Arsenal

Arsene Wenger wants Alexandre Lacazette to emulate Zlatan Ibrahimovic

By Daniel Lewis, Senior Reporter | 11 August 2017

Arsene Wenger believes that Alexandre Lacazette can continue his prolific scoring rate in the Premier League, having been left impressed by Zlatan Ibrahimovic's form.

Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger has challenged striker Alexandre Lacazette to match the success of Zlatan Ibrahimovic in his maiden Premier League campaign.

The France international joined from Lyon for a club-record fee of £46.5m earlier this summer and has been tasked with scoring the goals to fire the Gunners to title glory.

Lacazette was prolific in Ligue 1, netting 91 times across four seasons, but many have questioned whether he can replicate that type of scoring success in the English top flight.

Wenger is confident that the 26-year-old can do exactly that, much in the same way as Ibrahimovic did when scoring 17 times for United upon joining from Paris Saint-Germain 12 months ago.

"With Lacazette it is simple," he told reporters. "He is an intelligent player who can integrate our game well as we have a game backed on mobility, technique. After that we get the efficiency. His record in France is to score one in 80 minutes. If he can maintain that record that would be ideal for us.

"As a game is in 90 that would guarantee you a goal. Goalscoring record is not necessarily transferable from the French League to the English league, that's for sure. But you could say that Ibrahimovic transferred an identical amount of goals from France to England. So that's the target Lacazette should set."

Lacazette bagged 28 goals in 30 appearances in his final campaign for Lyon to finish runner-up in the Ligue 1 scoring charts.