Kai Havertz\u2019s goal against Liverpool on Sunday did more than settle the match. It also took him into Premier League history, even if the significance was easy to miss in the celebrations.<\/p>\n
The Arsenal forward did not try to claim too much credit afterwards. Instead, he pointed to Declan Rice, whose assist made the finish straightforward. Havertz was clear in his assessment of the move, saying: \u201cI think 90% of the goal belongs to that man,\u201d Havertz told Sky Sports after the game. \u201cWe all know his right foot. Today he was there, brilliant overlap and perfect cross. For me it was an easy tap-in. As I said, I think that goal definitely belongs to him.\u201d<\/p>\n
On paper, Havertz\u2019s record may not appear especially striking. He now has 46 goals in 172 appearances, a return that does not immediately leap off the page. Yet that is part of the long-running debate around him. Since joining Chelsea in 2020, his role has often prompted more questions than answers. He has played as a winger and across midfield, but at both London clubs he has settled in as a striker, despite neither side originally signing him for that position.<\/p>\n
There is, however, a clear explanation for why he remains central to one of England\u2019s strongest teams this season. Havertz has scored only four goals in 14 matches in all competitions, but three of them have come against Manchester City, Chelsea and Liverpool. That pattern matters.<\/p>\n
Even last season, when injury limited him to 24 appearances and 1,066 minutes, he still managed goals against Man City and Chelsea, along with important strikes in Champions League knockout ties, including one in the final against Paris Saint-Germain.<\/p>\n
Arsenal may yet find more goals elsewhere, perhaps from a more natural striker, but that is not certain. The fact Havertz is still starting ahead of Viktor Gy\u00f6keres says plenty. Gy\u00f6keres has the numbers, with 97 goals in 102 games for Sporting CP before 21 in his first Arsenal season, but Mikel Arteta is left weighing a different question: who delivers when it matters most.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Havertz\u2019s Liverpool winner brought history, but his value to Arsenal remains a deeper debate.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22178,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[192,175,172],"tags":[1836,59],"class_list":["post-22179","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arsenal","category-liverpool","category-epl","tag-2026-27-premier-league","tag-featured"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22179","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22179"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22179\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22178"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22179"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22179"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22179"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}