Stats shows Declan Rice is better than Arsenal’s current midfielders in key areas

Arsenal made Declan Rice their record transfer and will be hoping he will improve their midfield.

The England international should be able to do exactly that, looking at his Premier League stats from last season.

The former West Ham captain excels in one particular area compared to his new teammates.

Rice, 24, made considerably more interceptions than any of Martin Odegaard, Jorginho, Thomas Partey, and Granit Xhaka, now at Bayer Leverkusen.

The midfielder completed 63 interceptions, 35 more than Partey, who had the most out of any of the Arsenal four.

Rice's ability to carry the ball up the field was seen far more last season than the Arsenal midfielders.

He managed 315 progressive carries, 65 more than Partey, 126 more than Odegaard, 232 more than Jorginho, and 169 more than Xhaka.

Rice also had the joint-best passing accuracy as he completed 88 percent of his passes.

This was only equaled by Partey and was better than Odegaard (84 percent), Jorginho (87.6 percent) and Xhaka (86.5 percent).

Only Odegaard and Xhaka managed more league goals than Rice last season as the pair scored 15 and seven league goals respectively.

Rice's four goals were more than Partey and Jorginho's records in front of goal in the campaign.

He also managed more assists than the two but was far behind the creativity of Odegaard and Xhaka who assisted 14 goals between them.

Having captained West Ham to Conference League glory last season he will also add leadership into the Arsenal dressing room.

Rice has joined the Gunners on a long-term deal and will fly out with the club for their pre-season tour in the US.

The North London side has paid £ 105 million plus add-ons for his services, surpassing the £72m fee paid for Nicolas Pepe in 2019.

He becomes the club's third arrival of the summer, following Kai Havertz and Jurrien Timber through the doors at the Emirates.