Time Has Come for Theo Walcott to Deliver or Be Sold by Arsenal

There has been so much fallout from Arsenal’s opening-weekend defeat to Liverpool that the performance of Theo Walcott has passed largely without discussion. However, his time on the field was an intriguing microcosm of his career to date; there were flashes of promise as well as moments of desperate underachievement. This is a massive season for Walcott—can he finally deliver and justify Arsene Wenger’s huge faith in his talent?

We saw the good and the bad of Walcott against Liverpool. He missed a penalty, scored a well-taken goal and then faded into obscurity. He must acknowledge the need to be more consistent, both within games and across the course of a campaign.

If you’d told Arsenal fans at the back end of last season that Walcott would start the first game of 2016/17, they would have been surprised. After barely figuring in the final few months of the campaign, Walcott was linked with a move away from north London—James Olley of the Evening Standard, for example, named him as a transfer target for West Ham. After a decade at the Emirates Stadium, it seemed as if Walcott had grown stale at Arsenal. His omission from England’s Euro 2016 squad seemed symptomatic of his decline.

However, 2016/17 has arrived, and Walcott remains an important part of the squad. There are a couple of factors that may have influenced that, the first being Danny Welbeck’s long-term knee injury. With Welbeck likely to miss the first half of the season, the Gunners will miss his pace and versatility in attack. Although Walcott was disappointing in 2015/16, those are at least attributes he can offer.

Things might have been different had Arsenal been successful in their bid for Jamie Vardy. Wenger triggered the Leicester City man’s release clause prior to the Euros, but the pacy striker chose to remain with the English champions instead. Had Vardy arrived, it’s possible Walcott might have been deemed surplus to requirements. With the Gunners—frustratingly, as far as the fans are concerned—still awaiting an attacking signing, he remains an important squad member.

Almost as surprising as Walcott starting was the position where he was deployed. After spending most of last season operating through the middle, granted a long-awaited opportunity as a central striker, …

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