Being a walking red card certainly isn't a barrier to having a career at Arsenal. It doesn't even preclude you from becoming one of the best midfielders of your generation and a byword for consistent excellence. Just ask Patrick Vieira, who, along with Richard Dunne and Duncan Ferguson, still holds the record for the most Premier League red cards with eight.
But Granit Xhaka is not Patrick Vieira. The Swiss midfielder has deputised well for the injured Santi Cazorla since the start of November, and his passing is reassuringly calm and accomplished, but he has not amassed the body of work which allows his disciplinary problems to be overlooked. While Vieira averaged a red card every 34.88 games, Xhaka, after the weekend's dismissal against Burnley, is averaging one every 9.5 matches in the Premier League.
The sample size is much smaller, his two red cards have come in 19 matches to Vieira's 279, but Xhaka is steadily building an unfavourable reputation. He has also given away two penalties this season in separate incidents to the red cards -- in the 3-1 home win over Stoke City on Dec. 10 and the 3-3 draw away at Bournemouth on Jan. 3. In what has been by some distance his worst week as an Arsenal player, on Tuesday he was also embroiled in an alleged incident of abuse directed at an airline staff member at Heathrow.
Xhaka, it should be noted, denies the accusation, with enquiries still ongoing. But the mere fact of the story is embarrassing enough for the player and the club, so soon after he landed a four-game suspension for a tackle on Steven Defour which was undeniably dangerous, even if no harm was inflicted on his opponent.
It might be seen as churlish to complain about Xhaka flinging himself around the pitch when Arsenal have long suffered from a soft belly, but there is clearly a difference between controlled physical intimidation and wild tackles which are just asking for the referee's attention. The fact Xhaka has now been shown nine red cards in just three years for club and country, stretching back to a 4-2 defeat for former club Borussia Monchengladbach against Freiburg on April 19, 2014, suggests he does not know the difference.
Vieira overstepped the line frequently, and even considered his future in England after being sent off in the opening two matches of the 2000-01 season. But he dominated far more games than he compromised. Emmanuel Petit, the Furio Giunta to his Tony Soprano, and not just because of the ponytail, was sent off three times in the 1998-99 season alone. It was a combustible partnership but, crucially, one which had delivered the double before these indiscretions.
Xhaka arrived in the summer for a fee of £35 million and at this juncture, Arsenal can feel justified to have expected rather more self-control. The only time Xhaka has directly cost the team points was in the Bournemouth draw but only the latest of late penalties from Alexis Sanchez gave Arsenal all three points at the weekend. At a time when Arsenal are not blessed with midfielders, with Cazorla still sidelined and Mohamed Elneny at the African Nations Cup, Xhaka will now miss a crucial game against Chelsea as well as three other fixtures.
It is strange, to say the least, that when Arsenal signed the midfielder he was presented as a mature head on young shoulders. There was lots of talk of Xhaka being a "born leader," embellished by his own rather cringeworthy story about having been given the keys to his parents' house instead of his older brother, Taulant. It sounded rather forced at the time and in retrospect looks plain silly. At the moment, he is not a leader but a liability. You wouldn't give him the keys to your bike lock.
Wenger's comments after the Burnley result were rather pointed: "He has to control his game and not punish the team with lack of control," said the manager.
The weight of this criticism was rather undermined by the fact that not an hour earlier, Wenger landed himself in trouble for pushing fourth official Anthony Taylor in the tunnel. But still, the manager's stance is clear. Xhaka has to reconsider how he flies around the midfield and launches into challenges.
As recently as Dec. 22 the player said he had no intention of changing his game, but for £35m, Arsenal can surley expect a more intelligent approach to self-improvement. Until he starts playing like Vieira, such lapses as we have seen this season cannot be indulged.