsene Wenger hopes everyone else’s indifference will be Arsenal’s gain after smashing Arsenal’s transfer record to bring in the prolific 26-year-old striker.
And should Alexis Sanchez remain in North London, the task facing Lacazette this season will be to alleviate some of the burden on the Chile international, who may yet appear to be running on empty after four successive seasons playing major international competitions.
GettySanchez hit 24 Premier League goals last term, his best-ever return, though it wouldn’t be enough to stop Arsenal missing out on Champions League football for the first time in 21 years.
The Gunners were outfired by all four clubs who finished above them in the table, leaving Wenger ready to break the bank to ensure his side are less reliant on Alexis.
Lacazette will offer more dynamism, better interplay, and his direct running will undoubtedly create more space between the lines for the likes of Sanchez and Mesut Ozil to hurt opposition defences.
"He has a different game to Giroud, which I think is good because you need different types of strikers," said former Arsenal star Thierry Henry on Sky Sports.
"Sometimes you'll need Giroud or even [Alexis] Sanchez in the middle and sometimes you'll need [Danny] Welbeck or [Theo] Walcott, whoever will have an impact."
But he will ultimately be judged on how regularly he can find the net. Lacazette’s arrival appears to have relegated to Olivier Giroud to a permanent second-choice forward, but the latter played his part last season.
Giroud hit 12 goals last term, in just 11 starts, to ensure only Tottenham, Chelsea and Liverpool could match Arsenal’s record of having more than one player in the Premier League’s top 20 goalscorers in 2016-17.
Lacazette his hit 94 league goals in his previous five seasons, 25 more than Giroud.
Lacazette 4/1 to score first tonight
However, adjusting their respective totals in accordance with the points system for the European Golden Shoe, where Premier League goals are worth two points compared to Ligue 1’s 1.5, Lacazette has only 'outscored' Giroud by 141 points to 138 over that period.
"He did it in the French league and people might say it's a different league, but, with due respect to Lyon, he'll also be with better players,” insists Henry. “I'm backing him to have a good season.”
If he does, Arsenal are likely to have a good one also. For every Didier Drogba, there's a Steve Marlet.
The pressure is now on Lacazette to make sure his time in England goes more like that of the former.
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