‘A great surprise!’ – How Arsenal’s Nuno Tavares has lit up Ligue 1 for Marseille like William Saliba before him

Marseille and Arsenal loanees, there’s just something about them. In fact not even loanees, Matteo Guendouzi liked it so much he made the move permanent and Alexis Sanchez, once a darling of the Emirates, also has made it his home following his release from Inter Milan.

But it is this year’s loanee, Nuno Tavares, who has picked up where William Saliba left off last season, by taking to Ligue 1 like the proverbial duck to water.

Tavares has already scored three times this campaign, more than his entire previous professional career in total, with Marseille sitting joint-top of Ligue 1 alongside champions PSG on 16 points.

In order to try and find out a little more about Tavares’ form we got in touch with Eurosport France friends Maxime Dupuis and Julien Pereira.

One of the best signings

We start with Dupuis who believes that Tavares’ pace makes him an ideal fit for manager Igor Tudor’s 3-4-2-1 system. In this set up Tudor wants either second strikers, attacking midfielders or inverted wingers playing behind the lead striker. The width comes almost entirely from the wing-backs, which is handy when you have wing-backs who are as good at going forward as Tavares and his partner on the opposite flank Jonathan Clauss.

Dupuis describes Tavares as a “a real threat” and “a good surprise at the beginning of the season.”

“He’s fast, which is good in Marseille, because Marseille plays a lot in transition.”

Dupuis also highlighted the Portuguese’s dribbling, pointing out that Tavares is in the top 10 of Ligue 1 in terms of dribbles per game.

Dupuis says that Tavares has been “one of the best” signings of the summer in France and “a great surprise”, adding that another Arsenal loanee, Folarin Balogun has also been very impressive.

The two-footed machine

Again, the pace and how it works in Tudor’s system came up, with Pereira pointing out that before the Auxerre game he had the second-most touches in the opposition box (18) of any defender in Ligue 1.

As Tudor himself pointed out in a press conference “he [Tavares] sometimes doesn’t even realise his qualities, his pace…he is so hard to follow when he accelerates.”

Pereira points out that two of the three goals Tavares has scored this season have come with his supposed weaker foot, his right. Explaining this in a press conference, Tavares said: “I’m left footed as everyone knows, but I prefer to shoot from the right because the shots come off better, it’s a bit of a paradox!”

As Pereira points out: “Tavarez can come inside into the half-space, leaving Dimitri Payet to hold the line. That makes the attack less predictable.”

What comes next?

This is the question. As we mentioned earlier, Marseille were able to prise Guendouzi away from north London permanently but they lost the battle over Saliba. Which way will Tavares go?

Well nothing is agreed yet, that much is clear. Despite Marseille’s and Tavares’ insistence there is no purchase option in the loan deal. It suggests there is a future of Tavares at Arsenal despite the presence of Kieran Tierney and new signing Oleksandr Zinchenko.

Tavares opened up in an interview with RMC Sport about wanting to play regularly and how he is happy at Marseille.

“At Arsenal, I do not know if it was a problem of competition with Kieran Tierney, but for me, that’s not even the point.

“I came to Marseille to finally be able to play in my position. When signing with OM, I wanted to have an option to buy, but Arsenal refused. With my agents, we always wanted this purchase option, but Arsenal didn’t.

“Now I’m at OM, and with or without an option, I’m happy. At Arsenal, I would have probably only played in the cup.

“I came to Marseille to play in my position, in the Champions League, in the league and in the cup [competition]. Marseille gave me this opportunity.”

If you’re reading between the lines it certainly sounds as if Tavares would like to be able to stay at Marseille and based on his current form who could blame him.