Arsenal huffed and puffed but couldn’t find enough to blow Burnley’s house down at the Emirates this afternoon, the game finishing in a disappointing stalemate.
There were some chances, Nick Pope making a superb save to deny Emile Smith Rowe, while Alexandre Lacazette failed to make the most of Smith Rowe’s drive and creativity, putting the best chance of the game wide.
The shortcomings in squad depth were obvious again, so let’s hope that that is addressed before the end of the window.
Here’s how the players rated this evening.
Read the Arsenal 0-0 Burnley match report and see the goals here
Liverpool 0-0 Arsenal – Player Ratings
The ratings are hidden by default until you vote, but if you just want to view the ratings and the comments, flick the switch at the top above Aaron Ramsdale. Also, please give the ratings a few seconds to load.
Absolute shite. That Laca miss literally hurt 😭
Did you kick something in frustration?
It crushed my soul 💔
Down vote for my pet hate of misusing the word literally..
After todays match I just can’t handle it.
Down vote for missing apostrophe in today’s.
Downvote for your missing apostrophe.
You literally can’t handle it?
The definition has now literally changed due to usage, so they’re actually using it correctly… sorry to rub salt in the wound.
I disagree. Radical descriptivism is silly. If a word means everything then it means nothing.
Just give Vlahovic what he demands and get him the number 9 position quickly!!
Which one? This game or last one?
Lol touché. This one more so because the net was wide open and a win was so badly needed and expected. But both were extremely deflating
Laca just doesn’t score many goals these days. Letting him be seen as some kind of No10/enforcer is not helping and he spends all his energy running around defending.
I like Laca as a dude but not as my starting striker. This felt dangerously retrogressive today. It was just so so boring to watch and reminded me of the darker days I thought we’d finally left behind. I can take a frustrating draw or even a loss when the team fucking show up but today they looked lost again. I thought Sambi was pretty invisible today. We need a presence there, but we’re also in dire need of a striker. Let’s hope we get at least one of the two.
Not got Odegaard on there.
Also, I thought White was just as culpable as Holding in terms of the slow, ponderous passing (as was Tierney, but you gave him a 5 already).
Glad someone else noticed this on White today. It was interesting Arteta tried to use him as almost a 2nd #6 from RB when in possession, but White was not good on the ball. Worst part was he kept playing hospital passes into feet of players covered super tight. That ended with Saka (multiple times), Holding, Odegaard (and others) getting kicked because of poorly timed passes. I don’t think Holding was to blame for anything. he had a much better game that White and was asked to play deep and off the ball as almost a sweeper. that isolated Saka… Read more »
Agree on all of that. I don’t really know why he wants to play a 4-3-3 because we look awful every time we play it/4-1-4-1. The away game against Burnley was painful as well, even if we won.
Being down so many RB’s was a huge impact on Saka. He needs better support play now that teams focus so heavily on him and Martinelli. Liverpool really gave teams a blue print of shutting down avenues for moving the ball through the center of the pitch and doubling the wingers. All that being said, we still created opportunities. I echo what others feel, a striker and a CM are clearly needed for this squad to evolve.
I think it would have been much more balanced to play White in midfield, Chambers RB, Holding CB and have one of Odegaard and ESR up your sleeve off the bench. If we’re down Partey (and that other clown), we kinda need White in midfield. I just don’t see white as a RB at all.
Arseblog basically rates players based on what they already think of them. Holding is always going to be rated worse than White, except in dramatic cases like Holding scoring or White making some obvious mistake.
White is not great as an attacking FB. We’d have been much better off with Chambers if he was fit. Or maybe even Tavares. Could potentially have played White as CDM which might have been more help.
Am I going bananas or are there only ten players rated, MØ left out?
What about Odegaard?
Maybe because he was missing in midfield [too far forward].
This won’t be a popular view but anything less than top 4 should be considered a major under achievement. Our main rivals have had such poor starts they had to fire coaches before mid season. Yes we brought in new players but 3/4 of the new starters were already established premier league players.
It’s got that eeriely familiar feeling of another season where we just fade away when the pressure knob gets dialled up. Time to step TF up and get some results. We are in a position where the top 4 is in our hands right now if we can take it. Manure, like their name suggests are poop, sp*ds are rubbish; if we pass up this opportunity it feels like it will be a massive blow.
Didn’t you say back in early December that top 6 and improved performances on the pitch (clear signs of progress) should be the expectation this season?
Sure, I did too, but now we are here should we just settle for top 6 (assuming we can manage it)? There have been some excellent progress this season. However, we are stuttering again. We need some big results – fast!
I don’t think anyone is settling for anything — just stressing the importance of maintaining perspective during difficult times. The hunt for the top four is not over.
Definitely not over: “we need some big results – fast!”
I said that was absolute bare minimum for Arteta to be retained. I also said that with no European football he really needed to be properly challenging for the top 4 or likely should be replaced. I don’t think there are any real standards however in that the club is too invested in him to the point where even mid table wouldn’t be enough to sack him.
