Well, we all knew we weren’t a match to Man City with their 33-goal scorer Haaland and the best midfielder on the planet in Kevin De Bruyne. But no one expected that we won’t show up for a fight. In the title race when a win was a 6 pointer, we lost and we lost badly. A 4-1 score is as bad as it gets, but the way we played it could have been worse.
So, where did it go wrong? As a starter, Arteta failed to adjust to the Pep’s tactics. Their first goal was a result of the free space De Bruyne was enjoying between our midfield and defence. In the first 30min, it happened couple of times when the pair of Haaland and De Bruyne were left with our CBs. I don’t think anyone can beat Haaland for the pace, it was a fight to be lost. We should have adapted, we should have dropped down and closed the space . We could have switched back to back 3 and fight on counters.
Second, we stuck to the playing XI which didn’t work against Liverpool, West Ham, and Southampton. Yes, Xhaka was back in place of Vieira but it doesn’t make any difference. Both are poor! If you say what options we had, I would like to point out that it’s our own doing. We haven’t been polishing the bench. We gave Vieira couple of matches in spite of his poor performance in his first, but we didn’t try an ESR. We haven’t tried a Partey + Jorginho midfield pairing. Saka looked knackered but we didn’t see Nelson allowing him some rest. Kiwior was brought into the fold against Liverpool, in last 20 min; I’m sure it wasn’t the perfect time to begin your premier league career.
Arteta’s stubbornness to play his favourites and not adapting to what’s in front, has cost us games. If you expect a player to deliver in 60 games a year, and if he don’t, you switch things up. Jesus might be great in compact spaces and running into 3 opposition players, but where’s the end result? If your CF do not have a goal in him, bring on Eddie. Revert to Trossard at the front who looks more clinical.
I don’t know, there has been a lot of things which we can see is wrong, but our manager sticks to the same old – same style, same player, same tactics.
Here’s the bitter truth. We didn’t lose the title because of this City game. We lost it against Pool (going 2-0 up), West Ham (going 2-0 up again), and Southampton (going 2-0 down at home in first 15min). I understand we are a young team, but young guns can fire too. It don’t matter if it’s your captain, if he is not having a good day, bring on your other no. #10, who saved your career at some point and was considered the next DeBruyne.
I’m not sure how much Arteta will learn from this but I’m sure of this – he is going to spend another 200m to bring some more enforcements, but with this stubbornness and Champions League + Premier League next season, we will have the same conundrum. Unless he buys another playing XI, which is not likely.
Here’s another one – if you think it’s a progress to finish 2nd this season, remember that Arteta was appointed as the head coach of Arsenal on 20th Dec, 2019. It’s been 3.5 years, with half a billion spent on a completely new playing XI bar our academy products. This season has been anomaly, Liverpool is having a bad one, Chelsea are sh*t, Spurs are spursy, and United is going through a rebuild under Tan Hag. If you think allowing 3 years for a manager, only to see him finish second after having a 9 point lead at some point, is considered a progress, then you have very low expectation.
With money coming in for New Castle, Chelsea appointing Poch probably, united getting stronger, Pool back in their form, what happens next? It would be tougher than this season. There will be 2 games a week and more Saliba-esque injuries. Who will we blame? Fixtures? Injuries? Bad weather? Because that’s what we have been doing apparently from like last 10 years.
We need an upgrade. We need an upgrade on Xhaka, whose average performance looks like a world class by his standards. We need a midfield, because you buy all the 50m defenders as you want, but it’s not gonna work if you don’t have functioning midfield. We need a better goal scorer if you don’t have confidence in Eddie. And we need an upgrade on the manager. Learning on the job is not a bad thing, but the pace is too slow for a club as big and as ambitious as Arsenal.
We need courage. We don’t need a captain who goes missing in big games, we have had enough of Ozil for years. We need the winning mentality, not the one we saw against West Ham of dropping performance after going 2-0 up. We need players who make fun of the opposition, on the pitch; who can bully the opposition, who are not satisfied with 2-0 lead at Anfield and want more.
Frankly, it has been a depressing month. We have thrown away the title and there’s no one else to blame. It was ours to lose, and we lost it. I’m angry, I’m frustrated and I’m sure you are, too. I hope the players feel the same, and motivates themselves to make the best of rest of the season.
It’s over for me, but we fight again tomorrow.
Chelsea have gone with a pacey front line.
Tonight could be the ultimate managerial CUNT vs CUNT contest.
