There’s something fun about winning when you’re not supposed to. When your club goes up against an opponent who are years ahead of you in terms of investment and training; who have better players in every position; who have just collected two of the most prestigious trophies in world football; and yet your club just manages to steal the game from them through a combination of good luck and hard work.
As Arsenal supporters, we can totally empathise with how the Liverpool supporters must be feeling today. They will be happy that their team are Premier League champions of course and that will tide them over for years but I remember losing a few matches to a mid-table club back in the Wenger era and being annoyed at how unlucky we had been on the day.
On the Arsenal side of the match, I feel like I don’t have to point to much other than the fact that we only had 3 total shots. I’ve seen us outplayed like this before (worse, like the time we had 0 shots against Barcelona after the referee sent off Robin van Persie for shooting the ball) but Arteta pointed out that even when you face an opponent of superior quality you can still get something out of the match through hard work and luck and that’s what Arsenal did.
If you want to win these games at the moment, with the difference of the two teams, we need to put everything on the line to get the points. I am really pleased because they can do it. It’s about keeping the right spirit and level of attention and I’m delighted that we’ve done it today.
Arteta was frank with his assessment of the differences in quality between the two sides – mentioning it in almost every answer – and in some ways Arteta’s starting lineup, I think, showed that he knew we were in for a defensive battle. I suspect he wanted a strong counter-attacking team and started Torreira and Holding to add some bite in midfield and the back line. And given the FA Cup semi-final looming on Saturday he rested Auba and played Pepe on the left – where we haven’t seen him at all this season – so he could start Nelson on the right.
But this is all getting too deep into analysis. This is a match that doesn’t need that level of scrutiny: Liverpool made errors, Arsenal capitalized on them. We did help create the errors, through hard work and smart pressing but if we were supposed to be a counter-attacking side, we were pretty dreadful at that. Though to be fair to the boys, defending non-stop for 90 minutes and trying to sprint 75 yards every time you win the ball is exhausting – which was evident by about the 50th minute.
There are a few points that I’ll raise here for discussion.
The first is that Lacazette has scored a goal in back-to-back matches against big opponents – ok, well, Liverpool was a big opponent. In fact, his record against Spurs is quite good: 3 goals and 2 assists in 4 Premier League appearances. That makes Spurs his favorite PL team to score on (tied with Southampton). Normally, any goal against Spurs catapults a forward into exalted status but Lacazette seems to be a victim of unrealistic expectations.
Given the transfer fee and his scoring record in France, plus the fact that he replaced Giroud, I think people expected Lacazette to be a 20 goal a season striker for Arsenal and he’s been much more a 14 goal a season striker. I’m sure he would have scored more goals if Arsenal had had a decent attack the last two years, a coach who wasn’t terrified to attack, some better creative players around him, and maybe if he was also the main man – getting a lot more playing time and service.
But as it stands, he’s one hell of a backup option on a team that has an established 20-goal-a-season dude. That’s something Arsenal haven’t been able to say for a while. For the longest time we went with van Persie or… Sanogo/Bendtner.
But also, when I mention that I think we will sell Lacazette, I’m thinking that a) I wouldn’t want him to be our starter and b) I wouldn’t want to lose Aubameyang because without Auba I think we would be way further down the League table. So, it’s more of a case of wishful thinking. Either way, I like Lacazette for what he brings to the table: great finisher, incredibly good attitude, team player.
The second thing is that a weird thing that happened yesterday after the match: 90% of the people on my Twitter feed were kind of upset at how Arsenal played – almost cursing us for our luck – but there were 10% of the folks just elated by the win. I was in that minority. I had shelved all of my expectations, the entire box of them! And I also didn’t even watch the match that intently, just sort of obliquely – out of the side of my eye.
I think I’m growing tired of analysing the football all the time: it takes the pride out of it, Gazidis. That is not to say that analysis isn’t important but rather that I’m jealous of the people who just enjoy things. Look, I’m going to be 50 in three months – then I will have to buy a Corvette or a Harley. Or I can just try to enjoy things for a while. I dunno.
