The former Manchester United player Paul Scholes believes that Mesut Özil took the “easy option” by opting to join Arsenal from Real Madrid
Özil move to Arsenal in the summer of 2013 for a club record fee and has since gone on to win an FA Cup with the club and a World Cup with Germany. However, Scholes was critical of the midfielder saying that he has underperformed since his transfer and that he often looks disinterested, although he added that Özil has been hampered by the lack of leadership on the pitch.
“Over the years, the big players who were really ambitious – [Patrick] Vieira, Thierry Henry, Cesc Fàbregas, Robin van Persie – have all left,” wrote Scholes in the Independent. “They left for the simple reason that Arsenal are not in it to win league titles any more.
“Those players have realised that if they want to win championships then they have to move elsewhere. It’s why I think Mesut Özil took the easy option joining Arsenal. Since he has been there you cannot doubt his quality but at times he looks like he is going through the motions, however much ground he covers.”
“He needs a leader around him to get him going. At Real Madrid he had a chance of winning league titles. At Arsenal that is not on the cards.”
In his Friday press conference, the Arsenal manager, Arsène Wenger responded to Scholes’ claims by saying that “Scholes would have loved to have played with a player like Mesut Özil.” Wenger added: “[Özil] has the quality and he works a lot harder than his style of play shows.”
In his column, Scholes also said that he would like to manage Oldham, the club he supported as a child, at some stage in the future but he feels that the timing is wrong for him to assume the current managerial vacancy at the club.
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