At the end of the Wenger era there was one absolute certainty to the Arsenal – they would collapse under pressure. Not under the pressure of a title race, because we only had one of those, but just under the normal pressure that any team would put on Arsenal when they were in possession of the ball. Time and again, Arsenal would be playing beautiful passing football and the opponent would simply decide that it was time to press an Arsenal player, they would win the ball, and Arsenal would be put into panic mode.
The result was penalties, wild tackles, stupid yellow cards, and errors leading to shots and goals. Arsenal were the most error-prone team in the Premier League. Players like Mustafi, Xhaka, and David Luiz were often scapegoated as the problem, and while they were absolutely a huge part of the problem, it was a problem which ran much deeper than just dropping a few guys because it lasted at Arsenal until about 12 months ago.
Arteta changed Arsenal. He worked on in-game management. He moved players like Xhaka out of positions where pressure would cause them to do stupid things. And he dropped players who didn’t respond well in pressure situations. Arsenal increased the talent levels all over the pitch and Arteta installed a new system with automaticisms which helped ease the pressure by playing higher up the pitch, creating overloads in possession, by creating openings off the ball, and by making sure that defensively Arsenal had good cover if they did lose the ball.
It seemed to have worked, mostly. Most of the matches, especially against lesser opponents, Arsenal were able to play through the pressure and get a good win. But there were a few times last season where it looked like Arsenal reverted to bad old Arsenal. Many fans put it down to injuries and there is a kernel of truth to that, however, the collapse of March 2022, where Arsenal lost 4 of five matches in the month between March 16th and April 16th, signaled the end of the Arsenal charge for top four.
So, Arteta went back to the drawing board. The players who were “the problem” – Soares, Lokonga, and Tavares – were shipped out and new players brought in. And there’s no question that it worked. Arsenal have been pressed and tested and have come out on top for most of the season. Arsenal are top of the League literally because they have addressed the problem of dealing with on-the-ball pressure. It’s no exaggeration to say that the ability to not just deal with the pressure but to pass out of it has been the factor which led to Arsenal’s success this season.
Which is why it’s been so disheartening to see Arsenal struggle again under pressure this season. Dyche’s Everton were the first team to really give us hell. Arsenal looked almost shell-shocked as Everton just refused to give us any time on the ball. That was followed up by Brentford, who easily could have won – and I know that their goal should have been offside but they outplayed us that day and I’m not brokering any debate about that. And then Arsenal faced Man City and lost both possession of the ball and composure. Guardiola’s City didn’t even need the ball to beat us. It was disheartening and many folks wondered if Arsenal could bounce back.
They did. And it was pretty convincing. The only small blip was Sporting. Sporting pressured Arsenal off the ball and out of the Europa League. But many again put that down personnel: Arteta had made a number of changes to stay fresh for the League.
Arsenal were cruising, all the way up until the final 60 minutes against Liverpool. It’s easy to blame Xhaka for the Liverpool turnaround; his asinine elbow on Trent did electrify the crowd and players. But it was an entire team collapse. The entire Arsenal system, all of the players, struggled to get the ball out of their own half. We couldn’t press them and win the ball back and we couldn’t hold them off. Arsenal had a good chance at the end and could have taken all three points but it would have been incredibly lucky considering the balance of the game.
And then came West Ham. Once again, Arsenal raced out to a 2-goal lead. And once again Arsenal couldn’t handle the pressure. Declan Rice and Antonio bossed Arsenal. Arsenal lost their heads. And worst of all, Arsenal looked like they were out of answers. So many times, Arsenal had possession and faced an organized wall of two players and looked like we didn’t know what to do to get past it. It was a combination of disheartening, boring, and frustrating. Arsenal were dominated. By a team that were in a relegation battle.
I’m not going to say that this is the title race over. Obviously, mathematically and statistically Arsenal are still in the title race. But I’m also not going to argue with anyone who thinks the title race is over. Arsenal are still in the situation where if they beat Manchester City, they win the League. But the question here is do we think we can beat City? Even with everyone fully healthy I’m not sure that’s possible. Arsenal seem to have been found out in terms of both their tactics and their mental strength.
