Arsene Wenger believes club-record signing Mesut Ozil is lacking confidence as Arsenal prepare to face Bayern Munich on Wednesday night.
The Germany international has been on the periphery of games in recent weeks and his contribution has split opinion among fans.
Ozil, 28, was defended by Wenger ahead of Saturday's win over Hull after criticism of his performances in the defeats to Watford and Chelsea which have seen Arsenal all but drop out of the Premier League title picture.
It is in games such as Wednesday's Champions League trip to face Bayern at the Allianz Arena where Ozil is expected to produce the goods.
But having not scored since the win over Stoke on December 10, Wenger feels the former Real Madrid man needs to find the back of the net to rediscover his self-belief.
"It's time for him to score again," Wenger said after Alexis Sanchez netted both goals in a 2-0 win over Hull.
"Maybe he will find confidence back as well, because he misses chances. He has chances and he misses the chances that don't look not feasible for him.
"I felt he did not feel confident (against Hull). It's always a problem because you think he can deliver something special but it's true that technically he missed things that he is not used to."
Wenger is at a loss as to why the World Cup winner has dropped from his usual high standards in recent weeks but said he had talked to the player, reportedly a summer target for Bayern, about the situation.
"I don't know - it can happen," Wenger said, when asked if he knew why Ozil had been under-performing.
"I don't know any specific reason. I had a chat with him (on Friday)."
Arsenal returned to winning ways with victory over the Tigers and now Wenger is looking forward to the prospect of coming up against Carlo Ancelotti's Bayern.
The teams have met six times in the last four years, with Bayern thrashing the Gunners 5-1 in Germany in their last meeting.
"You have to enjoy football," Wenger added.
"At the end of the day you have to keep that as well. It's true that it's not always easy but it's important that you feel happy. So what we want is to do well and qualify against Bayern Munich."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here