Arsenal beat Villa 2-1 in a sloppy game of football. Arsenal missed several good chances and probably should have been 3 or 4 goals to the good before half time but a big miss by Saka and few bumbles on the line left us with a 1 goal lead.
That shouldn’t have been a problem, however. Villa looked like utter trash for the first 60 minutes or so. I think they couldn’t even register a shot on target. Which was largely because Arsenal kept them hemmed in their own half. It was utter dominance by Arsenal, but we couldn’t quite put the game away.
As the 2nd half droned on I found myself getting bored with the game. Arsenal weren’t creating any chances and Villa were doing their level best to shit up the affair. Whenever I get bored I know exactly what’s going to happen next: Arsenal are going to concede a goal. And sure enough, no sooner than I had written “this is looking like one of those games we are going to wish we’d scored more” than they scored a goal from a corner.
Now, let me be clear here: the referees were absolutely out of their minds. Yesterday’s main official was Robert Jones. It was just his 2nd time refereeing an Arsenal match and only his 25th Premier League match. He’s not afraid to give a penalty, normally: he has 9 pens in his first 25 Premier League games. I guess he didn’t want to get to double figures? The VAR official was Darren England, the same referee who was in charge of the Leicester match and called a penalty for Jaime Vardy but had it overturned by Mike Dean in the VAR room. All of these officials watched Tyrone Mings throw Bukayo Saka to the ground in the penalty area and did nothing. And then in the 2nd half, they sat and watched as someone fully obstructed, actually held, Aaron Ramsdale, and scored a goal.
I watch a lot of football and I’m here to tell you that the officials in England aren’t really that bad. I also like the idea that Jones and England are young, new officials, and are getting a chance to referee the Premier League. The game is full of these subjective rules and frankly it makes the game really difficult to judge. But I just can’t see how it’s not a foul to pick a player up and throw him to the ground. Even if you think “Saka went down easily” or whatever, you still have to explain how it’s not a foul to physically chuck someone to the ground.
It’s crazy to me that this official took five minutes to make sure that the Arsenal wall was at least 1 step closer to the ball on a free kick but didn’t see anything wrong with the Saka thing or the corner kick. I am at a loss here.
As for their goal, I think Tomiyasu probably should have headed the ball away. And I think Ramsdale needs to shove the player away but none of that means that goal should have stood. If that’s the new standard for officiating, then we should be putting Gabriel on every keeper in the League and have him grapple them.
The officiating was sloppy and the football was sloppy. Almost as soon as Arsenal conceded the goal, they went down the other end of the pitch and scored. Matty Cash left Martinelli all alone at the far post (I think he was preemptively going to pick the ball out of the net) and Saka made a good cross for him. Martinelli did still need to put the shot away and he did, Arsenal’s lead was restored.
This really should have been a fun match. Arsenal put them to the sword early on and forced a lot of errors from Emi Martinez and Emi Buendia. But the officials ruined this contest for me, making it entirely about them and their performance instead of the players.
Speaking of the players. There were questions about whether Kieran Tierney can play the same way that Zinchenko does (drifting inside and playing like a CM in possession) he definitely did do that. He was 2nd on the team in progressive distance passed.
This represents a pretty major shift in the way Arteta has set the team up. Because the LB is able to play in CM, we now have Xhaka making runs into the box and acting like a chaos agent up top. He did need to drop deep and help Lokonga out a little more than he normally does but the fundamental way that he played was largely unchanged.
Speaking of Lokonga, I thought he was ok in the CDM role. He was pretty conservative in his passing (except one attempted throughball) and didn’t really need to make too many dribbles or carries forward (he was 5th in progressive distance carried). The only thing that made me nervous is that his touch was really loose at times. Midfielders generally can’t get away with taking a touch that allows the ball to travel 5 yards but fortunately Villa didn’t really press us in midfield so he ended the game with 0 turnovers.
It might be a moot argument (can he play DM?), however, as it looks like Arsenal are buying Douglas Luiz from.. Aston Villa. Yes, the guy who scored from the corner. I don’t know much about him other than the fact that he won the gold medal at the Olympics for Brazil (with Martinelli) in 2020. He played DM for that Brazil team. And he scores from corners.