You may have a point about pressure, but we have improved, and we are still outperforming to be where we are right now. We cannot lose players like Saliba and expect it not to matter, we don’t have the depth. City may slip up occasionally but they have 2 interchangeable players in each position. Over time that means depth and continuity, and reversion to the mean tells us the likely outcome. We *might* win the title, but we shouldn’t. Not this year anyway…
We are definitely improved but it looks a bit to me like teams have figured out how to play against us in attack. The start to the second half was absolutely dreadful from Arsenal today. We were time-wasting right from kickoff and never seemed to get into the game. At this point, I trust Arteta to find some new ways to get the ball up the pitch and I think he did that for a bit today but West Ham adjusted and were able to figure it out, largely. That, to me, is pretty scary. Really feels like a bigger problem.
You’re upset. I get it but you needed to take a breath before writing this piece.
So, you cherry-picked the games Arsenal struggled in to fit your narrative while choosing to ignore the rest? So all the other wins were through sheer luck or better, those teams haven’t figured Arsenal out how to pressure Arsenal? I sometimes like your writing but this isn’t one of those times.
I absolutely didn’t ignore the rest of the games.
“So all the other wins were through sheer luck or better, those teams haven’t figured Arsenal out how to pressure Arsenal?”
Just off the top of my head I can think of 3 games when Arsenal won purely by luck. 1-0 against Leeds when we were against the ropes for the most part, and Bamford missed a PK. 4-2 against Villa when it took 90th minute strike by Jorginho that went in off Martinez for an own goal. And 3-2 against Bournemouth when Nelson scored in the 95th minute. All three games could’ve easily been draws or losses. So yes, we’ve gotten our share of lucky wins this season.
We should be able to beat a team like West Ham, who played on Thursday and have other priorities, given a 2-0 lead and 80 minutes to play. There are absolutely no excuses whatsoever.
I do think it is nerves. You can see it in how we couldn’t even hold the ball. Teams have pressed us all season, we normally just pass around them. We just…. stopped playing.
Yes, Holding and Tierney for Saliba and Zinch gives us less ability to pass out, evade the press. You can see it, but we should still be good enough.
It takes immense mental fortitude to do this thing, to win the league, and the players have a lot of credit here. They’ve been immense. But this game showed just how immense they need to be. More than they currently arse, unfortunately.
No excuses, under normal circumstances we should have won, even with injuries. But that shouldn’t detract a thing from the team over the course of the season.
As long as fans back the team we should be okay.
*wades into Twitter*
Buggerit, we’re fcuked.
I watched the game again. To me if looked like over confidence or complacency which changed the dynamics in both the matches. There is definitely a problem of not being able to retake the control but that can happen in away games. I have seen MC not being able to control the tempo, e.g Newcastle away, although they retook the control later on. I don’t see anything structurally wrong unlike last year.
Not having Zinc and Saliba today was a deal killer.
Either move White inside to partner with Gabriel or put Saliba back in or forget it.
That means moving Saka back there or Reuell Walters, and move Trossard up top-something, anything.
Mikel has to change the tactics and play with players who can hold the ball, dribble the ball, and interchange positions in many areas.
Where the hell was ESR today too?
The team can get their confidence back with just 1 clean sheet!
If Mikel wants to play for 2nd place, then he will keep doing what he is doing.
AFC are never going to be 2 players deep at every position, at least not in my lifetime.
“Where the hell was ESR today too?”
Been wondering about that myself… I mean, I would think you’d put in a guy with a number 10 shirt on it ahead of Vieira or Nelson. Baffling, to say the least.
Tierney is no Zinchenko and it really hurt the team. He tried to play inverted, but ended up playing more as a pivot and was poor at progressing the ball, it felt like it was a lot of backwards passing. When he stayed wide and played more as a more traditional LB it was better. I think Arteta didn’t adjust his tactics to suit the personnel available. Jesus would have been better off the bench in this game and dropping Xhaka back into the pseudo-left back role earlier would have helped ball retention, and sub Trossard in for Tierney to play the LCM and link/exchange with Martinelli. Partey was not having a good game, Jorginho at half time would have made sense. Agree tho, with Saliba and Zinchenko, this game is a joke for the Arsenal. I think this summer in addition to adding Declan Rice, Edu might need to look for a LB or RB that can do what Zinchenko provides, if there’s no plan B. Tomiyasu can flip LB and RB back-up. Not sure if Kiwior has it in his locker to play as an inverted back like Stones is doing for City.
