You stay underrating the systemic problems of this team. Its weird too because you want Wenger out.
It doesn't work like that. Just because I want Wenger out doesn't mean accountability goes out the window. I've been saying the same thing to NQ on another thread. We have systematic problems; that's well known on here, but that doesn't mean every fault gets swept under Wenger's door. I don't care if the the decided to play Sanchez as wingback, regardless of how alien that position is to him, I don't expect to see his work rate drop, his first touch disappear, his dribbling skills going out the window and so on. He may be horrible at defending because he's playing in a terrible system, but the core of his abilities will still shine through regardless of where he plays. I'm not seeing that with Xhaka.

At the very least, we should be bossing the midfield, especially against a team like Preston. No excuses. Even if we can't make great use of his playmaking ability because he's not getting the ball where he likes it, his chance creation stat should suffer at best, not his first touch and passing accuracy of all things. I'd expect plenty of midfield dominance and possession without much bite like we're used to seeing. That's not the case these days. We can't even control a midfield and it's been this way since losing Cesc and Nasri. That Ramsey, Wilshere, Arteta axis was the start of a disaster where we had serious problems just stringing together an attack.

In fact, didn't you say Xhaka would be an upgrade on Arteta? It's not as if he's being told to do something drastically different from Arteta. We weren't playing with Coquelin in the midfield so you can't put the blame on his limitations either. I'm just not seeing the point in this signing and it's down to Xhaka to sort his game out. I'm not for switching to a system that plays to his ability as playmaker when we bought Ozil for that role. You already know my thoughts on him and I find it crazy that after all the protests about him being the best number 10 in the world, the chances he creates..etc..I'm seeing blogs suggesting we turn him into a forward. Such tinkering ideas is why I created that Ozil thread in the first place. How many playmakers do we need in this team? Heck, I honestly think Alexis's goal and creative output trumps them all and we should be building off that if anything.