And finally, this should probably be a blog post all on its own, but after the match Arteta called on the owners to invest money in the squad. And even more incredibly, the quotes were published on the Arsenal.com. I need to be clear, he didn’t absolve himself of his own responsibility but neither did he take all of the burden on himself.
On his responsibility:
There is a lot of uncertainty in many areas, but what we can control now is who do we want to be as a team, the culture that we are building to do that, the spirit that we need to be successful, and then improve our players and my main focus is on that. I want to make our players better and I want to make them more comfortable and create an identity for the football club because then it will be easier to say we need this, this and this.
On picking youth to help develop those things:
Well, the first thing is the selection because I cannot tell them that I believe in them and then never play them. We try to make sure that everyone fits as part of the team because that’s how you keep the spirit, and you have to put them in big games as well. They showed today that everybody is ready. It’s the way they train every day, it’s the way they have been behaving every day, and everybody deserves a chance. Today they showed that they could do it.
On what he’s done so far:
It wasn’t part of the gameplan obviously [to not see much possession] but at the moment you can see in many areas the gap between the two teams, what we have to achieve and the areas we have to improve. Certainly there is one area that we’ve caught them on and it’s the belief, the accountability, the passion… they play for every single ball. With that we can beat a lot of teams. Against Tottenham we had total dominance for several periods and we lost the game, so we will find the right balance but credit for them as well for what they have achieved.
And when asked if he thinks he needs money to help rebuild the sqaud:
I think it’s pretty clear that we need to strengthen the squad.
Liverpool wasn’t a miracle. Leicester wasn’t even a miracle*. They are two recent examples of how the ENTIRE CLUB pulled together to make something incredible happen.
There are numerous clubs above Arsenal (or near us) with less resources who are playing some excellent football and clearly building toward something: Leicester, Southampton, Wolves, Sheffield. If Arteta can get the attitude sorted, can get the culture of the club right, and if the management and owners can get the financials and scouting right, there isn’t any reason why Arsenal can’t be a top four club again. Maybe not a Perennial title challenger but surely in the chase every once in a while.
So, let’s all call on the management team to get it together and get Arteta the resources he needs.
*They are doing it again. This top four challenge this season is a result of the hard work and dedication of the entire club. It’s not just that others around them sucked and they got lucky.
Source:
https://www.arsenal.com/news/we-needed-put-everything-line-win
Don’t wait for birthday milestones for a Corvette or Harley. Life’s too short
Great (and funny) to win in those circumstances, and even greater that Arteta didn’t use that result to rhetorically diminish the obvious gulf in quality and cohesion. I mean, we were outplayed by Liverpool-upon-LaPlage for crying out loud. But yes, I can well remember in the early to mid 2000’s being the comprehensively best team on the day and losing to the likes of Bolton, etc., so I know exactly how Liverpool fans feel today.
I’m extremely curious about what happens with this club in this transfer window. It feels like an all of nothing scenario; neither would surprise me. Oh, and can I ask: who here is ready to deem Pepe a wasteful expenditure, by which I mean, “relative to our needs as a club at this juncture in our history”?
I said at the time he was announced that Pepe was a vanity purchases by con Don Raul. There’s a good player in there (even better if he could use the other foot even 1% of the time), but not what we needed.
I’m not sure if he is “not what we needed”. We were absolutely screaming for a top quality wide player, who could take on defenders with ball at feet, break opponents down in the final third, score goals, and provide assists. He is all of those things and what’s more is that he’s doing pretty damn well for a guy who doesn’t get much playing time and just spent the last year at a club with no ball progression (apart from David Luiz) which was falling apart at the seams because the coach was a massive coward who was picking fights with the players and then backing down and playing a coward-ass brand of football.
I was certainly happy with the result. After the first 20 mins, I was thinking we were going to get smashed…I would have been happy with just a tie.
On the Pepe front, the jury is still very much out for me. At one point in the first half I very much saw him just walking away in a situation where he should have been pressing. Literally walking.
