Reiss Nelson is the Premier League's most clutch player - Arsenal are lucky to have him

Robin Bairner

• Updated: 4 Mar 2023 18:14 GMT
• 3 min read

Reiss Nelson has not played barely an hour and a half of Premier League football this season, but the Arsenal attacker is already threatening to be a decisive figure in the title race.

Coming off a season on loan at Feyenoord, the 23-year-old has found his opportunities at the Emirates this season restricted primarily by injury issues.

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Twice he has faced extended spell on the sidelines because of thigh issues, which have been followed by spells on the bench.

Nelson has also been a victim of the ongoing excellent of Bukayo Saka, who occupies his favoured role on the right, yet when he has called upon, he has delivered.

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Nelson delivering consistently

Never was this more apparent than in Saturday’s 3-2 victory over Bournemouth. He stepped off the bench with quarter of the match remaining, in what was a vital fixture to preserve Arsenal’s lead at the top of the table.

Within a minute, he had delivered a cross that was converted by Ben White and in the 97th minute of the match drilled home a beautiful winner to keep Mikel Arteta’s side with the momentum in the title race ahead of Manchester City.

It wasn’t the first time this season, though, that Nelson has played a decisive role off the bench for Arsenal.

Against Nottingham Forest in October, the former Hoffenheim loanee stepped off the bench with the match in the balance at 1-0 and delivered two goals to make 3-0 before setting up another in a 5-0 victory.

Nelson’s contribution this season might have been slight in terms of minutes so far, but in terms of quality, it has been tremendous.

For every 15 minutes Nelson has been on the park, he has contributed directly to a goal either via scoring or creating.

Of course, Arteta cannot hope the academy product will continue that level of production, but it must be comforting for him to know that he has such a clutch player to call upon on the bench.