1000% agree, especially as it relates to Tierney. He has an instinct to defend first. Ready to drop back at the first sign of an attack. Wonderful for many teams. Not for us. In addition, he also will just boot the ball when he senses pressure. Running backwards? Kick it out of bounds. High ball back near our box. Clear it out of danger. Zinny has a possession mindset. He takes those same balls and holds possession and resumes attack as quickly as possible. Maybe to a fault. And he’s a key outlet/partner for party and Gabriel. Little pieces that come apart start to add up.
Last season is starting to echo. We were in a good position, then a couple of losses and all of a sudden we had to beat Spuds away to get CL. And players were getting injured and we were losing our ability to play our style. Now we have the same challenge, but this time we have to win at the Etihad (and Newcastle). A taller order than what we had hoped for. I’m not ready to say it can’t happen, but I’m not in the “We got this” category any more.
It’s not Tierney that was the “problem”. Against Wham he passed 200 yds progressive passing. Against Fulham, Zinch passed 219 yards progressive passing. You can’t even say that the problem was White for Saliba since they had about the same yards in those two matches.
I think it was a combination of Ramsdale bombing long (he led Arsenal in progressive passing with a huge 530 yards) and Odegaard getting essentially marked out of the game.
Progressive yards is not the only metric to judge their comparative contributions. Zinny might take down a ball under pressure and pass 3 yards to Partey, or back to Gabriel, whereas Tierney just hoofs it away. The stat that demonstrates this is simple. Completion %. Against WHAM, Tierney had 78% completion. To use your comparison, against Fulham, Zin had 89% completion rate. That squares with my observation. When Zin gets the ball, we keep possession. When Tierney gets the ball, we give it away more. That was the big problem in the 2nd half. We didn’t control the ball. That wasn’t the only problem, and he wasn’t the only culprit, but it was a factor.
I think we can all read the writing on the wall – Tierney is sold this summer. He’s a very good LB, but not for the JDP positional play Arteta wants to use. Everyone is doing it – TAA is inverting into midfield now for Klopp, Stones for City, Rico Lewis. The only way I see Tierney working in this team now is if we had a Caicedo playing beside Partey at the base of midfield triangle and then the LB doesn’t need to tuck in during possession. And someone like Trossard on LW who more plays the half-channel. But that’s a whole new wrinkle to the team and maybe it’s in Arteta’s long term plans to be able to make tactical switches like this, but baby steps – he has a young team and they’re winning playing the current system.
I mean, Tierney doesn’t just hoof it away. that’s a huge over exaggeration and completely unnecessary to your point which was otherwise well made.
The biggest difference is that Zin made 9/10 of his long passes and Tierney made 5/9. Also in midrange passes, Tierney missed two more than Zin.
Passing is a two way street also, and again, I think that part of the reason why West Ham were so effective is that they were able to block off our passing lanes. They did have the third most interceptions any team has had against Arsenal this season. And that’s not entirely just down to Tierney, Saka and Jesus had terrible games from a ball-retention/passing/receiving standpoint.
Would you say though Zinchenko makes more progressive dribbles tho?
Much more progressive carries on average, yes.
An entertaining and overall, fun season. A vastly improved team. But. Still. Not. Good. Enough. For the top prizes anyway.
As Tim points out, that’s consecutive 2-goal leads blown which teams with real title cred just cannot and will not do. We ran out of gas at this time last year as well, and we will have to “settle” for second, or worst case, 3rd place.
Third isn’t really in the cards. I think we’re 15 points ahead of United. We’d have to lose 5 of the last 8 matches for them to catch us. If that happens I’d really question whether Arteta is the right man for the job.
It would be a total collapse and highly unlikely but as neurotic Gooner of many years, I recognize and fear any negative mathematical possibilities!
Being found out easily, right from the off West Ham set to press us and we scored two goals against the run of play.
