The simple reason why Viktor Gyökeres is struggling for Arsenal

Viktor Gyökeres has not lived up to the hype so far in an Arsenal jersey. He's scored three goals in his opening six games, which isn't a disastrous tally by any stretch of the imagination. However, more would have been ideal, given the task he's asked to fulfil, and the teams Arsenal has played.

Arsenal has already faced UCL sides Liverpool, Man City and Newcastle in the Premier League. Gyökeres has scored zero goals against those teams.

So, this is why there's a spotlight on Gyökeres' head right now. It's not because he can't score, it's because he can't score against big teams. But why?

The simple reason why Viktor Gyökeres is struggling for Arsenal

Against big teams, Arsenal still has imposter syndrome. Despite their magnificent record against the big six in recent times, Arsenal still approaches these games in a negative manner. Rather than brilliance maixmization, they resort to damage limitation.

It cost them against Liverpool, and it cost them against Man City. Thankfully, they fixed up in the second half against Newcastle and actually played like potential champions.

Arsenal's mentality is harming Viktor Gyökeres. It's for this reason that the Swedish striker is struggling, because of the ripple effect from the manager down to the players.

Playing reserved, negative football does not benefit the center forward in any conceivable way. It actually goes against their best interests, so it's quite bizarre that Gyökeres is made the center of attention for a game plan he cannot control. If he went against what the manager suggests, then all hell would break loose.

We saw Viktor Gyökeres see out the entire match at St James Park yesterday, which is a sign of trust from Mikel Arteta. It's also a sign that more is to come from Gyökeres, which nobody can deny is needed.

Now that Arsenal have their first impressive result of the season under their belt, they should get their confidence back. With a good run of fixtures coming up, Arsenal will adopt a more dominant and confident approach, which leads to more chances for Gyökeres.

It's a boring answer. We wish we had more to give you, truly. But if we're being completely frank, the simple reason why Viktor Gyökeres is struggling is that the team he plays for struggles to see that they are capable of dominating big games.

Let's all hope that changes, and that it changes fast.

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