When Olivier Giroud was ruled out for four months with a broken tibia in August, it looked as if his season, and perhaps even his Arsenal future, was going to be a write off. The signing of Danny Welbeck and some of the initial success the Englishman had only added to that feeling. The turnaround has thus been remarkable. Just seven months later he’s Arsenal’s joint top scorer in the Premier League, is having his best season ever, has just won the Player of the Month award for March and has played a crucial role in Arsenal’s upturn in form since the Autumn.
Source: arsenalfc.com
And lets get one thing clear, he has had a fantastic season. He has the best non penalty goal rate of anyone in the league at 0.93 goals per 90 minutes. It also dwarfs anything those who were realistically available to potentially replace him have achieved, Mandzukic going at 0.47, Falcao at 0.35 and Balotelli just 0.11. A few poor misses in a single game does in no way change those facts, or the fact that Giroud has been as clinical as you could realistically expect a striker to be, and then some, over the course of this season.
I’m not as sold on his hold up and link up play as most. He loses the ball quite a lot for someone who will very rarely look to take on players, and his passing accuracy is poor. However, he clearly has a good understanding with crucial players in the team, and when his first time flicks come off they’re a thing of beauty. And you can’t argue with his scoring record this year.
So just why has Giroud been so prolific in front of goal this season? Mainly it’s because his finishing has been off the charts. He’s scoring twice as much from a similar amount of chances as he did in his first two seasons in England. Ironically this is actually quite concerning, because he won’t be able to keep up his ridiculous efficiency this season, especially as he had never been more than average in terms of chance conversion before this season.*
*What I’m basing this off is Expected Goals (ExpG). If you don’t know what that is a quick google should help, but it basically excess the quality of chances and how much you’d expect a normal striker to score. It’s not sustainable to outperform your ExpG as much as Giroud has.
However, he has had a decent chunk of the season now, basically four and a half months, so while there is a bit of randomness in Giroud’s sudden streak it likely hasn’t come without improvements from the player and mitigating factors helping him do better.
There are a few such factors. For a start he hasn’t been overworked as much as he was last season. Giroud is physically very impressive and has very rarely fallen foul to injuries in the past, but playing twice a week consistently takes it’s toll on everyone. As the only reliable centre forward option last season Giroud was played into the ground, playing all bar three of the clubs Premier League and Champions League games. An early season scoring streak evaporated in the Autumn and by the winter and spring he was a shadow of the player he was when he started the season. His only real boost in form came after Yaya Sanogo had played a couple of games in a row. In total he played 59 times, in a period of just 9 months, equating to a game every four and a half days.
This season has been different. A three month layoff, a three game suspension for a head butt and not being registered for two CL group games has meant Giroud has had enforced layoffs to help keep him fresh. Arsenal have also had greater options with Welbeck and Alexis Sanchez around, meaning Giroud hasn’t always been relied upon to start, and has come off the bench against Southampton, Leicester and Man United in the cup. He’s visibly looked more impressive as a result, changing the game against Southampton, and putting one of his best performances of the season against West Ham a week after Welbeck was chosen upfront ahead of him against United.
Of course, the competition for places also helps in motivating players. Some of Giroud’s best periods of form have followed after a challenger has put a case for the centre forward spot, Walcott two years ago, the summer bids for Higuain and Suarez, Sanogo last year and Welbeck this one.
Another is the improvement from set pieces. Giroud has scored five goals from corners and free kicks this season, which may not sound remarkable but it more than doubles his tally for the entirety of last season of two. There may be some individual improvements on Giroud’s behalf in this case, but it also follows the fact that Arsenal as a side have improved remarkably on set pieces this season. They’ve been a long term issue for Arsenal and they scored just five goals in the league last season from them, but they’ve already scored 7 in the league this season, which makes them 8th best this season, and five of them have been since January. It’s clearly something they’ve worked on and Giroud has reaped the benefits.
Another factor that has likely helped is the pace and movement in the side this season compared to last season. At times last year Arsenal’s frontline was completely devoid of any real pace, but with Alexis, Welbeck, Walcott, Chamberlain and Bellerin around that’s far less of an issue this season. This means the team can get towards the byline and offer cutbacks to Giroud and allows more space for him to play with the threat of people running in behind. One only has to look at the two goals Giroud scored v Newcastle at home to see the benefits, for each goal Alexis and Bellerin got in behind the defence and crossed to Giroud for a goal from near the byline.
In total 11 of the 13 goals Giroud has scored, and both of his FA Cup goals, in the league this season have been first touch finishes. This emphasises the impact Giroud has had from set pieces and crosses, both in the air and with near post finishes.
There are still doubts whether Giroud is good enough to be the main man for a potential title challenge next season, but he deserves a lot of credit for even making it a potential debate given the situation a mere several months ago. He’s performed better than anyone could’ve realistically hoped.
Oscar Wood
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