To Keep or Not To Keep Part 1: Theo Walcott

Afternoon all,

Despite the intense speculation regarding imminent transfers, medicals and the like, it is fair to say there is not an awful lot going on in the goonerverse. So much so that every “news story” seems to be a rehash of the same old speculation repackaged with interest inducing headings.

What I hope will be a better read and certainly serve more purpose is to start a mini-series focussing on a number of players who seem to split opinion amongst football fans. Hopefully over the course of the week or so I can give a balanced (can be hard for me) account of strengths, weaknesses and more importantly; if they can play an important part in the coming season. There are a number of players that seem to divide opinion in the Arsenal squad not least of all, the apparent “deadwood” we have in Bendtner, Park, Arshavin, Djourou, Squillaci and of course Chamakh. In addition there are many more that divide opinion despite their undoubted ability/potential in the form of; Ramsey, Gibbs, Diaby and even Gervinho.

However our first point of call today is someone that splits opinion the most Theo Walcott. His performances vary from the sublime to the ridiculous and with only a year left on his contract, with contract talks apparently stalling, many wonder whether he is worth keeping on.

Theo Walcott signed as a 16 year old with bags of potential and pace to frighten even the most veteran of defenders. He came with not only huge potential but unsurpassed expectations which were further increased by his selection for the 2006 world cup squad despite still not having played for Arsenal. Without a single appearance in the competition some already began to doubt the young forward.

However following the difficult summer, Theo finally made his Arsenal debut and though his talent was clearly raw, his blistering pace meant that he had an immediate impact creating an assist to save a seemingly lost game against Aston Villa. I have created a table detailing his Arsenal appearances, goals and assists to give some indication of his impact on the team.

		Appearances	Goals	Assists	Goals Contributed	Games per G.C
Arsenal	2006–07	32	1	7	8	4
	2007–08	39	7	5	12	3.3
	2008–09	35	6	4	10	3.5
	2009–10	30	4	2	6	5
	2010–11	38	13	9	22	1.7
	2011–12	46	11	13	24	1.9
	Total	220	42	40	82	40

As you can see from the about table, aside from a little dip in the 2009-2010 season Walcott has been on a general rise in productivity. He in the last couple of seasons, has contributed 20+ goals through assists and goals at a rate of under goal/assist per 2 games. This certainly isn’t bad but by the same token is not world class. In perspective to the Arsenal team though, this represents the most prolific return outside of Robin Van Persie.

According to EPLindex.com he took a total of 58 shots and scored 11, he completed 665 passes out of an attempted 839 which represents a pass completion rate of 79% and created 33 goal scoring chances. These are all fairly decent numbers on the surface but certainly have significant room for improvement. I suppose the most important statistics are his goals and assists which are combined second highest at the club behind Robin Van Persie suggesting he is very important to the team.

Player	Apps	Minutes played	Assists	Assists Per Match	Assists Per Minute
Song	34	2999	11	0.32	0.004
Walcott	35	2747	8	0.23	0.003
Gervinho	19	1685	6	0.32	0.004
Rosicky	28	1759	4	0.14	0.002
Ramsey	34	2465	4	0.12	0.002
Arteta	29	2475	2	0.07	0.001

As you can from the above table on Assists in the Premier League, Walcott certainly played an important role in the goal scoring department whether it through goals or assists.

When you delve a little deeper though and look at his overall game, something which has been criticised you can see there may be some reason behind the criticism.

Player	Apps	Minutes played	Attempted Passes	Passes Completed	Pass completion	Passes completed per minute
Arteta	29	2475	2229	2023	91%	0.82
Ramsey	34	2465	1925	1681	87%	0.68
Rosicky	28	1759	1275	1087	85%	0.62
Gervinho	19	1685	615	521	85%	0.31
Song	34	2999	2248	1895	84%	0.63
Walcott	35	2747	839	665	79%	0.24

As you can see in terms of pass completion he is far lower than the rest of the team at just 79% averaging just 0.24 passes per minute. This suggests that he can go missing for large portions of the match and despite playing 2747 minutes only attempted 839 passes. Of course his role is not centered around passing and you would expect him to have a lower completion rate than Arteta/Song/Ramsey given he plays higher up the pitch. This is somewhat corroborated by Gervinho’s similarly low numbers in this regard. Even so, it is clear that he could and should do better, especially in a team that needs to retain possession to assert it’s authority on the match.

Player	Apps	Minutes played	Chances Created	Chances Per Match	Chances Per Minute
Arteta	29	2475	58	2	0.023
Ramsey	34	2465	51	1.50	0.021
Rosicky	28	1759	37	1.32	0.021
Song	34	2999	35	1.03	0.012
Walcott	35	2747	33	0.94	0.012
Gervinho	19	1685	30	1.58	0.018

Again you can see that when it comes to chances created Theo Wacott lags behind the competition on the whole. 33 chances created, though respectable is far lower than the 58 by Mikel Arteta, especially when you consider the “Chances per match” column. His is the lowest and again this is an area there is plenty of room for improvement.

Despite the negatives, and believe me I am not blind to them, Theo is clearly a player that has the ability to cause problems and more importantly create goals. He was our second highest scorer and second highest assist maker in all competitions. For this alone combined with his age of 23, I would say he is worth persisting with and securing into the long term. There are not many 23 year olds around the world with the level of experience, goals and assists as Walcott and at the age of 23, it would seem criminal not to see him into the peak years of his career given the level of support we have given him in his career.

Also as a side note, I am more then aware of the pitfalls of statistics so from a personal point of view regarding his ability I would say there is much to be desired. I think he is technically one of the weakest players in the squad and does sometimes struggle to get involved with the game. This highlights his importance even more in a perverse way, showing that despite his lack of (relative to peers) skill, he is still able to be an effective player capable of a moment that can change the match.

I say he’s a keeper.

Let me know your thoughts below.

GoonerVerse.