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Declan Rice's thoughts at the end of the goalless, soulless draw against Nottingham Forest mirrored those of every Arsenal fan in the vicinity and beyond. Those in the stands couldn't hear them, nor those on their sofas. But it didn't take an expert lipreader to make out the words, “every f**king time”.
For the second time in two Premier League games, Arsenal have dropped points against sides they really should have beaten, missing the chance to now be 11 points clear of a stuttering Manchester City side. No, this is not the City of 2023 – but with Marc Guehi and Antoine Semenyo in their ranks, one would imagine that they will narrow the gap between now and May, even if it's not quite enough. They need no encouragement either way.
Yet people think in terms of positions too much. Take midfield, for example. You could say that Declan Rice and Martin Zubimendi are both “defensive midfielders”, but given how fundamentally different they are, the label of what position they play in is basically all they have in common.
The same goes for strikers. When Arsenal went into the summer looking for a striker, they were a bit more specific than looking for someone who could simply play up front. Dennis Bergkamp and Thierry Henry were both strikers; if you were to ask Arsenal fans which one they'd rather sign a regen of, there's probably only one answer.
Most frontlines consist of three parts: let's call them the killer, the machine, and the facilitator.
The killer is the most obvious player in any frontline, and in many ways, it's the toughest player to find. Surprise, surprise: it's the guy who puts the ball in the back of the net: the merciless finisher, adding full stops to moves. This is the player who offers inevitability, and often, they're the biggest ego in the team: the one who is driven purely by individual goal tallies as much as they are by three points at the end of the night.
The machine differs slightly from the killer: while the killer is predictable to a tee, the machine needs to offer the opposite. They usually have to be physically supreme, able to create and score, and though they're not often the player who gets the most goals, they'll probably have the best underlying stats in terms of their reliability in the final third.
The facilitator enables the other two. This could be someone who's there purely as a creator – or someone who's there for their work-rate and to do the dirty work for the other two. Often, it's the easiest player in any frontline to find.
Aside from a handful of examples, most front threes fit into the formula. Mohamed Salah was the killer in Liverpool's most successful attack, Sadio Mane the machine and Roberto Firmino the facilitator. For Real Madrid, Cristiano Ronaldo was the killer, Gareth Bale the machine and Karim Benzema the facilitator. At the 2002 World Cup, Ronaldo was an obvious killer alongside a machine in Rivaldo, with Ronaldinho the facilitator behind – and as a sign of a world-class attacker, the latter was capable of switching up his role, becoming the machine alongside Samuel Eto'o (killer) and Ludo Giuly (facilitator) when he lifted the 2006 Champions League against Arsenal for Barcelona.
Barça's MSN used Luis Suarez as the killer, with Neymar and Lionel Messi generational examples of a machine and a facilitator, respectively. It's not exclusive to the greatest trios of all time, either: Newcastle United followed the template to a tee with Alexander Isak the killer, Anthony Gordon the machine and Jacob Murphy as the facilitator. Tottenham Hotspur beat Arsenal to Champions League qualification in 2022 with Son Heung-min in the killer role, Harry Kane as the machine (those two are fairly interchangeable: hence their long-term success), and a more creative spark of Dejan Kulusevski as the facilitator. It's not limited to front threes, either: Arsene Wenger's 4-4-2 relied on Henry as the killer, alongside Bergkamp as a facilitator, with Freddie Ljungberg usually the most attack-minded and machine-like of the flat midfield four.
Mikel Arteta's first proper attack for Arsenal had Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang (killer), Nicolas Pepe (machine) and Alexandre Lacazette (facilitator). Now, he's fighting Pep Guardiola's Erling Haaland (killer), Jeremy Doku (machine) and Rayan Cherki (facilitator). Which brings us on to Arsenal's current frontline woes. Bukayo Saka is quite obviously a machine. Kai Havertz, whatever you think of him, has been a superb facilitator up front for the Gunners, playing a hybrid false nine/target man role to bring others into play.
They needed to sign a killer. Viktor Gyokeres has not been that.
That sounds like an insult to the Swede's Premier League performances thus far in a red-and-white shirt. It's really not, though: regardless of how Gyokeres has performed against the expectations he had when he arrived, the Gunners have won more games with him than without him, and though he's only scored three goals from open play in 17 starts all season, it's hard to argue that the team around him haven't been performing.
The problem isn't specifically that Gyokeres has been poor. It's that Arsenal signed the 27-year-old because they needed a killer. It turns out that they've signed another facilitator.
It's a problem that's dogged Arteta since Aubameyang left the club. He hasn't had an out-and-out killer in his frontline since the Gabonese goal-getter left the club: Leandro Trossard has stepped up to the plate a few times for a purple patch or two, while Gabriel Martinelli has threatened to be that guy without truly kicking on. Both are better suited to the machine role from the left-wing – even the facilitator role, perhaps, given the former's creativity and the latter's selflessness.
And it's an accusation that Pep Guardiola had to deal with for the longest time. Given that a ‘killer’ is often associated with having an ego, it's been levelled at the Catalan that he's rather reluctant to work with that kind of player following the public fallout with Zlatan Ibrahimovic – yet building attacks around Robert Lewandowski and Sergio Aguero certainly suggest otherwise. Arteta, too, has moved big characters on, and looked to more selfless centre-forwards like Havertz, Gabriel Jesus and even Mikel Merino.
It might be something that comes to define this Arsenal team. They are the most complete side in every aspect in the Premier League right now, with full-backs capable of switching roles depending on the task at hand, a midfield trio who can take on each other's jobs at will, and the ability to dominate in possession or soak up pressure in a low block without too much of a problem.
Sometimes, though, you need a killer to get you over the line. Guardiola found it in the Champions League, constantly getting close to the promised land before eventually signing Haaland. Jurgen Klopp completed his side when he realised that he needed a killer out on the right wing to complement the moving parts he already had in the frontline. Jose Mourinho has made a career out of asking one player in a trio to live up to their bastardry and another to be the sacrificial lamb.
And given that Jesus, Trossard and Martinelli will all have a year left on their respective contracts this summer – with Havertz having two years – we're probably set for another few months of the “Arsenal need a striker” merry-go-round yet. Assuming that Gyokeres won't be tapping out after 12 months, it'll probably be an upgrade at left-wing – and it almost certainly has to be someone who will deliver the output that neither Havertz, Jesus, nor Gyokeres have been able to in front of goal.
Because if Arsenal are to win the league, they need to squeeze a killer from somewhere. It might prove to be the biggest test of Arteta's coaching career yet to find one to turn this side into a superteam.
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