Arsenal signed Nicolas Pepe in the summer of 2019, for a record fee of £72m, and a lot of fanfare. The Cote d’Ivoire international has played 87 games since joining Arsenal, getting a total of 35 goals and assists across all competitions. So why has his time in London felt like someone who’s still adapting to football in England?
Pepe joined Arsenal at one of the most tumultuous times in the club’s history. With Arsene Wenger departing in the summer of 2018, the club went through a huge transition. Losing the head coach, team manager, and DOF in one go meant that there needed to be a business transformation across the breadth of football operations.
Switching to a European Model, the club appointed Raul Sanllehi and Sven Mislintat who alongside Gazidis would be responsible for all football-related decisions including transfers, while the head coach would then just shoulder the responsibility of preparing the first team for matches.
Arsenal have since then abandoned the model within 2 short years and gone back to having Mikel Arteta as the manager with a lot more responsibilities and power in decisions beyond coaching. This lack of vision was exemplified when the head coach at the time requested the signing of Wilfried Zaha but the DOF Raul Sanllehi used his contacts to bring in Pepe, not to mention overpaying for the player.
This meant that Pepe went into a team with a manager who probably didn’t trust him, with the added weight of adjusting to the different style and physicality of the Premier League. He has shown flashes of brilliance and his output has been good for someone who doesn’t play regularly, but there is a lingering doubt whether he’s suited to the football the club wants to play.
Tactics and Team State:
For the purposes of this article, we will look at Pepe’s time mostly under Mikel Arteta as Unai Emery lasted less than 6 months into the 2019/20 season.
Under Mikel, Pepe has started 15 games, featuring in a total of 28 games so far. He’s been used both on the left and right-wing, the majority of his games coming from the right. Before we look deeper into his role, let’s talk about the main aim with the initial 3-4-3 system deployed by Arteta. The system was designed to provide 3 defenders at the back due to our well-known frailties defensively, while also making up for the lack of technical players who can progress and receive through the central channels.
The idea was to progress through the wings and get the opposite side winger into a 1v1 with the fullback. In particular, Tierney would stretch play on the left, as Arsenal would look to build up through Xhaka and try to isolate Pepe on the opposite wing.
It worked very well against teams who looked to attack us and gave up space – while we failed to create anything when we came across sides who were happy to sit deep and defend. As the system got stale, and our lack of a #10 or #8 playing between the lines got exposed, Pepe would move wider to the touchline to receive the ball or drop deeper into the half-space.
Here’s a heat-map of his pass receptions in the Premier League so far – notice the lack of passes received higher up in wide positions or inside the half-space.
While moving to the 4-2-3-1 system has alleviated some issues, the principles during build-up play remain the same. It’s no wonder his best performances have come in games in the FA Cup, especially the semi-final and final last season, and the Europa League.
Pepe has scored 6 goals in the Europa League this season from a npxG (Non – Penalty expected Goals) of 2.8 while also providing 4 assists. It’s clear that when teams allow him a little more space, he can produce the goods.
Another reason and a consequence of the system is that the right-back was required to invert during the build-up to allow Tierney to push really high up and provide cover centrally if possession is lost. This meant that Pepe’s touches came midway into the opposition half and not in the final third. Against settled defenses, when the RB isn’t overlapping it’s really hard to beat two men on the wing and put balls into the box.
The emergence of Bukayo Saka hasn’t helped him either – the teenager has looked more suitable to the right flank role required in Arteta’s positional play system, especially since the integration of Emile Smith Rowe and the signing of Martin Ødegaard. Their willingness to come short or go into space, to combine for quick one-two passes, take people on and just general application of ability means the game time has been further reduced for Pepe.
Application
Being kept out of the starting lineup and not getting regular mins is bound to hinder any sort of momentum and confidence. These issues have plagued Pepe’s season, and while there are mitigating factors to his form when you consider team state – there’s another argument to be made about how well he has applied himself this season.
His playmaking from the right and left have been wanting severely. Looking at passes into penalty area from open play there seems to be a clear dearth of quantity here. Notice the high-value zone in red around the penalty box, Pepe either doesn’t get into areas to play balls in there or chooses to not create separation with his marker to affect that.
Most of his time on the ball is spent receiving, coming inside in the right half-space, and playing it square or back. This is more evident when you look at his crossing from the wings.
Choosing to float a lot of hopeful balls to the far post from the right side, and crossing early from the left side. The success rate is usually pretty low on these sort of crosses, as is clear from the viz below. With one assist all season in the PL, there is a clear lack of application of ability here from Pepe who can offer a lot more. Compare to Saka or Martinelli, who are always willing to try things and take their man on – Pepe seems really passive when receiving the ball in wide areas.
If you look at the viz below, apart from dribbling, Pepe hasn’t actually performed that well across most metrics. The npxG looks good because of the massive gap between the top scorers in Europe this season and the rest of the bunch. His defensive output has certainly improved, for which the coach deserves credit as well.
Pepe would usually leave his right back stranded in transitions but this season he has shown a willingness to track back and cover. One clear area where he has been consistently good is his dribbling ability, which was carried over to the PL. The only problem is how often and in what areas he chooses to apply himself.
The manager doesn’t feel he’s the clear starter every week and as Arsenal look to fix the squad this summer, you have to question whether Pepe is the first name on the team sheet going into the season. His competition is going to be Bukayo Saka for the RW position and with the way the teenager has applied himself this season the manager would be hard-pressed to drop him.
Regardless, I believe the manager should persist working with him. Someone who can find the goal on a regular basis even when less involved in the team performances is a player you need to keep and work with.
How do you feel about Pepe and his time at Arsenal so far? Do you see him as a starter next season? Or he is going to be limited to cup games and as a rotation option for Saka?
Let me know in the comments below.