Arsenal: Martinez may make life hard for Bernd Leno’s return
By Kian Long
The Arsenal goalkeeper conundrum is one they won’t mind having.
Arsenal fans won’t mind having one excellent goalkeeper, let alone having two. If the obviously unfortunate Bernd Leno injury has taught them one thing, it’s that Emiliano Martinez can be just as good.
Truth be told, despite the Argentine goalkeeper being at the club for what feels like ten decades, I myself had not known much about him. I always knew he was good, but I was hesitant about having him as the first-choice goalkeeper.
But he’s proven that time and hard work can pay off, as he has always been adamant that he would be Arsenal’s first-choice goalkeeper, despite playing behind the likes of Wojciech Szczesny, Lukasz Fabianski, Petr Cech, David Ospina and of course Bernd Leno.
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Martinez has been surprisingly good and, in all honesty, I think he is one of the goalkeepers in the best form in the Premier League since project restart. He went on a run of clean sheets, before Jami Vardy, unfortunately, broke that spell in the 1-1 draw, but even conceding this wasn’t his fault in the slightest.
So, it will make things more difficult for Leno to come back than he would like. Am I saying that he won’t make the starting XI again? Of course not, that would be ludicrous. Leno is still our first-choice goalkeeper, but if Martinez keeps up his amazing form (which would be great), then Leno may have to work hard to justify booting Martinez back out of the starting XI.
Of course, this is an excellent conundrum to be facing. It counteracts the centre-back problem quite nicely, since this summer Arsenal can focus their attention on signing a centre-back rather than a goalkeeper. It’s just nice to have some solidarity in at least one position.
Next. How Arsenal could lineup next season. dark
What do you make of Emiliano Martinez’s performances of late?