From a skillset perspective, he reminds me of Alexis. Good dribbler, likes to cut inside from the wing and shoot with his better foot. But Alexis was far more aggressive and hardworking, both for Arsenal and Chile(that in fact is what burned him out). I see little of that in Pepe. And without either work ethic or much end result, it’s tough to see how he justifies what we paid. The other similar player comparison would be to Christian Pulisic. He cost slightly less, is 4 years younger, and has more goals in fewer appearances this season than Pepe.
I think it’s very fair to say Pepe was a vanity purchase. I also thought Auba, however good he has been, was also a vanity purchase. After all Laca had been purchased just six months prior for a huge fee as well. The money should have been invested in central defense where it was needed the most with a stop-gap attacker being brought in. The club of course did the opposite.
I had a long reply about the futility of hope but deleted it.
I think Leicester (and Brendan Rodgers) is a fraud and they’ve had results against Liverpool and City that proved it. They’re a lot like we were just before the end of the Wenger era. But they play attractive football with younger players and I think that’s the best we can hope for.
And Wolves are a corrupt enterprise. I would never want to compare us to them.
Arteta isn’t getting any resources. Anyone crossing their fingers hoping for this is asking to be unhappy.
The apocalypse is always just around the corner in politics, marriage and football.
My concern is that once it sinks in to Arteta what coaching a KSE club is going to be like. he’s going to say con mucho gusto y adios. He’s a young coach with potentially another 30+ years in the game if he wants. Why would he waste time here?
And who of any quality would want to replace him under this owner? Unless of course the pandemic somehow levels the financial playing field between teams like us and “the usual suspects” (Bayern, PSG, etc.) Don’t hold your breath. But Stan will be happy if you hold his beer.
Agreed – Arteta is only here for another 3 or 4 years, maybe 5 tops. When Barcelona or one of these other clubs come calling he will leave. If he manages to create an exciting team with limited funds, maybe win a cup or two, it will only accelerate the schedule. We have crap ownership and senior management with no track record of knowing how to build anything… a coach with ambition isn’t going to stick here long term.
I never thought about this but enjoyment can be for two different things in football. Enjoyment or just plain joy for the result, and enjoyment of the performance.
Unfortunately, I could never really just enjoy the result. When you come from a place where people are poor and money has to be stretched to cover for the basics in life, you try to get as much utility for your money as possible. I am not in that place anymore, but the lessons still stuck with me. People in my village only got the EPL in 2006, and even though there were teams who won trophies, Arsenal was the most watched.
I remember my fiancee asking me a few years ago (before the FA Cup wins) why I never missed a game by a team which had gone so long without a trophy and was seemingly always in a crisis. I told her that its because Arsenal are the only team I know which plays to make me happy that I spent 2 hours of my day invested in them. Whether they win or lose, they played to make me come back and watch, root for them and proudly call myself a gunner.
If all it took for a fan to be happy was the result, there would be no point in watching the game, because the joy of a result isn’t dependent on seeing how the result was acquired. So for many poor people in Africa, Arsenal was and hopefully remains one of the only sides worth spending money that could have gone to food, because seeing Wengerball in full flow (win or loss) was enough to warm the heart and make you forget about your struggles.
That’s why Arsenal has been the most supported EPL club on the continent, where young boys herd cattle with Ozil written in marking pen on the back of their shredded shirts, where kids try to score “Arsenal” goals on gravel pitches with stones for posts, where the up and coming generation of coaches is majority Arsenal fans and were inspired to coach by seeing the joy that Arsenal’s football brings to their communities, and where two hours can buy your family some loafs of bread to eat, there isn’t a better club to follow than Arsenal. It also explains my constant anger at Emery. He wasn’t a bad guy at all, but he was the extreme opposite of everything so many in Africa loved this club for.
So I might be one of the lucky ones to be able to afford a decent life right now, but my upbringing will never allow me to just enjoy a result.
Thanks, Devlin for so eloquently sharing what Arsenal means to you. And for the perspective.
Excellent, submission. Could very easily have been written by me, or millions of people around the word, but I’m sure not a lot of us, would have written it as smoothly as you have done.
Nice post. All the people I’ve known called Devlin, have been Irish. Just goes to show, never assume.
Beautiful. Sums it up perfectly and thank you for sharing with us
stan the maN ain’t spending any money out of his pocket.