A few worrying things from the game, however. One is that Ramsdale seemed to have been complaining about his hammy. We have a backup keeper and he’s apparently good at saves but I think we’d miss Ramsdale’s distribution. The other problem is that the giant shit head John McGinn crushed Ødegaard’s foot. Øde spent about 5 minutes limping around before being taken off. His backup is the new guy, Vieira. The other problem I’m seeing is that Saka looked dead tired for the last 60 minutes of this match. He only had 57 yards progressive carry yesterday which is nearly 100 yards below his average in the first 4 games this season (148). Nelson is ostensibly his backup but he’s injured and that leaves just Marquinhos. I should probably just stop worrying – maybe Marquinhos will be great! – but I can’t! Saka is crucial to the way that we play, he’s usually an outlet for our long balls on the right. I would ideally like to see him get some rest but we are going to need him for Sunday at Old Trafford.
I agree about Saka. Against Fulham I think Saka looked really good (not everyone agrees) – me made the right decision time and again to drive towards the box. Once there, he looked poor.
This game, he looked poor earlier on. Definitely looks like tiredness – physical, mental, maybe both.
But why, so early in the season? He got a rest over the summer, didn’t he? And the games have been a week apart (except for this one). I’m curious. An accumulation over the last couple of years?
He needs to be rotated, and a break from England duty for a bit maybe. If we paid a good chunk of change for Vieira and he can play in this position, we need to start introducing him. Especially if we’re not buying another player to play there.
A concern.
I don’t know man, look at that dribble he has just before he should’ve won a penalty off Mings. He beats like 5 dudes. Teams really clamp down on him and Jesus much prefers to combine with his compatriot on the other wing which often leaves him isolated. He does look jaded at times and I really thought ESR should’ve got the start today, but what do I know? We keep winning and Saka keeps being a big part of those wins.
It’s true, and sometimes the stats surprise you. His xG chain or whatever, his goal threat, consistently high.
Tactically, I thought it was interesting that we went back to a 4-2-3-1. I thought that suited Tierney really well because it allowed him to go back to doing what he does best: bombing up and down the touchline. I went back and looked at Zinchenko’s heat maps from Leicester compared to Tierney’s from yesterday and the difference is pretty clear: Tierney spends more time in defensive zones and much less time centrally. It’s evident from their pass distribution map too and pass success rates too. Tierney completed just 74% of his passes yesterday because he was trying to get to the byline and be really direct. He was excellent, but in a very different way to Zinchenko.
The change also forced Xhaka a little deeper than he has been when we were out of possession, but he still had license to roam and popped up all over the pitch. This was possible because Gabriel pushed up to the halfway line to cover the gaps he left behind, and Xhaka would rotate with Sambi who did not get involved in the buildup as much. Meanwhile Saliba hung back and played free safety, usually marking the slippery Watkins. If you look at their average positions, it’s striking how much further forward Gabriel was than Saliba. The upshot of this was that Xhaka could still make those second man runs from deep and be that “agent of chaos” like Tim says (much like the role Gundogan plays for City), and it was from one of those that Gabriel’s opener came. It was an excellent bit of sleight of hand from the manager, at once conceding to a two man pivot but still finding a way to keep the same numbers in attacking areas that we had with the 4-3-3.
All in all, I thought we played some really pleasing football, especially in the first half, against a Villa team that were clearly instructed to throw their weight around from the first whistle and despite a referee that seemed to turn a blind eye to their tactical fouling while immediately punishing the merest hint of one from one of our players. Kamara should have had two yellows in the first half as well, maybe McGinn too. Our habit of overcoming adversity will stand us in really good stead as the fixtures get harder and the weather turns colder.
Tierney and Zinchenko’s heatmaps are very similar, Doc. Zinchenko had more touches so it looks a little different but they are very similar.
Xhaka’s heatmap was very different. Much more central play by him.
https://www.sofascore.com/team/football/arsenal/42
I used whoscored… check out Zin’s pass locations compared to Tierney on the chalkboard. Much more central.
What I don’t understand is why most of the referees come from Yorkshire (where Mike Riley hails from) and the wo neighbouring regions (North-east and North-west). It’s not as if football is not played in the rest of the country. One of the highest concentration of football clubs can be found in London and surrounding regions.
