Atlanta v Arsenal – Champions League begins.

We have a fancy goals and assists counter at the bottom (phone) and sidebar (desktop).

Ambarish
Thanks for the explanation and hope springs eternal.

To be fair Altanta are 9th with mixed results losing to the bigger teams regularly buy a couple of goal margins.

We should be too strong for Atlanta even with Jorginho pulling the strings in midfield and will be interesting to see how good Rice is at supplying our forwards.

I think 1:2 to us, but I want us to be playing to our strengths and quiet 1 and 2 touch football through the Italians.

Some starting line ups with tactical line ups we can put out from the Mirror.

https://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/arsenal-odegaard-injured-atalanta-mancity-33703156

The goals is a nice improvement to the site, Ambarish, thank you.

Tony—as a longtime admirer of the Atalanta manager I generally get a good sense about what tactical tweaks Gasperini might employ against a particular opponent…his base model is a 3-4-2-1, but much like with the Italian national side it will morph into a something vastly different at each end of the pitch depending upon whom he perceives to be the opposition’s greatest threats

against Pool last season, in their rather convincing 3-0 victory at Anfield, when Klopp prioritized the PL and started Elliot and Gakpo out wide and Jones and Endo in the midfield, he clogged the middle, then sat a bit deeper in the flanks, so as to encourage them attack out wide…of course Pool obliged, as that was their tactical preference anyways, then as soon as they committed one too many players, they choked them out with well-timed “zonal” presses…as soon as Pool conceded possession they would attack with pace and numbers, in the most direct manner possible…if they failed to achieve the desired results they would quickly retreat and repeat the process…interestingly enough they looked much the deserving side even though they had less than 30% possession

whereas against Lever in the Europa Final, it looked far more like a 3-4-3, that relied far less on the above pressing scheme and much more on a man-to-man marking approach…Gasperini believed that the keys to stopping this still undefeated Lever side was to man-up their best distributors of the ball and wide side threats…by doing so he stymied Granit’s ability to be an effective pivot man, as he had no time or space on the ball, and even when he broke containment, his preferred target, Wirtz, was likewise being shadowed…these adjustments forced Lever into opting for either a slow, plodding course of action, or an overtly reckless, ball-conceding shit show…when the first plan failed miserably, they flipped the script, which left them exposed on the counter…of course, the fact that Lookman put on an absolute clinic certainly didn’t help matters

if we field a similar team to last week, with Rice replacing Tross and Jorginho acting as the poor man’s Ode, I think Gasperini will deploy a hybrid of the two approaches…a zonal press scheme against Saka, with one man defending the incoming pass, and the other concerned with the backside…then I think he will put a man on Havertz, forcing him to play more with his back to goal, and Jorginho, so that it will be difficult for him to pick a pass…finally he will attempt to defend Rice’s right leg, when on the ball, so as to trap the play on our less utilized left side

that said, I’m not sure how effective this plan will be this early in the year, as these sort of nuanced tweaks are generally more successful later in the season, but if it works and we end up committing more players into the final third, we had better be ready for their counter-attacks…ultimately I think MA will deploy another sideways borefest, which should be enough for us to eke out another victory, as I think Atalanta’s off-season transfer messiness has negatively impacted their form thus far…Cheers

Ambarish—not sure I agree with your “easy draw” take, except to say that it could be worse…I think the one thing that favours us is the fact that we only play each opponent once, which makes things far easier for our one-trick pony of a manager, as opposing managers can’t devote the same attention to details as they would if we faced each opponent twice…now there’s a couple tricky away fixtures, like Inter and Sporting, along with tonight’s affair, but it would be shocking if we didn’t cruise into the next round…if that doesn’t pan out, things could get rather messy come the holiday season…of course, by that time we should be substantially more healthy, fingers-crossed

probably wise to switch Jorginho with Havertz, even though the latter has been rather dire as a midfielder since he arrived…this will likely enable Jesus to come deeper and Havertz to run in behind at times, which will make it more difficult for Atalanta to double-team Saka…I’m also pleased that Marts is playing so that their wingbacks will have to be more honest when it comes to their positioning

Ambarish—there was no way that MA was going to put Ethan in the starting 11 in a CL away fixture…not to mention, if all the rumours are true, regarding Jesus’s camp being pissed at his lack of playing time, it makes some sense that he’s in the starting 11, which meant that Havertz was always going to be shoehorned in somewhere

Atlanta playing the good old man marking game, specially that midfield.

TRVL

Yeah, I was being too optimistic forgetting Mikel likes his own toys.

based on how their Keeper is playing I would make him play the ball as much as humanly possible…he’s got a shocker or two in him tonight

Free kick around the box.. let’s do it

that Ederson yellow could be crucial, as he’s there best man marking midfielder

Ref is the guy that looks like Tross. A good omen.

Brilliant one from Saka, though didn’t go in..

KP—I knew you were going to say that…what match was it when you first mentioned the resemblance?

that’s the kind of tracking we’ll need tonight

how Havertz doesn’t have a yellow yet is beyond me…I guess it might be worth it to try and get Ederson his second yellow

you would think we would avoid trying to stop quick free kicks like the plague nowadays

we’re very fortunate he snatched at that attempt

this sort of more plodding 50/50 affair should favour us, as we should be much harder to breakdown than them

this is the kind of match that highlights White’s deficiencies going forward, as Saka has been relegated to an afterthought thus far…if Ode is out for an extended period we need to contemplate putting Timber on the right, in his natural position, and Calafiori on the left

Ambarish—I’m not defending his camp, as I would have sold him off this past summer, but I’m sure there are some interesting Brazilian pressure points inside the Emirates, especially with Edu being MA’s underling

get used to this sort of uninspiring football if Ode is out for an extended period…this is why we should have targeted a real Striker and an Ode-like player on the left side

this Atalanta side has been leaking goals in Serie A so far yet we can’t seem to create a good chance from open play…the only nibble we had was on Saka’s set piece strike…it speaks to MA’s lack of tactical prowess when it comes to scheming up offensive opportunities…let’s hope there’s a sense of urgency in the 2nd half

there would have been no need for Partey to do what he did if White wasn’t so far out of position

glorious double save, albeit horrible first penalty attempt