It has been cited numerous times ad nauseam.
AFC gets 100% of it’s spending through commercial operations.
The only way forward is to sell and rebuild.
End of….
Harley Davidson, the motorcycle that intentionally annoys everyone else who is not on a Harley Davidson motorcycle by being obnoxiously and unnecessarily loud, and that’s before you turn on the radio. Please don’t do that to your fellow humans.
Agreed. Harley owners are arrogant a**holes who love LOVE p*ssing people off with their loud farting machines. Don’t do it, Tim.
Never would, nor the Corvette. It’s a joke about men who do that in order to re-invigorate their shrunk shanks.
I was lucky enough to score an advance test drive in a Mustang Mach E in my favorite flavor, cherry red (to quote Mick Jagger). 475 km/300 m of range, about 6.5 seconds from 1 to 100 kph, zero emissions. Not cheap but way less than a Tesla. Sweet. Does son-of-1Nil really need a college degree?
Shrunk shanks. Ha! Whenever I see one of those t*ssers rev their throttle for attention, I just think, “compensation.” Something’s shrunk, and it’s not just the shanks.
Tim
No more stats and analysis posts for the foreseeable future then ? Would be a pity, because I enjoyed them.
But I understand how you feel. Analyzing Arsenal nowadays is asking for more depression.
Great post Tim and it was an awesome win. Performances are nice to talk about and stats make great blog fodder but football is about getting results. Arteta has improved our ability to get results and it has very little to do with tactics or complex attacking strategies or out smarting the oppositions manager. All that stuff is over rated. I don’t think he has improved the technical skill of our players or fixed their first touch or made them technically better at passing the ball or improved their shooting accuracy. Where they have improved is the energy, work rate, concentration and commitment and they have been defending like their careers depend on it. A player who gives a damn is always going to be an improvement over a player who doesn’t
That’s been the main difference. A change in attitude. Discipline? Commitment? Call it what you will. Without that, you haven’t a hope in hell of succeeding. Long may it continue. Historically, and pre Wenger, Arsenal were never regarded as skilful or attractive, but what the fans always expected was effort.
Tim @ 9:19AM
At least so far the evidence points to the conclusion that the stats Pepe put together in France greatly overestimated how good he is and how effective he can be at doing the things you suggest we need.
Goals and assists are slightly down from Lille
13 goals and 12 assists for Lille last season in 3,500 minutes
6 goals and 8 assists for Arsenal in 2,500 minutes.
Definitely hope to see some improvement but that’s not horrendous.
Pepe hasn’t really been able to put together consecutive good performances and pretty rarely has flashed ability equivalent with his price tag. I won’t write him off yet though given that our midfield is #trash and he’s already on his third manager in a brand new league.
I’m not one for stats that much, personally, but I found this on Arseblog, which I thought was pretty damning.
“Arsenal’s midfielders (not counting attacking midfielders) create just 0.86 key passes per match. That is total, not per player. This ranks 14th in the league. Arsenal’s midfielders create just 0.06 xA per match. So even on the rare occasion that they create chances, they are often not very likely to be converted into goals. This ranks 19th, only ahead of the relegated Norwich City.”
yeah. it’s crazy. Looking at xG Buildup 90 Xhaka and Ceballos are both at around 0.43 this season. Last season Guendouzi led the CMFers with 0.51, in 17/18 Xhaka led all with 0.63. If you go back to 15/16 Cazorla was 0.73 and even Elneny was 0.67 while Coquelin came in at 0.56.
Couple things have happened here – the opponents are pressuring Arsenal’s midfield. They have been targeted as weak and easy to cause panic. Fouls on the MFers are WAY up and passes under pressure are through the roof:
Xhaka’s total passes per game are down over 20 but his passes attempted under pressure are virtually identical: last season he made 13.7/77.5 passes under pressure (18%), this season he’s made 13.2/62.9 (21%). Guendouzi’s percentages are virtually identical; Torreira’s numbers are through the roof 11.1/51.2 (22%) this season v. 13% last season.
Turning on my silent electric engine.
Well, I was in the 90% and 10%, which means I am 100% in favor of following AFC.
