Man City, Man U, Tottenham, and Liverpool all dropped points this weekend and gifted Arsenal a golden opportunity to climb into second place with a win over Burnley. Though such a feat is far from guaranteed.
Much has been made of Burnley’s away form this season and for good reason. They have taken just one point in 9 matches, scoring just three goals and conceding an amazing 20 goals.
The reason Burnley are so atrocious away from home is that they are an Allardycian side: they sit deep, don’t act proactively to win the ball back, hit long balls over the top, and try to control the clock more than the ball. They do this both home and away.
Burnley attempt the third fewest passes of any away team in the League (349), the second most total long balls (81), and the 2nd highest percentage of their passes are long balls (23%). But despite playing deep and giving the opposition most of the ball this doesn’t mean that they are trying to win the ball back. This is what I mean by Allardycian.
They have the second fewest tackles of any away team (25.1) and 3rd fewest fouls (11.1). They are 9th in interceptions and that is their one and only proactive defensive stat. What they do a lot of is clearances (33.3), shots allowed (22), blocked shots (7.1), and saved shots (5.6). They are 3rd, 2nd, and 1st worst in all of those categories. In real terms, they deserve the away record that they have. As a manager, your team cannot just simply lie there are take it up em the way that Burnley do.
They are also the worst in a ton of these categories in the final 15 minutes of matches, meaning that at basically no time in the match, are they at all trying to win games. They are even dead last in shots taken in the first 15 minutes of away games (0.8), third worst in saves (0.7), and (of course) number one in aerial duels in the first 15 minutes (9.3). Their entire game plan revolves around sitting back and trying to hit opposition on counters.
Arsenal should have this.
You must be logged in to post a comment.