Aren’t we still challenging for the top four?
Why is it a bad thing for the club to be invested in Arteta? Haven’t we taken some extremely important steps forward as a club, on and off the pitch this season? Aren’t these signs of an upward trajectory?
We are not improving despite spending like maniacs.
We had a rather poor start too tbf. Many people would have considered Chelsea and United to be title contenders before the beginning of the season, rather than battling it out for top 4. Looking at our squad compared to theirs, we really do need a striker and a midfielder to realistically get top 4 imo.
That was only 3 games though and two were against teams who clearly aren’t our competition (Chelsea & City). I know we think of those two and Liverpool as rivals but in reality they aren’t. We’re part of the rest of the pack fighting for the final CL spot which is why beating the teams we should is so critical.
You say only 3 games but those points could be crucial come the end of the season, so I think it’s fair to say that it constitutes a bad start. I’d also argue that a team that you’d expect to be finishing in the top 4 probably should be able to get something out of those games against big teams, we’ve lost to every big team we’ve played, Sp*rs notwithstanding. Those points are worth the same as the ones against teams we should be beating, if not more because some will be 6 pointers.
We simply aren’t the same class as City or Chelsea so we were likely to drop those 6 points no matter when during the season we faced them.
No, but we’re closing the gap. Stay positive – much good to come.
I hear what you’re saying, we’d “expect” to lose those games so it shouldn’t count as an especially poor start. But West Ham aren’t in the same class as Liverpool and Chelsea either, and beat both this season. We were very unfortunate not to get something against City at home as well. So these games shouldn’t be write offs. More to your original point, I think certain other clubs would have sacked their manager for that same start we had. Arteta was under pressure until well into October I recall. Finally, if we should be disappointed by not getting top… Read more »
We have no other commitments than the league which gives us a huge advantage as it lets us play the same players every game. It’s a formula several other teams have used in years past. It’s also very likely our striker issues are down to the system as every striker who plays under Arteta struggles for goals. We have Auba who has consistently been one of the best strikers in Europe prior to this year. I would also add it is very much Arteta’s choice to rely on Xhaka.
I could write a whole article on Auba, but to summarise in a lengthy paragraph, it’s fair to say he doesn’t play like a modern day lone striker in a possession/pressing system. Nor is Arteta the only Arsenal manager that has had issues playing him up top alone as opposed to off the left or in a pair, all of which introduce their own issues. Really, Auba needs to address his own limitations as a player (and as a professional). I also don’t think Auba is a player that Tuchel, Pep or Klopp would be after either, for those same… Read more »
He did try and sell xhaka and get the Italian guy (who is doing nothing much at Juve since he signed for them), so it is more a case of having to persevere with what you have until we get someone better!!
Prior to this year Auba had another mediocre year. So you’re wrong on that. And it’s not as if Arteta hasn’t backed him….he sanctioned the deal to keep him at Arsenal. Entirely down to Auba’s primaDonna bullshit that’s rightly keeping him out the team.
We played city off the park and unfortunately still lost but disagree we are not in the same class when it comes to competing against them.
It’s the Arteta effect to go from exciting to unbearable in an instant. One bad result and the team goes to pieces.
Fully agree
I’m starting to think that Arteta won’t be sacked even if we finish 8th again
Need a Striker that can head the ball. The amount of pointless crossing today was us at our worst again.
I dont understand this pointless/blind crossing? Why why why why why why.
No plan B. Remember in that terrible terrible run in 2020, Mikel said, “I think it’s first time in the PL that we put 33 crosses. I’m telling you that if we do that more consistently we’re going to score more goals. If we put the bodies we had in certain moments in the box, it’s maths, pure maths & it will happen”
31 crosses today amounted to absolutely nada. Was so hard to watch.
When those bodies are midgets with the aerial threat of moles however….
This was alarmingly doughnutty.
Felt like 1/3 of those crosses were to switch play to Saka but most fell short. The rest were just hopeful prayers that someone gets on the end of it or it starts bouncing around awkwardly to get a foot on
Lokonga put some great diagonal balls out there. Saka was a little less dynamic than usual. Burnley defended very well.The crossing near the end was desperation. Some of those crosses weren’t bad.
Yeah, a Giroud option.
We coulda had HFB back for ONE million squid! Arguably one of the best headers of a cross in Europe.
Goodness me that was a very boring game to watch. What happened to the spirit and hunger in this team? We were hunting and showing some skill a few weeks ago?
The players look tired if you ask me – certainly physically and very possibly mentally. We haven’t really rotated and the worrying thing is our squad is even thinner now than at the start of the window.
That shouldn’t be a problem now, though, we’ve played ourselves out of both cup competitions.
Hope Tomi is back for next game and we can keep the core fit for the rest of the season. Top 4 is still possible
We very much miss partey and Xhaka. Love him or hate him we don’t play well without him!
Blaming Holding alone for the slow pace? The entire backline was shite… Xhaka is very important, sad and hard to admit but true.