But, I also enjoy my club that much more when we play as Devlin put it so nicely.
If we tighten up the defense, I mean really tighten up the defense, then we do not need $200 million goal scorers to get us over the top when the club is so obviously imbalanced. The clubs like pool, manure, $h*tTy, chavs, even spuds, and possibly now newcastle will make sure their clubs are filled with $50-200 million dollar players. We can’t compete that way.
So, we have a shot stopper at the back Leno, and a goal scorer at the front Auba, and nothing in between. Now, I am oversimplifying this greatly, but you get the the point.
There are many young players out there just waiting for a coach like Mikel to build the club into something. (Yes, coaching matters) I really do not feel that we would be so fortunate as to sell one good player and get 3 great offensive players in return like pool did. It will have to be built piece by piece, hopefully 2-4 pieces at a time, centered around the defense and the center of the midfield, if Mikel has any chance at all, and we as viewers do not want to see the club fall of a cliff.
No relegation in the nfl, nhl, and mls.
Parking my scooter quietly in my carport.
Excellent post Tim. Thanks! Very sharp. I am a gooner since 1994 and I never ever seen anything like this from us. This back-to-the-wall performance and mentality is something we really missed during the Wenger years. I mean the back four of Nigel/Tony/Martin/Lee and of Viera and Henry had this mentality but we were too good to be battered. But since 2004 we lost even the winning mentality we only wanted to ‘play’ beautiful football. But now it is back and it is wonderful. We find our balls. I used to play 5-a-side games we took it seriously and I remember how much it ment surviving an onslought from a far better oppenent. It built the team. C’mmon Arteta, C’mmon Arsenal
P.s. I am 53 and happy owner of a 1976 Toyota Celica 🙂
Great post Tim. Enjoyable win. If we can do the same on Saturday; I’d be ecstatic
(and surprised)
Get an electric car – hydro is cheap here in the N.W.
I’ll suggest that it’s not so much the absolute funding for transfers the club has/gets, but whether the transfers are in line with what Arteta can agree with. Bunch of mediocre players who can somehow can fit into his system might still be fun to watch.
If Arteta is able to somehow pull a European football rabbit out of his hat, it will have a huge impact on the club. There will be a bit more in the kitty for transfers, and a much better story to sell to transfer targets – the club is in exciting ascendency. I don’t expect it to happen via the Cup, but it still is a possibility in the league. The unmentionables must lose to Leicester, and Sheffield have to drop points in one of their two matches – and we need to win both remaining matches. Not unheard of, but not impossible.
50 isn’t so bad. From my standpoint it felt a lot like 56 does now lol. Bread and birds will keep you younger than any vehicle. I get much more of a thrill adding a new bird to my life list than driving any car. You’ve touched way more lives with your writing than any of those midlife Harley huggers can ever dream of. Thanks for creating this community and Happy Brithday! Here’s hoping Arteta also brings you a present with our finish.
I had the misfortune to be on holiday on Lake Garda at exactly the same time as Harley Davidson Europe Chapter had their annual get together. Absolute murder. Imagine dozens of Harleys put put putting up and down for absolutely no reason whatsoever. Mostly middle aged men. There is a special place in hell for people like that.
Excellent post Tim. You are right to be in the 10%. Beautiful football is highly enjoyable and I wallowed in that pleasure during the early Wenger years in part because it was such a contrast to what had gone before. However that win against Liverpool evoked memories of many satisfying victories by George Graham’s teams against technically superior sides not least that against Parma in the ECWC. It’s a different kind of pleasure and one that I had forgotten throughout the Wenger’s years of pomp, his declining years and the aberrration that was Emery. Beautiful football bringing success was very nice but beautiful football without balls was frustrating. I’d forgotten how pleasurable a fighting victory against the odds was. Now we’ve found our bottle, we need to add some midfield class.
Tim
The stats I saw at Who Scored, Pepe had 22 goals and 11 assists last season in 3300 league minutes at Lille and this season he has 5 goals and 6 assists in 1913 PL minutes. That is a significant drop off. You could argue that it’s only his first season and it will take time but more concerning is at least subjectively he doesn’t seem to be steadily improving as you would hope. Despite the relative lack of talented attacking players on the squad he hasn’t impressed Arteta enough to become a definite first team regular.
