Time for Alexandre Lacazette to show his class in new look Arsenal attack

If you are a regular follower of this column, you might recall that we have been considering calling time on Romelu Lukaku. The Manchester United striker is the player that has donned the coveted captain’s armband on most occasions for us during the course of this Fantasy Premier League season and even though he has managed to get himself on the score-sheet in 10 fixtures, the fact that he has only scored more than once on one occasion means that we have missed out on big returns.

This has inevitably led to us losing ground against the field, especially with the likes of Harry Kane, Mo Salah and Sergio Agüero recording some impressive hauls.

Going forward, we could easily plump for this illustrious trio but would that enable us to make up any of the lost headway – probably not? So, why not consider a Plan B.

We recently highlighted one area in which United’s attack has been lacking this season, so we are going to put that ‘key passes’ theory to the test and give Lukaku a stay of execution in the hope that his fortunes improve following the arrival of Alexis Sánchez. However, if we are going to adopt a differential captaincy policy between now and the end of the season, we are going to need at least one other player to call upon on a regular basis.

Injuries to Leroy Sané and Kieran Gibbs have also forced our hand a bit ahead of GW25 but the plan is to upgrade Andre Gray with a striker that we feel may be capable of registering some short-term premium returns and one player that fits the bill this week is Arsenal’s Alexandre Lacazette.

Lacazette hasn’t really exploded yet but there have been some promising signs at Arsenal of late. Shipping Sánchez out can only be good for dressing room morale and there are a number of players with plenty to prove, not to mention the imminent arrival of Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang from Borussia Dortmund.

A resurgent Jack Wilshere should be fully motivated, with a place in Gareth Southgate’s World Cup squad seemingly there for the taking, while Henrikh Mikhitaryan gets a fresh chance to shine. On top of this, Mohamed Elneny has put in a couple of strong performances of late and the likes of Aaron Ramsey and Alex Iwobi are sure to provide some stiff competition for starting spots as well.

With one free transfer carried over, Gibbs, Sané and Gray are therefore sacrificed in a -4 point hit that sees Virgil van Dijk, Alexandre Lacazette and Tom Carroll coming in.

Aubameyang is expected to complete his move before the transfer deadline, so there is surely no better time for Lacazette to step up to the plate and prove that he deserves a spot in Arsene Wenger’s new look front line.

The Gunners are in action against bottom club Swansea City on Tuesday and the Frenchman has the privilege of wearing our GW25 armband!