Darren Bent reacts to Eddie Nketiah’s display against Manchester City

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Darren Bent has lauded Eddie Nketiah for the way he has led the line for Arsenal in Gabriel Jesus’s absence, but told talkSPORT that he needed to do better up against Manchester City on Wednesday night.

Mikel Arteta’s men are facing their toughest challenge of the season after losing 3-1 at the Emirates. The Gunners have been knocked off the summit in the Premier League. And they have now won none of their last four games in all competitions.

City were able to step through the gears in the second-half. And Arsenal have been left wondering what could have been after creating the chances to win the game.

Bent disappointed with Nketiah after Arsenal loss

And no player had more attempts on goal than Nketiah, as shown by Whoscored. The 23-year-old did win the penalty which allowed Arsenal to equalise. However, he also passed up some good chances.

Those misses proved to be costly.

Of course, the game saw Haaland go on and score his 26th league goal of the campaign. And Bent suggested that the difference between the two strikers proved to be crucial.

“It’s fine margins when you look at games like that. Haaland doesn’t really have a kick all game. He gets half a chance, he sticks it away,” he told talkSPORT. “Now listen, I love Eddie Nketiah. I think he’s done really well in Gabriel Jesus’s absence. But he’s got to stick one of them chances away. In that type of game where you might not get that amount of opportunities because Manchester City are a great side, you have to stick that away.

“So that was a, I’m trying to think of the word, that was an eye-opener.”

Nketiah did amazingly well in the games following the World Cup. He certainly alleviated many of the concerns once Gabriel Jesus was sidelined while away with Brazil.

Unfortunately, Nketiah appears to have gone off the boil in front of goal of late. He has not scored in any of Arsenal’s last four games.

That is a problem for someone like the 23-year-old. He does not tick the same boxes as Jesus. The Brazilian gets involved in the build-up play and causes so many problems for his teammates to exploit.

Nketiah is more of a natural goalscorer, often putting himself in the right position to finish chances. So when he is not finding the back of the net, Arsenal do have more issues than when Jesus goes through dry spells.