How Arsenal target Gabriel compares to Arteta's current defensive options
Everton must have believed they had the edge on their Premier League rivals in the race for Gabriel when his name began to don the gossip columns a few months ago. The Toffees have been courting the Brazilian for some time following an impressive campaign for Lille where he really made a starting spot his own, albeit in a season cut short due to the Coronavirus pandemic.
He isn't the first gem that Lille have unearthed and he certainly won't be the last, but Gabriel looks set to be the next high-profile departure from the Stade Pierre Mauroy. Victor Osimhen completed his move to Napoli last week, and in the days since, speculation has been rife that Gabriel will depart for Ligue 1 side, albeit for England.
Everton, though, won't be the only side in the running for the 22-year-old. Arsenal are believed to be considering a bid for Gabriel as Mikel Arteta aims to revamp his defence. Shkodran Mustafi is available this summer, David Luiz has just one year left to run on his current deal and Sokratis has fallen out of favour at the Emirates. Arteta needs to look to the future. William Saliba has returned following his loan stint with Saint-Etienne as part of the agreement that saw the Gunners sign the youngster last summer, yet the Gunners boss believes more work is needed.
And so Gabriel is the latest player linked with a move to the Emirates Stadium. In the shortened Ligue 1 season, Lille conceded the fourth fewest goals (27) in France's top tier, with the young defender starting 23 of 28 league matches. Despite failing to start just five league games, Lille lost three of those five outings and conceded 29.6% of their total league goals in those five matches.
He is evidently a vital member of the Lille side, but the issue for Les Dogues will forever remain that, whenever they do perform well, their brightest stars get picked up by Europe's bigger clubs. Nicolas Pepe left Lille for Arsenal last summer, after all, in a club-record move. The French side are able to command high fees for their in-demand stars, which bodes well when the time comes to cash in on Gabriel, but they'll hope to start a bidding war for the defender, with Manchester United also rumoured to be monitoring the centre-back.
Standing at 6"3', Gabriel is a towering presence in defence and it's a physical quality to put to good use as he developed a statistically calculated WhoScored strength of 'aerial duels'. Indeed, Gabriel returned an aerial success rate of 64.8% in Ligue 1 last season, that better than Luiz (55.3%) and but lower than Mustafi (75.6%) and Sokratis (67.8%). However, for an Arsenal side that returned the second worst aerial success rate in the Premier League (46.1%), Gabriel is a defender who would improve this lowly figure.
Crucially still is that Gabriel is a far stronger tackler than Arsenal's most-used centre-backs in the Premier League last season. While tackling should be considered a last resort for defenders, Gabriel still made more tackles per 90 (1.8) than Luiz (0.9), Mustafi and Sokratis (1.3), and, crucially, did so with a better success rate (85.4%); Mustafi (73.9%) was his closest competitor in this metric.
A huge critique of Arsenal's current crop of centre-backs is their rashness in their bid to deny opponents the chance of scoring, and here Gabriel again shines. His 0.8 fouls committed per 90 is lower than Luiz, Sokratis and Mustafi (all 1), while the youngster didn't commit a single error leading to an opposition league goal in 2019/20, something Luiz (2) and Sokratis (1) can't claim. The Lille defender's concentration qualities belie his tender years and, coupled with his aerial success, Arsenal's weakness of 'defending set pieces' won't be so exposed with Gabriel at the back. Having been carded just three times, too, Gabriel's approach to defending is almost angelic.
Of course, at his age, Gabriel remains a diamond with rough edges that need smoothing. The young centre-back yielded a pass success rate of 82.2% in Ligue 1 last season, that better than Mustafi (81.9%), but lower than both Luiz (85.1%) and Sokratis (87.9%). For an Arsenal side that has developed a style of play of 'possession football', this is a quality that needs improvement, but at his age; Gabriel will develop accordingly with the right tutoring.
Given the way Arteta has improved the broken squad he inheritied from Unai Emery, fans can rest assured that Gabriel would come along nicely under the Spaniard's tutelage. And supposedly available for a modest £25m, he could prove an fine capture and one that has the potential to form a long-term partnership with Saliba at the heart of the Arsenal defence.
