Former Arsenal star Charlie Nicholas has criticised caretaker manager Freddie Ljungberg and a number of the players he selected to play against Norwich at the weekend.
The Gunners sacked Unai Emery last week and have placed Ljungberg in charge on a temporary basis, but the Swedish coach didn’t get off to the most convincing start with the club.
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Arsenal looked suspect in a number of areas as they dropped more points at Carrow Road, and Nicholas has singled out five particularly poor players who he thinks shouldn’t be making Ljungberg’s XI.
The Scot, writing for Sky Sports, slammed Granit Xhaka, David Luiz, Sokratis Papastathopoulos, Shkodran Mustafi and Calum Chambers, though it’s worth noting that Sokratis wasn’t actually in the starting line up.
Still, it’s clear Ljungberg lacks options at Arsenal and Nicholas questioned why he decided to give more chances to flops such as Xhaka and Mustafi after their total lack of impact in the last few years.
“They had a bit more spike about them at the weekend but Freddie, why are you picking Shkodran Mustafi?” Nicholas said.
“When are you going to learn about Calum Chambers? I also cannot understand how David Luiz is in the team. He just doesn’t want to run. He is only interested when he gets the ball at his feet.
“Sokratis Papastathopoulos is a shocker and Mustafi is even worse. Granit Xhaka also cannot run.”
It seems pretty clear that Ljungberg or whoever comes next at AFC is going to struggle with this squad of players.