Recalling the nascent stages of Bukayo Saka’s senior career at Arsenal, the young star has remarkably named Mesut Ozil as the best teammate he has ever had. This choice is particularly striking as it overlooks a plethora of other gifted players, instead favoring a figure who remains controversial in The Gunners’ history.
Saka’s inaugural start for Arsenal unfolded in December 2018, where he featured alongside Ozil. He was deployed on the left wing in The Gunners’ starting XI for their Europa League clash against Qarabag FK. At just 17 years old, Saka was crowned Man of the Match in that memorable fixture, a game ultimately decided by the German playmaker’s assist for the solitary goal.
Nearly seven years on, Saka has firmly established himself as a pivotal first-team player for Arsenal. Ozil, however, departed North London long ago amidst a series of highly publicized controversies. When prompted by BBC Radio 5 Live to name his best teammate, Saka lauded the slender attacking midfielder, stating, “Mesut Ozil is a high-quality player. It was a pleasure to play with him [at Arsenal] and a joy to watch him [at Real Madrid].”
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The former Real Madrid midfielder made the majority of his 17 appearances alongside Saka during the first half of the 2019/2020 season, before the COVID-19 pandemic brought global football to a standstill. When the Premier League eventually relaunched with “Project Restart,” allowing matches to resume in empty stadiums, Ozil was conspicuously absent from Mikel Arteta’s Arsenal squad.
The precise reasons behind this dramatic shift in his standing remain shrouded in ambiguity. The Gelsenkirchen-born footballer had previously courted controversy with several politically charged statements. As the highest-paid player at the Emirates Stadium, Ozil was reportedly among a small group of players who initially refused a pay cut at the height of the pandemic. However, his manager vehemently insisted that this was not the cause of his surprising departure from North London.
“Honestly, I take full responsibility. I have to be the one to get the best out of the players. That’s my responsibility. It has nothing to do with any behaviour or, like, a pay cut,” Arteta asserted after omitting Ozil from the squad for the 2020/2021 season.
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The playmaker, now 37, did not take his exclusion lightly, publicly criticizing various club decisions from the sidelines before ultimately joining Fenerbahce on a free transfer in January 2021. While Saka holds Ozil in high regard, some of his current teammates might point to different metrics. For instance, despite playing over 3,000 fewer minutes, Martin Odegaard has already accumulated more Premier League goals than Ozil ever managed for the club.
