‘I can’t change myself’ – Xhaka defends making instinctive decision against Liverpool

Granit Xhaka has defended his actions which led to his sending off against Liverpool, claiming that Arsenal fans would have had further questions if he hadn’t made the decision to lunge in also.

The Swiss midfielder has been a talking point on too many occasions, getting himself a number of red cards since joining the club along with other mistakes in big games also, but he appears to insist that he cannot change.

Xhaka appears to claim that he is forced into taking risks due to his role in the side, whilst claiming that he feels as though his actions are questioned regardless of the outcome.

“I’m in a position where I have to make a 50/50,” Xhaka can be seen as stating on Twitter. “It’s a risky one, of course. People will say ‘Why do you always risk?’ This is who I am. I can’t change myself.

“I need to improve and I need to improve. But in this moment if Jota takes the ball and he scores, they will say ‘Why didn’t you stop him?’ Now I stopped him, and people say ‘Why did you get the red card?’

“After the game, everyone is smarter than in the moment. Myself as well. It’s a moment where I have to make a decision and this time I took the wrong one.

“I feel sorry for the team and the supporters.”

His red card may or may not have denied us a place in the EFL Cup final, and while in hindsight we don’t believe Jota had any chance of scoring after his connection with the ball in this instance, he only had milliseconds to make his decision on this occasion.

That being said, not all of his red cards and errors have been as the last man in defence or such intense situations, and I think it is an easy out to simply claim ‘this is who I am’, because that simply isn’t good enough in usual circumstances.

While I agree that he had limited time to make his decision against Jota, whilst also believing he should not have been the player forced into making that decision as the last man, I think he is giving himself too easy an out here.

Do you agree?

Patrick

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