Marc-it’s clear that our recent form and MA’s chosen side will embolden a Chelsea squad that has struggled for goals to play on their front foot, which does worry me a little…what happens if we cock-up another fixture???
I’m all for squad rotation, but it has to be done with some modicum of tactical insight…I would have rather that we started Nelson for Saka, Tierney for Zinchenko and had ESR replace Xhaka, as this would have given us some width on both sides of the pitch and vastly increased our available pace…of course, if we didn’t have a one trick pony on the touchline we could have made a variety of differing selection choices, but I’m just not convinced what’s on offer today fits the typical Arteta script
here’s hoping that Chelsea’s anemic scoring record since FF’s return continues to be the storyline today…it’s clear that Chelsea’s new sugar daddy expected much more from the greatest player expenditures in PL history, but let’s be clear that much of the spending was with the future in mind
btw the match commentators just remarked that Arteta has made less changes than any other manager in the PL this season, to which I respond no shit Sherlock
If Xhaka had a right foot….
what a weirdly frantic opening 5 minutes…Chelsea’s backline looks to be ripe for the plucking, unfortunately our first easy chance landed on Xhaka’s foot
KP-are you sure that wasn’t his left foot? it’s so hard to tell nowadays
If Xhaka could control a pass…
Chelsea are a disorganized mess out there so we better pot a couple before they take their collective heads out of their asses
Kroenke
If Xhaka could play football!
Kiwior needs to settle down – looks like a headless chicken rushing about.
Chelsea are fucking terrible
Marc
You wrecked my punchline.. That was coming next!
You away on business or something?
Great finish
I’ve witnessed some exceptionally boring former Chelsea sides, but never quite this pathetically disjointed
I must have a fairly sizeable time delay
Fucking nice goal. My TV coverage is 2 minutes slow!
I was just about to say how much I missed Auba’s pressing abilities!
Kroenke
Nah – Going straight from work on a school night means 3 hours in the pub prior kick off plus a quick beer after the alternative is rushing home to get the train and not getting a chance to eat etc.
Truth is struggling to be excited about Arsenal and selling my ticket for tonight knocks £80 off my renewal.
Maybe goalie shdve stopped it.
Good economic strategy mate! Jam tomorrow – Kroenke would be proud.
I certainly take back my initial selection concerns if this is going to be par for the course from Chelsea…that said, I feel like Marts would have been already on the board if he were starting
why are we all of a sudden sitting deeper…oh yeah, MA’s post-goal strategy blues…maybe he was banking on a 1-0 result
good save…Chilwell probably should have done more on his preferred foot
TRVL
Tross is having a night to forget so far.
KP-I just don’t see him as a like-for-like Marts replacement, as he needs to be tucked inside more…problem with that is when Xhaka is playing in more advanced spaces, he needs to give way…talk about deferring to the totally less appealing option…just once I would like to see Tross on for Xhaka, with Marts on the pitch
Another nice finish.
Maybe I was wrong about Arteta and Xhaka – having a player so useless on the pitch the opposition completely ignores him might have benefits!
Beautiful ball across for Ode
Xhaka has now had 3 silver platter opportunities, with nothing to show for it…I doubt he was actually passing to Ode, as that was definitely meant for Jesus…we should be up at least 3 or 4 by now, but I’ll take the 2-0 scoreline
Marc-like I’ve said all along, just imagine if we had someone of consequence playing for Xhaka…either he too would be left largely ignored or he would open up space for other important players
Good grief Chelsea are shit.
My Mum would have them organised better – I don’t know who the fuck the new owner is but he’s gonna get lynched next time he shows up in West London.
I hate to be glass half empty, but a lot of this is down to how poor Chelsea are.
TRVL
We’ve been on the same page re Xhaka for about 6 seasons!
Kiwior plays at seria A speed.
Chelsea should fire FF at half, as per his request, especially if he has any hopes of getting another managerial gig at some future date
Kroenke
That’s not half empty its an honest assessment of what we’re seeing.
Marc
If your mum gets the Chelsea job after Frank, and needs a teaboy, tell her I’ll do it for 5 mill a year. ☕
KP-that aint glass half empty, as even Stevie fucking Wonder can see just how shit Chelsea are on this evening
We’ve blown 2x 2 goal leads recently, can we fuck up a 3 nil lead?
the 3 of us are in a great minds think alike echo chamber and it’s so fucking amusing (for real)
KP-I feel a tad safer against this particular opponent, considering they’ve scored 1 goal in the last 5 fixtures…I seriously hope I haven’t spoken too soon…
with that previous thought in mind, Arteta might try to start 2 Keepers in the second-half