Micah Richards names the three Arsenal players who have seriously underperformed this season

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Arsenal have had a lot of problems since the start of the 2024/25 season.

Injuries have been a big issue so far – Mikel Arteta hasn’t had a fully fit squad available at his disposal for any game this campaign.

To make things worse, a few terrible refereeing decisions have gone against the Gunners, costing them points in the Premier League this season.

The biggest problem of all, however, is the form of some of their players – three of them need to step up and deliver in the final months of the campaign.

Micah Richards says Gabriel Martinelli and two other Arsenal players have underperformed this season

Arsenal’s attack has come under a lot of criticism recently.

The Gunners create plenty of chances every game through Martin Odegaard and others, but their attackers have failed to convert a lot of them.

Bukayo Saka’s unavailability has made things worse for Arsenal in the final third. That has led to people saying that they have become overly reliant on set-pieces.

Micah Richards, who watches Arsenal regularly, has claimed that three players have not done enough this season – Gabriel Martinelli, Leandro Trossard and Raheem Sterling.

He said on the Rest is Football podcast: “Martinelli, I think, when Arsenal play, they go down the right-hand side and Saka does something special and they double up and you’ve got Odegaard to come back in the number 10 role and then spray it out to the other side.

“But, Trossard has not been playing amazing well this season. Martinelli has been off it. They brought in Sterling, but he has not hit the heights we all expected.

“So, I just think they’ve become too predictable at times, too reliant on set pieces. And I think they need a different option up front, just to stretch attacks, something a little bit different.

“I don’t know if it’s, I won’t say it’s lack of belief, but there’s something in it when you’re going into the game with Arsenal where you’re thinking, ‘they’ve got all the tools, but they just don’t manage to get over the line in the way you expect’.

“But I think in January if they get a striker, it could all change.”

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Mikel Arteta’s system is partly responsible for Martinelli and Trossard’s struggles

Martinelli, Trossard and Sterling should all be performing a lot better than they have done this season. Some of their performances have been really disappointing.

However, Arteta deserves some blame too.

On the left flank, Arsenal just don’t move the ball quickly enough. More often than not, the likes of Martinelli, and Trossard are ignored when they are free and only receive the ball when they have one or two defenders in front of them.

That makes their life so much harder, and the fact that they don’t have someone like Odegaard to help out as he does on the opposite side increases their struggles.

It’s easier said than done, but Arteta has to find a way to make the left side of Arsenal’s attack as fluid as the right. Once that happens, the Gunners will dominate the league.