One of the most highly-publicised transfer sagas of the past few weeks is finally set to reach its conclusion, as Declan Rice closes in on his record-breaking £105m move from West Ham United to Arsenal.
The 24-year-old was the subject of two failed bids from the Gunners, who subsequently fended off interest from Manchester City and shook hands on a British record £105m fee with the Hammers before entering a protracted period of negotiations over the structure of the payments.
Despite the lengthy process, a deal was never truly believed to be in jeopardy, and Rice - who had his heart set on representing Mikel Arteta's team - is expected to be unveiled next week after completing a medical and putting pen to paper on a five-year contract.
Using statistics from the 2022-23 Premier League season, Sports Mole takes an in-depth look at how Rice compares to Arsenal's other midfield options, excluding Bayer Leverkusen-bound Granit Xhaka.
Goalscoring
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It remains to be seen whether Rice will be deployed as Arteta's new number six or a box-to-box midfielder - the 24-year-old recently stated that he believes he is evolving into the latter - but he will bring an additional goal threat to the Gunners' engine room either way.
From his 37 Premier League matches last season - the joint-most appearances for a current Arsenal midfielder alongside Martin Odegaard - Rice found the back of the net on four occasions, putting him third in the Gunners' engine room list behind Kai Havertz (seven) and Odegaard (15); Havertz was mainly utilised in a centre-forward role for Chelsea last season, but Arteta has already hinted that the German will be deployed in the centre of the park for the Gunners, hence his inclusion in this comparison.
Rice's quartet of strikes in the 2022-23 Premier League is more than fellow number six options Thomas Partey (three) and Jorginho (two), while he also outperformed his expected goals of 2.4, as did every Arsenal midfielder bar Havertz and the scoreless Albert Sambi Lokonga.
The England international's four goals came from 35 shots throughout the campaign, but only eight of those hit the target - an unremarkable percentage of 22.9, which is again lower than Odegaard (33.3%) and Havertz (44.3%) but higher than Partey (14.3%) and Jorginho (11.1%).
However, with four goals from eight efforts on target, Rice is only behind Partey in that column, with the Ghana international finding the back of the net three times from four shots on goal to come in at 75%. Odegaard is slightly lower at 48%, while Havertz scored with less than a fifth of his shots on target at 19%.
With Rice normally operating in a deeper role, it comes as little surprise to see the England international rank second in terms of average shot distance at 23.6 yards - only Jorginho let fly from a longer range on average with 26.2 yards.
Playmaking
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With just one assist in total during the 2022-23 Premier League season, Rice will happily leave the playmaking to the likes of Bukayo Saka and Odegaard - who set up seven goals last term - but Havertz and Jorginho also just set up one goal apiece, while Partey had no assists to his name.
However, the £105m man managed to produce 100 shot-creating actions in total - only behind Odegaard's 163 at an average of 2.75 per 90 minutes - with 86 of those SCA's coming from a live-ball pass and seven from a dead-ball situation.
Rice drops to third in terms of goal-creating actions with six, as Odegaard leads the way with 17 while Jorginho posted seven throughout the top-flight campaign, but he is only behind the Norway skipper for attempted (63) and successful (35) take-ons.
Rice therefore boasts a take-on success rate of 55.6%, only just behind Odegaard's 57.8%, but Partey is the runaway leader in that category, managing to complete a whopping 77.8% of the take-ons that he attempted last season.
Arsenal's other midfielders bow to Rice's superiority when it comes to carries, though, as the 24-year-old led the way with a total of 1454 for a distance of 9145 yards - second-placed Odegaard is some way behind in the latter category with 6930 yards.
Rice also tops the Gunners' charts in progressive carries (88) and carries into the final third (75), but he only registered a paltry five carries into the penalty area, putting him below both Odegaard (26) and Havertz (30).
Passing
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Totalling 2475 touches of the ball during the 2022-23 Premier League - putting him in the top 20 for all players in the division - Rice unsurprisingly attempted and completed more passes than any of his soon-to-be Arsenal midfield teammates.
The former Chelsea youngster completed 1846 passes from 2135 attempts, bringing him a respectable completion percentage of 86.5%, which is better than all of Jorginho (85.8%), Havertz (81.3%) and Odegaard (80.3%).
However, Partey fared slightly better with 87.2%, while Sambi Lokonga actually tops the rankings with 89.1%, but the Belgian played far fewer minutes than his teammates for Arsenal and Crystal Palace, completing 360 passes from 404 attempts.
Rice also sits at the summit of the passing yards column with a total of 33,652 and a progressive distance of 9456 yards, while a 93.2% completion percentage for medium passes sees him rank higher than all other Arsenal lynchpins bar Lokonga.
On the other hand, Rice only places fourth when it comes to long pass completion with 68.8% - a category which Partey tops with 74.2% - but the Englishman's 60 switches of play is significantly more than Partey, Odegaard, Jorginho, Havertz and Lokonga combined (32).
Furthermore, only Odegaard posted more crosses than the West Ham skipper's 44 last term - albeit by quite some distance with 91 - but Rice did take one more corner kick than the Scandinavian playmaker, swinging the ball into the box on 19 occasions in total.
Defending
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With Partey's future still a hot-button topic amid reports of a possible move to Juventus, Rice may very well be instilled as Arsenal's new number six, where he would need no second invitation to flaunt the ball-winning qualities that have made him one of the hottest properties on the Premier League market.
Rice made more tackles than any other Arsenal engine-room enforcer last term with 79 - winning 38 of them - although he does rank below Partey in the success charts, as the Ghanaian won 40 tackles from his 70 attempts in 2022-23.
Rice did not attempt to tackle as many dribblers as Partey or Jorginho last season, but by successfully challenging 31 of them from 50 attempts, his success rate of 62% puts him in first place, while Partey came in at just 48.1%.
Furthermore, the 24-year-old made far more blocks (45) and interceptions (63) than the other five Arsenal midfielders in this list - ranking highest in the entire Premier League for the latter category, greater than Partey (28) and Jorginho (30) combined - while also registering 58 clearances.
Interestingly, both Partey and Rice won a total of 37 aerial duels last term, but the Englishman lost 26 - one more than his African counterpart, seeing him come in with a success rate of 58.7% compared to Partey's 59.7%.
A total of 334 recoveries was also more than each of Arsenal's quintet of midfielders, while he also committed just 23 fouls - fewer than Odegaard (30), Partey (37) and the more advanced Havertz (60) - but it will be intriguing to see how Rice's defensive contributions stack up for a title-chasing Arsenal team compared to a West Ham United side battling to avoid the drop last term.
Ben Knapton
