Arsenal have gone and spent £52m to secure the signing of Noni Madueke from Chelsea.
On the surface, it looks like a very expensive backup signing, considering the Gunners already have one of the best right-wingers in the world in Bukayo Saka.
However, there is more underneath the surface with Noni Madueke style of play and his fit with Arsenal, rather than simply being Bukayo Saka’s backup.
He was brilliant for the Blues this past season, starting 27 matches in the Premier League and being second on the team behind only Cole Palmer in terms of xG + xA per 90 minutes.
Arsenal have finished second in the Premier League three straight seasons and need to bolster their squad to challenge with the likes of Liverpool, Manchester City, and Chelsea.
Arsenal spent big this summer, bringing in Martín Zubimendi, Viktor Gyökeres, Christian Nørgaard, and Cristhian Mosquera.
Noni Madueke is undoubtedly one of the best young English talents on the wing, and has said before that he moulds his game after his new teammate, Bukayo Saka.
He started his career in the Netherlands, starring for PSV Eindhoven.
At just 22 years old, he had already played in over 100 matches at the club level and had even recently featured for England this summer during FIFA World Cup qualifiers.
In this player analysis and scout report, we will examine whether Noni Madueke is merely a backup option to Saka, or whether Mikel Arteta and Arsenal have different plans for him.
Noni Madueke Ball Progression & Dribbling
Just how good is Noni Madueke?
Well, if you want a winger who can drive right at defenders and dribble right past them, you will not find many better than Noni Madueke.
The 22 year old was second in the Premier League last season behind Jérémy Doku in progressive carries and ranks incredibly high in every dribbling metric.
Noni Madueke Radar Chart 2024/2025
He loves to receive the ball on his natural left foot and beat defenders inside to create his own scoring opportunities.
Last season, he averaged 3.54 shots per 90 minutes, which was the fourth-highest in the Premier League.
The other crazy thing about Madueke is that even though he takes on and dribbles by defenders at a high rate, he hardly ever gets fouled.
He only averaged 1.1 fouls drawn per 90 minutes, while Saka drew almost double the amount of fouls.
That tells me he’s not looking to go down and is also really good at “actually” blowing by defenders to get into space.
Even though he takes a high number of shots, not all of them come from outside the box, where there is a low percentage chance they will go in.
His average shot distance was 14.4 yards, which was actually shorter than the likes of both Alexander Isak and Mohamed Salah.
He scored seven goals in the Premier League off of 9.6 xG, indicating he should have scored a few more goals than he did.
As we will look at below, he’s not simply a backup option for Bukayo Saka, but it is nice to have a player of his skill set available to replace Saka in case of injury.
If we go back to last season, Saka was injured for most of the second half of the campaign, and Arsenal were forced to play an ageing Raheem Sterling or Ethan Nwaneri out of position, which simply didn’t work.
Just how important was Saka to Arsenal’s offence?
In the 15 matches they played without him between the Premier League and UEFA Champions League, the Gunners averaged 1.47 xG per 90 minutes.
In all of the other matches with Saka in the lineup, they averaged 1.75 xG per 90 minutes.
Now that Arsenal has a replacement at Noni Madueke’s level, they won’t be in the same position they were last season.
Can Noni Madueke Play On The Left?
If you look at Noni Madueke’s heat map below, you’ll see that he spent the majority of the time down the right flank last season.
Towards the end of the campaign, Enzo Maresca moved him to left wing because Pedro Neto was better utilised playing on the right.
Madueke is not a one-trick pony who only dribbles inside to shoot with his left foot.
He has shown numerous times that he can shoot with power from both feet and is perfectly comfortable dribbling past defenders on the left.
Look at this example against Everton towards the end of last term.
He burns the left back, cuts inside, and fires a powerful shot to the bottom right corner, forcing Jordan Pickford into a difficult save that won Chelsea a corner.
He won’t be a regular starter on the left for Arsenal.
Still, he provides another option for Mikel Arteta, someone who combines the strengths of Gabriel Martinelli (beating defenders off the dribble) and Leandro Trossard (shooting and scoring goals), which they excel at individually.
He played in six matches on the left wing last season, and when you compare his numbers on a per-90 basis to what he put up on the right wing, there really isn’t much of a difference.
|
Category (per 90) |
Right Wing |
Left Wing |
|
Touches in Penalty Area |
8.46 | 6.10 |
|
Carries into Penalty Area |
3.90 |
4.19 |
|
Progressive Carries |
6.99 |
6.67 |
| Successful Take-Ons | 1.95 |
2.67 |
Can Noni Madueke & Bukayo Saka Play Together?
The natural answer to this question is no, because they are both naturally right-wingers.
However, Noni Madueke did start a few matches last season at left wing and can certainly fill in for Martinelli if needed.
The question is, though, could they both play on the right side together?
There is a way that can happen.
Last season, Arsenal faced teams sitting in low blocks so many times that they couldn’t play through the middle.
The solution was to funnel the ball to Saka’s side of the pitch, trying to overload the opponent out wide, and create chances from there.
Arteta is naturally a conservative manager.
If Arsenal lose the ball out wide, it will be more difficult for teams to hit them quickly in transition than if they lose the ball centrally.
There were a few instances where Bukayo Saka inverted from his natural right-wing position into the half-space, such as in this situation against PSG when Arsenal were trying to break down their low block.
You can see from Saka’s radar that if you take all of the essential data to an inverted winger, he’s one of the best in the world.
Bukayo Saka Radar Chart 2024/2025
Even though Saka is one of the best right-wingers in the world, he is constantly double-teamed every time he touches the ball.
If you invert him into the right half-space and have him play Martin Ødegaard’s position, that frees up Madueke to play naturally on the right wing, where he can take defenders on 1-v-1 with a lot of freedom because of the attention Saka will get.
Martin Ødegaard is one of the best creators in the Premier League, but he’s not looking elite when it comes to getting his own shot.
When Arsenal are in desperate situations where teams are sitting really deep against them and the Gunners need a goal, utilising Saka in Ødegaard’s role in the right half-space and bringing on Madueke to play on the right wing gives Arsenal numerous options now to break down opposing low blocks that they didn’t have last season.
Conclusion
On the surface, I am sure many Arsenal fans will be puzzled by this signing because his primary position is the same as that of Bukayo Saka.
He won’t supplant Saka on the right wing, but he will provide Arsenal with another level of versatility.
Arsenal’s biggest issue last season offensively was breaking down low blocks because they were too reliant on Saka to be their main goalscoring threat.
They lacked another forward who could beat defenders and create their own shots.
He likely won’t repeat his shot numbers from last season at Chelsea since Saka is Arsenal’s main shot-taker, and the Gunners just signed Viktor Gyökeres.
You likely won’t see Madueke inserted into the starting XI right away, but he will be used in several different positions and could see more minutes as the season goes on.
I honestly believe that Noni Madueke’s long-term plan is to eventually replace Gabriel Martinelli on the left wing.
His preference is to play on the right, but he provides way more production in front of goal than Martinelli does.
The signing of Madueke continues Arsenal’s trajectory of having versatile players who can play multiple positions.
This gives Mikel Arteta maximum tactical versatility, making the Gunners one of the most challenging teams to prepare for in the Premier League.
