When West Ham United faced off away to Arsenal at the Emirates Stadium seven months ago, it is fair to say the Viktor Gyokeres was enduring a sluggish start to life with the Gunners.
The £54 million signing from Sporting Lisbon had scored only three times in his first 11 matches of 2025/26 for club and country.
And while Arsenal would make relatively light work of Nuno Espirito Santo’s side that October afternoon – Declan Rice and Bukayo Saka scored in a very professional 2-0 home win – Gyokeres got very little change out of Konstantinos Mavropanos at the heart of West Ham United’s backline.
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Mavro has already gotten the better of Gyokeres once…
Dinos Mavropanos faces Viktor Gyokeres as West Ham United host Arsenal
At the time, the mere sight of Mavropanos on the team sheet tended to send shivers down Hammers’ spines.
As hard as it is to believe now – the Greek international has become West Ham’s ‘warrior’ and arguably their top performer in 2026 – Mavropanos was being spoken about back then like the maligned, recently-jeered Max Kilman is today.
Mavropanos vs Gyokeres, in October, saw a supposedly error-prone centre-back get the better of a clunky, clumsy £54 million Arsenal millstone.
“Pick literally any game [Kai] Havertz has played against West Ham sides better than this one, he cooked in all of them,” one frustrated Arsenal fan wrote on X, pining for the crocked German as the Swede stumbled through another forgettable outing.
“Gyokeres was getting clamped by Mavropanos.”
Seven months later, Arsenal’s impending arrival at the London Stadium will see defender and striker renew acquaintances again, the narrative around both players now very different.
Mavropanos and Gyokeres have made big strides forward
After three goals in 11 games at the start of 2025/26, Gyokeres is now on a run of 18 in 29.
There are many who still have serious reservations about whether the former Coventry talisman is really the long-term answer to Arsenal’s long-standing striker problems. But there is no doubting that Gyokeres is currently in a very different space compared to early-October.
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“It doesn’t happen overnight and Viktor has been working extremely hard,” Arteta told a press conference on Friday, two days after Gyokeres bullied Atletico Madrid’s defence into submission in the Champions League semi-final.
“The level of demands he puts on himself are incredibly high. He always wants to learn, he’s always asking questions, he always wants to do extra things. He’s always trying to find ways to find those connections with his teammates, whether they’re in the canteen, in the dressing room or on the pitch.
“At the end, when you have that kind of behaviour, you get rewards.”
Few strikers are capable of getting the better of Mavropanos in a physical duel. Captain Jarrod Bowen has ‘run out of words’ to describe just how impressive the number 15 has been in 2026.
Certainly, when Mavropanos restricted a struggling Gyokeres to a watching brief seven months ago, few would have imagined that May’s rematch would be billed as one of the league’s best centre-halves going up against one of the league’s most-improved number nines.
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