Owen Hargreaves thinks the whole trajectory of Eddie Nketiah’s career has ‘changed’ after his match-winning brace during Arsenal’s 3-2 win over Manchester United on Sunday.
The former Bayern Munich midfielder made reference to Luis Figo and how playing against the Real Madrid legend, and winning, set the lights off for his career that included playing for Manchester United and England.
Could that brace against one of Arsenal’s old rivals do the same for Nketiah? Well, he has certainly laid down that platform.
The World Cup was still on-going when Gabriel Jesus was injured, and whilst that news was a body blow, it allowed the club to think and make their next move before domestic football returned.
Well, Mikel Arteta put full faith in his Hale-End star, who is now repaying him with his recent performances and now it could be argued that if Jesus returns tomorrow, then he’s sitting on the bench.
Following that brace, Hargreaves feels Nketiah will now feel different when walking out with his teammates on matchdays, as he told Premier League Productions (23/01/23 at 2:15 pm).
“I think what changes the whole trajectory of his career, those two goals at the weekend,” said Hargreaves. “I remember I played against Luis Figo, in my first big game.
“I remember looking across and I was thinking ‘I am in trouble here. That’s Luis Figo’, but after the game, we won. It made me realise, you can go up against these guys and you can win. It doesn’t mean that you are a bad player.
“But you have to be able to find a way to impact the game of that magnitude. I think Eddie now will see himself in the tunnel with the boys thinking ‘I am equal now’.”
NOW IT GETS TOUGHER…
The better Nketiah gets, the more he scores, the more chances are that he is going to be a marked man, week in and week out.
He has shown some form of consistency since returning to the World Cup, it’s now a case of taking it up a few levels.
At this moment in time, it could be argued about who starts between the £100k-a-week Hale-End star (Spotrac) and Jesus, well, this is his chance to blow that conversation out of the window as the Brazil star returns from injury during the next six or so weeks.