West Ham unlike Liverpool dint really change anything tactically.
The subs were just like the performance, the boss dint know what he was supposed to do, the Jesus sub was done at home and he couldn’t change that in game.
Saka is just not there, and the pen was more likely going to miss as he has lacked confidence lately. I said before he took it just dint feel confident .
Beyond City Newcastle and Brighton will cause us more problems and we need to be ruthless. If a player is having a bad day take him out let him watch.
I wouldn’t go so far as to say they “dominated” us. Nor would I have said our goals were against the run of play. I think we were on top for the first 30. But then some combination of we took our foot off the gas and they figured out how to play us.
And until the last 15 or so, they were then on top. Arteta needs to have something a little different for a Plan B.
Not sure if Saka is tired, but hasn’t quite been himself. I can understand why Areta left him on after to the penalty miss to keep his confidence up and give him a chance for redemption. And Odegaard was good initially but then got a little too tricky, too many back heels and flicks.
Holding is not terrible, but we do miss Saliba. Having two big, fast CBs allows us to play a higher line and apply more pressure. And they can cover for each other a little better.
We’ll see what happens against Soton. A good response and I won’t be too worried, regardless what happens against City. But another effort like this and Pool will be problematic.
Also, what was the deal with VAR on their first goal? It certainly looked like Rice kept it under control because it hit his arm. But while there was commentary about it right after it happened, no replays. Nor was there commentary or replays shown during half? Seems weird.
I completely agree with the way you saw the game. We started very well, dominated, produced fluid football and score twice. Then things changed. We retook control for the last minutes. But we were we sterile for much of the game. I don’t remember Fabiansky having to stop one ball.
We have difficulties with a well organised high press (like most teams). To escape from that, we need technically strong players, comfortable with the ball. That’s where Saliba and Zinc would have helped. With regard to that, Partey had a weak game. He usually does well the call the ball under pressure and recycle it vertically.
And most vexing of all: yes, Rice handled the ball. He had his forearm raised, it was a blatant handball and the VAR did not even look at it, it seems. The bloody machine (or rather the humans using it) cost us 4 points and possibly the title.
I actually don’t think we started well. You can tell with this team, in the first 5 minutes, what the game is going to be like. We looked timid, withdrawn. We scored 2 good goals that I did not see coming. West Ham were shook, starting to drift mentally, and then Partey just let them back in. And then we reverted to those first 5 minutes.
We did pretty well for about 25-ish minutes, then collapsed. I’ll argue that that wasn’t a penalty (he was already in the air even before contact), but that doesn’t change that we didn’t play well.
I’ll be honest, the performance itself is a lot more worrying than the results to me. I hope our performance can pick back up. But honestly, that draw in the grand scheme (as grand as football gets anyway) of things didn’t change the situation that much.
A 3-point lead and a 1-point lead, assuming City wins their game in hand, makes almost zero difference since we still have a game against them coming up. Even with a 3-point lead, we still need to get at least a draw against them since our GD is far behind and every goal we lose against them counts double. The situation is exactly the same with a 1-point lead, where we can still be above them even with just a draw.
We just used our leeway against West Ham instead of another game in the future. In terms of points, we’re still in the title race, but yeah, it’s gonna be incredibly tough and I’m not sure that we can do it.
when you’re up 2-0, you have to win that game if you want to be champions. this is regardless of who you’re playing or where. arsenal are being chased down by an absolute machine in man city. i referred to them as the terminator. they’re relentless; easily the best team in the world right now.
while the jury’s still out on zinchenko, i thought today was a game he needed to play. likewise, i think the liverpool game was a game he needed to sit. i don’t know what went into arteta’s thinking; maybe concern with jared bowen.
partey was uncharacteristically sloppy with the ball today. he’s typically very sound in possession.
bukayo needs to be dropped but will arteta have the balls to drop england’s golden boy? after all, he’s yet to sign a new contract. with saka’s recent performances, trossard is too good to not be in the team right now.
i wanted bukayo to take the penalty because i felt he needed a goal. if arsenal fail to win the championship by a point or 2, i’m afraid that penalty miss might haunt him.
