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Along with his double in on Saturday, Viktor Gyokeres has now scored six targets this 12 months, greater than another Premier League participant.
The Sweden striker arrived in the summertime as a press release. Followers anticipated an on the spot affect, one thing like an Erling Haaland-esque explosion into the Premier League. They did not get it. However along with his latest run of kind, it seems like he could possibly be precisely what Arsenal wanted.
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Regardless of his latest enhancing run of kind, a typical criticism of Gyokeres from rival followers is that he solely scores towards the league’s newly promoted sides, or these within the backside half. Factually, that is true. 5 of his eight Premier League targets have come towards , , and .
However Arsenal’s title cost faltered final season towards precisely these kind of sides. Conversely, this season, Gyokeres is exactly the person to dispatch these sides, even when they nonetheless put up an organised and, at occasions, suffocating defence towards the Gunners. This is not a participant stat-padding towards smaller sides, it is one doing precisely what we want him to do.
It is also been an eye-opener for followers watching a participant adapt to life within the English prime flight whereas very publicly studying on the job. Physicality-wise, there may be merely nowhere to cover within the Premier League, and Gyokeres has typically regarded considerably off the tempo. Nonetheless, he has failed, adjusted, and improved within the public eye and below immense scrutiny. That is to be lauded.
He’s proof that the transfer from Primeira Liga is not nearly technical talent, which he’s nonetheless engaged on. It’s as a lot concerning the psychological energy to fail and develop whereas the world watches.
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These early indicators of him ‘coming good’ are not any fluke, however the results of a participant keen to be imperfect whereas the ending touches fall into place. And his latest kind reveals each indication that they’ll.
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