North-south divide in UK is a real thing. If you speak to many people in North of England, they have a pathological hatred for people from the south of England. I did an analysis several years ago when Mike Dean was in peak form, and a handful of referees including Mike Dean who were all from the above 3 regions officiated a disproportionate number of games accounting to about 65%-70% of the total games.
Not much has changed since. Where does Robert Jones hair from from? You guessed it – born in Merseyside and belonging to Cheshire Football association (adjoining Yorkshire). What about Darren England? He’s from Mike Riley’s home county – Yorkshire.
Do you remember the last time when a close group of referees were repeatedly officiating certain games tilting the field slightly in favour of certain teams? Yes, it was the Calciopoli.
Of course, no suggestion that this can be repeated in good honest England. But are we really to believe that they don’t have any inherent bias ?
The Villa player did to Ramsdale what a Brentford player did to Leno in the first game last season… tied/held him up. Perhaps the view of the officials — with Ramsdale being behind the player — was that he couldn’t effectively hold him and was just defending space, but that’s a foul any way you look at it. He had his arms around him and impeded his movement. Maybe they’ll start giving free kicks the other way once every team starts doing it.
The potential get of Luiz would be a good one. Young, premiership tested Brazil international who is solid in midfield, can hit a dead ball, and has a mean progressive, vertical pass on him. The double injury may have forced it (Edu hinted a month ago that we had enough in midfield), but it’s the right move from Arsenal.
The sample size is small, but I have very little faith in Matt Turner from what I’ve seen in preseason. We may have solved the deputy problem in central midfield, but we’ve still got the issue at goalkeeper and wide right. Hope that Turner proves me wrong. Marq isnt ready and is as one-footed as Pepe is. Offers little threat on width and on the outside. But he’s not one for now, so that’s ok.
Ode has been sparkling, but part of me wants to see Vieira. Now he’s a player who excites me.
Alas, looks like it’ll have to wait until Jan at least. On paper, I like the idea of Danilo and Luiz replacing Elneny and Partey. The former because of his ceiling and age, the latter because of the other thing.
In practice, I’ve never seen either play enough to form real judgement.
Looked at the Mings incident (clip, not game) and Im of the view that Saka exaggerated that fall. Sorry. Calling it as see it. I thought beforehand that he did some kind of WWF move on Bukayo.
Ramsdale was clearly impeded though, and it should have been a fk the other way; goal disallowed.
No need to apologize.
Not sure what angle you saw, but Mings clearly uses his hips to lift him and then turns his torso to throw him. Watch here: https://twitter.com/nonewthing/status/1565236585553166336
I felt that way – especially the angle VAR showed. The other angles VAR shows make it clear Saka is just lifted and tossed aside.
Very good games thus far. On Saka, I think he has been really good, and funny enough I pick that up on second rewatch. He is in the right positions and going past defenders. His defense has been up there, not Martinelli level but close to. It’s just that final product that is lacking. Pass instead of a shot or placement of a shot instead of a hard hit. He might be trying too hard.
Very interesting game to watch huh?!
I was waiting on us becoming a side that teams give up their way of playing against, and just plan on how to stop us. It might start with them thinking they can outmuscle us, but our boys are really battle tested right now. Arteta’s insistence on intense training sessions might have the downside of players getting injured or exacerbating injuries in training, but the upside is that teams are going to slowly back down when they realise we can bo on the inside as well as we can on the outside. Props to Arteta for that, I really like that.
When they do finally realise that physicality won’t win out, they will have to come up with tactics for how to not lose by a lot. Gerrard came up with a blueprint that I thought would come a bit later on in the season, but at least we got to face it now.
Even though Saka has not scored and his output isn’t up there with our other attackers, his mere presence is a big issue that was always going to be a part of every team’s plans on neutralising Arsenal. Major change or not in structure, style of play or personnel, Saka would have been circled by every EPL manager as a threat when they face Arsenal. along with Odegaard, that right side is producing some amazing control, game management and serious threat, even though the output is more on the left.