He was on penalty duty for Lille – I removed those because they inflated his goals tally. Also because he’s been given two penalties at Arsenal but the penalty duties here at Arsenal are much more widely shared.
He was also allowed to take all of Lille’s corners and dead ball set plays which he is excellent at and which he provided a number of assists.
Feel free to start scapegoating Pepe, however.
it takes time to adapt to the premier league, especially coming from france. i typically expect a player to be near their full level at about 18 months after their move…something i made up watching pires when he arrived. what makes him special is his ability with the ball but his link up play has to improve. be patient. i know his best is yet to come.
what the premier league knows is that if you let him get on that left foot, he will bust your tail!
BathGooner.
The objective of attacking football is to score goals. All the wonderful passing and creativity doesn’t help you win if you can’t turn the passes into goals scored. Unfortunately, if you look at the numbers Wengerball was never all that effective in terms of actually scoring goals. Arsene used to justify our defensIve issues by saying we were an attacking team but if you are going to sacrifice defensive solidarity at the alter of beautiful attacking football then you need to significantly outscore your rivals to compensate for conceding more. The problem we had was somehow those other teams we competed against at the top of the table were able to play solid defense and concede less but still score more goals then we did at the same time. That’s why the praise for the beautiful football we played always seemed a bit off base to me.
sorry bill but i’ve got to disagree with you again. arsenal played a brand of football that was entertaining to the neutral fan. likewise, it was incredibly difficult to defend against. the common strategy was teams often “parked the bus” on arsenal and hoped to catch arsenal on the break. if they just came out and played, they could be ripped to shreds…and this applied to any team in the world. despite the extremely negative approaches teams applied arsenal created tons of chances.
you have to remember that football is entertainment first and arsenal were the greatest show on earth. very few teams could replicate even a bad version of what arsenal did every single week. besides, they’re the only team in over 100 years to go unbeaten in the english top flight. not to mention, the double-winning side from 2002 went unbeaten away from home and, if memory serves me correctly, only lost one game. how many teams have done that? how can you say that team wasn’t great? nuts!
Bill,
I couldn’t agree more. The arc of death as my son christened our oft repeated attacking manoeuvre that generally led to nothing or worse still a winning goal from the opposition’s first attack became an all too frequent experience in Arsene’s latter years. I have been impressed by Mikel’s decision making on and off the park and look forward to his new project as he seems a man with clear ideas and the steel to see them through.
i appreciate arteta speaking honestly and plainly after the game. arsenal were fortunate to win the game but respected the gap in quality between the two sides. with that, i don’t believe liverpool players are that much better than arsenal players. sure, they have some guys who are world class but it’s the clear direction and stability that their manager has brought to the club over a number of years that’s the true tell.
likewise, i don’t agree that lacazette is lacking a good attacking group. he’s been spoilt in that regard since coming to arsenal. it’s been that the midfield has been suspect. either xhaka has played cdm or they’ve had to use the double-pivot to hide xhaka’s weakness in that cdm role. regardless, it’s marginalized the midfield, which has meant arsenal have had lost their thrust from midfield, which has meant the attacking players, including lacazette, have been forced to do more defending. with that, i’ve always said that lacazette is a step down at center forward to giroud. i used to argue that wenger should play lacazette in the hole behind giroud, not in giroud’s position.
as for the center mids poor stats over the past two seasons, i’ll leave you with two words. unai emery.
i appreciate devlin’s post. who doesn’t love the beautiful game played well? wenger has won plenty of silverware and admirers all over the world with the way he set arsenal out to play. in the late 90s, i often frequented the african countries for work, visiting benin, tanzania, kenya, djibouti, and eritrea and it was good because arsenal was africa’s team. that meant i could always catch them on tv more than any other team in the world because they played the most beautiful football. also, there were players of african descent like vieira, kanu, and later lauren involved in this brand of football. win or lose, you were going to be entertained by arsenal. everybody wanted to play like them.