Troussard is very good, but I wonder if Saka is having a loss of form or if teams are just setting up to nullify the right side too well. I remember cringing a few times at the positions he was receiving the ball in from White, not much room/time to do anything really.
Is it me or was Xhaka rather anonymous? Could we have Trossard behind the three attackers? At least when we chase a (season defining) goal.
C’mon folks, don’t be so downbeat! We are still top of the league by 4 points! In this league it is unreasonable to assume you are going to win every away game.
I don’t know about West Ham bossing us, but the passing was definitely not as good as it has been. Missing Saliba will do that. I didn’t mind Zinchenko rested for Tierney, but asking Tierney to do Zinchenko things is not optimal – his strengths are different.
Still, we had a penalty at 2-1 and Saka missed it. That’s not good enough at this level.
We’ve been out of the race like three times this season and City have slipped each time. I hope we’re “briefing” the PGMOL pretty thoroughly because that’s how they won their last game against us and it cannot happen again.
If last week felt like point gained (even after going 2-0 up) then this one definitely feels like 2 points dropped. You just don’t lose games like this, especially when the title is on the line. This is where City have an advantage over us, they’ve got that Champions mentality. And we… we seem to crack under pressure, and I think it’s as much on the players as it is on the manager. Holding, Partey, Gabriel, Saka, and even Ramsdale on their 2nd goal all had a game to forget but what has been said by Arteta at halftime? After the game? As some already noted, why play Tierney in the inverted fullback role when it’s clearly not something he’s comfortable doing? Can Saka be dropped? What happened with ESR? So many questions yet we seem to be lacking answers/solutions.
Biggest regret is St. Totteringham day was delayed! Maybe Friday!
The beauty of the game is that its full of surprises. This team has more points than Haaland and Co. in April. Everybody kept putting time frames to when arsenal gonna bottle it, yet it is still in our hands.
It is a low chance to win at the Etihad, but it would not be impossible, far from it because this is football. We all follow this game for such moments. It saddens me to see arsenal fans who do not want to belive or dream.
This reply is meant to be a comment on the artical.
@Tim
One thing I notice in all the games you mentioned in the article is that trossard didn’t start any.
He started all our 7 game wins & was benched for the last 2 draws.
Jesus is scoring but slowing our tempo with his injury acts & we seem to need a high tempo to attack well.
Ode, despite scoring has been hidden last 2 games which seems to affect Saka.
I suggest 1 of Ode or Jesus needs to be dropped for trossard. He seems to have a business-like attitude to him that I’m not fully getting from Jesus (especially when we are ahead).
Great Post and great comments from you guys. I agree re Leo.. he has a hunger and gave us something different. 7 and 0 when he’s played including 3 assists in 1 match. Nothing against Jesus, brilliant player and a complete pain in backside for opponents when he plays but dynamic has changed somewhat. Main concern (and yes he’s still learning) MA8 gotta use his subs more effectively. Saka should have been hooked. And please Mikel put on ESR and not Vieira who’s still new to this league and learning. Last wk v LFC puts on Kiowier (sp?) With 10 mins to go? A game of that magnitude? Wtf.. ? MA8 you’ve learnt from the best. AW, PG, etc.. don’t balls it up bcos u have favs do your in game management and make the correct substitutions at the right time. Putting Eddie on in 87/88th wtf? Why?
Many folks are commenting on the weird subs that Arteta does. I haven’t a clue what he’s thinking half the time. On ESR I do wonder if he’s not fit or if there’s another problem.
Cheers Tim. Agree re ESR there is some kind of agenda. Was the man who turned our season around and saved MA8’s job v Chelsea. Then demands the no’10 and gets it but maybe MA8 doesn’t like some1 questioning his authority? (See pea n MO?) or maybe he doesn’t think ESR is not fully fit? Too many questions not enough answers. We had it with Bruce Rioch n Wrighty in the past and DB10 with AW when he chose to play Kanu over our superstar duchman
Tbf, I didn’t see anything wrong with Nelson’s game. Probably he’s just fitter/performing better than ESR ATM?
haha … you guys … go ahead and do you …
I am silently confident that we’re gonna win it.
Cheers!