Knowing that, Aston Villa sought to shut down the entire right flank by crowding it, being physical, pressing Ben White when in possession, shutting down the passing lanes from Saliba directly to Saka or Odegaard, as well as our holding midfielder in this case, Sambi. the average positions of their side has TWO players in the same spot as Sambi, and in direct line (vertically) with Odegaard. Odegaard, along with Saka, also had Two player in their immediate vicinity who looked to kick the living daylights out of them.
The two of them actually showed something scary which was that technically they are so good, crowding them basically amounts to suicide. They have the abillity to get past players (Saka’s dribbling in tight spaces seems better than his one-on-one wierdly), pass around pressure and also push back physically. It also leaves the opposition open to Xhaka, Jesus and Martinelli on that left side, and my oh my, its becoming a scary trio to face.
My props are to what those three are creating, which is a robust, hardworking, hard running, direct F*CKING threat. their combinations are never ending. everytime they get in possession, its either beating players, bullying opponents, combining and they SHOOT when they see the slightest opportunity to. It looks like our right side, from Saliba to White, Sambi, Odegaard and Saka, are built to move the ball and control. That left side??? beautiful chaos is what comes to mind.
Gerrard did say one thing before the game though that is a bit concerning, which is also something that Tim alluded to. Gerrard said Arsenal give the opposition a moment in games. I guess he meant that Arsenal give up control and let opposition dictate at a certain point in games. Villa tried to defend as best as they could while they waited for it, Fulham (in retrospect) seemed to do the same, and Man Utd will have noted the same thing.
I can’t even blame Arteta because in some games last season I thought he instructed his side to drop off, but the AON docuseries showed him asking for the complete opposite. So I really don’t know what’s going on here. Maybe this is where a player like Jorginho comes into play. A player to slow the game down without losing control of it. It has me considering Arthur Melo as a better signing than Douglas Luiz.
And on Sambi, its better to focus on what he has and what he rings to the table because he could add something that we didn’t even know we needed. for now, he just needs ames to acclimatise to the role all over again, having played the entire pre-season running box-to-box. He will find his moments to go forward, moments to stay back, what positions to take up to receive the ball from Ramsdale (who normally passes to Elneny and Partey from time to time never passed to Sambi whose positioning was all wrong), positions to take up to receive the ball from Saliba and White, where Odegaard and Saka like to receive the ball, when to run it insted of passing it, when to distribute long which he did very well as usual) and also, how much time on the ball our current system affords him.
There is no Partey calibre player who would come and sit n our bench, its not happening. But can we develop one? Can we allow one to grow into that calibre of player? 100%.
The boy is special people. While he is being compared with Partey by his own fans, they are missing the fact that looking at his peers, he is head and shoulders above so many players. Let us not pull a Guendouzi with him and compare a 23 year old with Partey. He is not a child and shouldn’t be judged as a development player, but we seem to have lost the patience for players around the ages of 22 to 25 who are developing into their final form. Eddie was facing a similar. If you are not a prodigy or established, you must not be good enough for this level. NO!!!
We have a gem guys. Look around world football and you will see what we have on our hands.
I love this, thank you for sharing.
We’ve looked like a furious swarm of bees to me this season. This is a change. When we played well last season I thought maybe we were seeing the ceiling of this team, glimpses of how good the team could be in a few years once consistency sets in. But this season so far has eclipsed that. We look so good bullying teams. Front the left, the right, every possession is a threat. From the kickoff. And Jesus, I didn’t realize he was so strong. Just bullies CBs, and he’s so small! Eddie too, he was playing games with them. If we concede, we get MAD, and score immediately. It’s insane, the best I’ve seen in a decade.
I’m loving it. It will end – probably against United! – but we’ve earned ourselves plenty of love.
This season for Saka is about learning how to thrive while being a targeted player. More adn more coaches will target him, and he will face more complex tactics designed to nullify him.
This season will test him more mentally than technically. He is already good enough on the ball, it’s all about how he uses that technical ability to overcome all the attention he will get.
I am not really concerned about this start. He is coping well so far and has still kept his focus on the team and the team’s objectives. If he starts trying to go it all alone just to feel like he is contributing, then we will start having a problem.
So far, he has been quietly very good.
Well said! His gravity alone is crucial to free up space for others. Watch how they target him in the buildup especially along the touch line near halfway. He has to work really hard to get the 1 v 1s that were conceded to him earlier in his career.