The stats that underline exactly why Arsenal contract rebel Alexis Sanchez owes fans an all-action performance against Newcastle

The strange lack of urgency Arsenal showed during the majority of their goalless draw at West Ham on Wednesday night was perhaps best summed up with eight minutes remaining.

On a night when the Gunners had been curiously passive, Arsene Wenger opted to withdraw Alexis Sanchez to replace him with Alexandre Lacazette. Taking off Sanchez can't have been contemplated for most of his time at the club, but it was a substitution which made perfect sense.

The Chilean had again been as ineffective as the pen that sits beside his unsigned new contract, with his long goodbye to north London going on and on.

After the failure of his move to Manchester City in the summer, Sanchez simply hasn't been the same player.

There have still been great moments, of course. Such as the brilliant strike against Cologne in the Europa League, almost blasting the ball through Hugo Lloris to score at a crucial time in the north London derby , that clutch last minute penalty at Burnley.

But, as fans' ire toward Sanchez grows, those moments have been too few and far between.

You only had to glance at social media during the Gunners' recent matches against Manchester United, Southampton and West Ham to see that patience has run out with a player once considered so dear to the supporters.

And 'run' is far from the operative word.

Because the extent to which the former Barcelona man has been slowing down becomes all the more apparent when you look at Opta's tracking and distance covered stats, something they monitor for every player in every Premier League game.

They show that Sanchez has failed to clock over 10.1km in any of his last 10 Premier League appearances.

By way of contrast, centre-back Laurent Koscielny clocked 10.3km at West Ham, where Mesut Ozil - another control rebel - covered 10.5km.

Indeed in Sanchez's last 10 Premier League appearances, he's completed 90 minutes in eight of them, and been the Gunner who has covered the least distance in six of those.

When he was withdrawn alongside Aaron Ramsey in the 73rd minute of the 5-0 win over Huddersfield he'd covered 8.0km - 1.7km fewer than Ramsey.

None of this definitively proves anything, of course, and you have to take tactical elements into consideration, but for such an all-action player they certainly seem alarming.

And suggest that he owes Arsenal fans a performance against Newcastle on Saturday.