Arsenal’s start to the new Premier League season has been far from convincing. Two post-80th-minute goals in the most dramatic fashion possible were required to prevent a shock defeat to Leicester City on the opening weekend, while a trip to Stoke last Saturday proved as tough as three of their last five, ending in a 1-0 victory for Mark Hughes side.

Just two games into the new season and the same old flaws that have plagued Arsenal for the last decade have already re-emerged; a disturbing timidness when out of possession, a lack of organisation when facing counter-attacks and accordingly, a tendency to be out-muscled and out-performed by physical sides who boast lesser quality but speed and power on the break – a category of team Leicester and Stoke, when they’re bringing out the old Tony Pulis playbook for Arsenal’s annual visit of the Bet365 Stadium, fall neatly into.

No player typifies those intrinsic weaknesses with greater poignancy, accuracy and naturalness than Mesut Ozil, Arsenal’s mercurial playmaker who, now starting the fifth full season of his Gunners career, is yet to truly justify his status as once the most expensive signing in the club’s history.

The fact he’s now been overtaken by Alexandre Lacazette says as much about how Ozil hasn’t taken the club back towards the realms of regular title contention in the manner expected as it does the relentless inflation of the modern transfer market.

Of course, there remains no question over Ozil’s ability; once Jose Mourinho’s lynchpin at Real Madrid, a World Cup winner with Germany and a four-time member of the Ballon d’Or’s top 20. But in the relentlessly-paced Premier League, Ozil’s shortcomings inevitably stand out, particularly when Arsenal don’t play well; his lack of dynamism, his questionable work-rate, his limited physicality and his subsequent manner of drifting in and out of games.

When Arsenal aren’t dominating enough to consistently get the German international on the ball, he often becomes anonymous – some would even argue, like they’re playing with ten men.

It’s certainly true that Ozil has been culpable before, seemingly shying away just when Arsenal need him most – especially against high quality opposition when they aren’t controlling the match, the kind of situations where you’d expect a talismanic talent to come to the fore.

And yet, there is also an unnecessary, incredibly simplistic and incredibly lazy trend of making Ozil the poster-boy of every bad Arsenal performance, of turning him into the scapegoat for every poor result against workaday teams. The post-match analysis of Arsenal’s defeat to Stoke on Saturday, Steven Gerrard describing the Arsenal man as a ‘liability’, provides the perfect example.

“I just worry about his reaction and body language – when the ball is turned over he offers his team-mates zero. Away from home he’s a liability – he just doesn’t do enough. It’s clear to see that out of possession he doesn’t want to know – he only wants to be on the ball, trying to create and making things happen.

“But world class players do both – when they lose possession they put a shift in for their team-mates and it was clear that didn’t happen.”

Throughout the 90 minutes on Saturday, Ozil produced two shots at goal, three successful dribbles and four created chances – the joint-second most of any Premier League player last weekend after Henrikh Mkhitaryan – whilst completing the second-most touches and the second-most passes of any Arsenal player after Granit Xhaka.

On any given matchday against any given Premier League opponent, most attacking midfielders in the division would be content, albeit not resoundingly delighted, with that kind of return.

Ozil did what he was put on the pitch to do; create problems in the final third and try to inspire a goal. He ultimately failed in the latter challenge, but it wasn’t for the want of trying – Stoke put in an expert defensive performance, rather tellingly blocking a whopping six shots, and goalkeeper Jack Butland would’ve comfortably walked away with the Man of the Match award had it not been for Jese’s goal-grabbing debut.

Meanwhile, for all the praise Stoke received post-match and all the concerns over Arsenal defensively, the home side only produced only eleven efforts at goal and just four on target. The Gunners were chaotic and dishevelled off the ball, but Stoke’s offensive opportunities all came on the counter-attack.

The goal itself was a consequence of Xhaka’s lazy pass in midfield and a failure to track Jese’s basic run forward. Are pundits really suggesting that was down to Ozil’s limited offerings off the ball? We certainly wouldn’t judge Eden Hazard by the same standards – in fact, the Arsenal attacker completed eight more tackles than his Chelsea counter-part last season in three less Premier League outings.

Of course, the inevitable difference between Ozil and Hazard is that one has provided the magic to get his side over the line in two of the last three title races, and the other has only shown his equal creative flair in fits and spurts. But over in his homeland, they have a much different interpretation of the 84-cap playmaker; rather than criticising his weaknesses as part of an eleven-man team, they ask how the rest of the team can get the best out of him. Has Wenger ever truly shaped Arsenal around Ozil, in the same way Chelsea have continually built around Hazard?

No question, instead of becoming Arsenal’s greatest strength, Ozil has grown to symbolise his side’s most fundamental weaknesses, many of which were painfully evident as Stoke claimed another unlikely victory over the Gunners on Saturday. But was it a truly bad individual performance from the German? Was he the reason Jese ran through the Arsenal defence virtually uncontested for a simple finish? Should an attacking midfielder ever really be blamed for the freedom and space another team enjoys on the counter-attack? There are two whole thirds behind where Ozil lines up on the pitch.

Typifying weaknesses is not the same thing as causing them – which appears to be where pundits are getting confused. Ozil’s been guilty of abject displays before, but his outing at Stoke wasn’t one of them. The simple truth is that he’s become an easy target for lazy pundits who know the midfielder’s unconvincing Arsenal career will always divide opinion and generate debate.

Much more significant, systematic factors were at the root of Arsenal’s 1-0 defeat last weekend.