Xhaka is the right type of player, but the wrong player if that makes sense. Plenty of deep lying, positionally disciplined, distributing midfielders that are better than him and don’t come with all the baggage. But for the time being we’re still better off with him in the team than having the wrong type of midfielder partnering Partey
Every time over the last few seasons we’ve played with only 1 proper deep lying midfielder we’ve been shocking. Can’t sustain any sort of pressure on the opposition, and passing out from the back becomes more difficult
It’s not Xhaka that’s important, it’s having two midfielders. Xhaka is a ponderously slow player (that we know is a walking red card/penalty). We pushed too many forward and all that does is force the ball wide and we have no striker to get on the end of crosses. Tactically pretty naïve today.
I don’t think it’s Xhaka particularly, but that second midfielder. Ode and Esr were never comming close to give passing lanes for the CBs. Ode was bombing forward runs ffs
Here here. Ridiculous setup playing 1 midfielder and pretending like the RB is another. Imbalanced across the pitch, no overlap on the right, no build up on the right. Lokonga having to hold deep in every attack to prevent the threat against Burnley counters and the 5 forwards (plus Tierney) all huffing and puffing around in each others space too much.
White was terrible today as an attacking option, Tierney at least tried to go forward.
Should have just played Chambers there. Don’t know what Arteta has against him, he’s half decent, perfectly acceptable squad player standard, and actually has a bit of quality and aggression going forward
Think he picked up a knock against Liverpool – not quite ready for a start by today? That’s what I was guessing, at least.
Perhaps, but even when fit he seems to be behind Cedric in the pecking order, which is a sad place to be
A bit like being an assistant dung beetle
The whole is far smaller than the sum of the parts (even allowing for a greatly diminished part in Lacazette). It’s surely a coaching issue. (Or perhaps the players have decided they don’t want Vlahovic to join them.)
No way Saka was a 6 today. Incredible player, future of the club alongside a few others, seemingly limitless potential… but not infallible. Pepe doing the exact same things gets a 4, which is about where I had Saka. As with every other player on the planet, he’s capable of a bad day at the office.
Seriously. I gave him 4.5. Love him, but he was not good today. Gabriel struggled, Laca struggled, I think the ESR grade was a bit high too. We lost this in our forwards and our tactics (too many too far forward for the sake of having players forward). Odegaard cannot play in midfield. He just shirks his actual midfield duties and pushes too far up the pitch (be that habit or tactics).
Saka and Martinelli were both victims of getting the ball super late, allowing Burnley to get plenty of bodies around them. Needed to release them much earlier.
I thought he was great minus the end product. Felt like he did all the hard work and had zero to
Show for it.
I am tired of defending Laca at this point, initally I wanted him to get a deal because of his footballing ability, his touch, his passing, his intelligence, his overall technical ability, how he has scored in big games, but he looks like he doesn’t want to score anymore, his hunger for goals has gone, and for this Arsenal team it’s not enough. Look I still think the bigger issue is our attack in general, you cannot be having one good chance at home against a side in the bottom of the league and to be honest all of our… Read more »
A 5 for Lacazette seems about right, because he was 8/10 as a holding midfielder and 2/10 as a striker.
Lol, se can’t score against the worst team in the league.
Hope this shitshow encourage the board to put more effort in the mission to buy a #9.
(Honest question: Auba were available or still sidelined due covid?)
The ref had a pretty good game today; he helped his team secure a draw.
There is a time and a place to blame the ref. Not here.
Westwood ought to have walked. If not for the stamp alone then the series of fouls thereaftwr should have sealed the dea. Otherwise timewasting should have been oenalised and better accounted for but we’rel hardly talking Dean / Shatwell levels of dodginess here
Just stop. He is not a great referee, and seemed inconsistent with yellow cards (more reluctant as time went on). But he also gave us a free kick right on the edge of their area after their player got the ball (around 60th minute). That’s was, potentially, an enormous refereeing mistake in our favour.
Why is not Ødegård rated?
Too slow, too ponderous & apart from ESR & Martinelli (to an extent?) a totally beige couldn’t be arsed kind of performance ! This group have it in them to be top 4 but they are not displaying it often enough ! We have some brilliant players who seem scared to express themselves ? Arteta on the sidelines must be a mare to play for? Shut the f**k up sit down and let the players work stuff out ! If they don’t do it change it ! Meanwhile the players seem to have succumbed to the tedious rigid style of… Read more »
That’s long been my suspicion.
I can’t imagine their coach constantly jumping up and down and gesturing like a maniac fills his players with confidence in how well his gameplan is working.
Today I saw no gameplay again ! Burnley would have loved balls into the box they really would ! The pace we played at & the lack of urgency we showed (certainly at the back) would have had them saying ” Aye just let them have it it’s not hurting us” Teams know that Saka & Martinelli are our danger so quite simply they just stop the source ! Not once were they “allowed” to be a bit inventive & go where they could hurt Burnley. I love the players but the game plan continues to be sh**e ! Vlahovic… Read more »
Who’s our best player at the moment? Get him off for Nketiah immediately.
And if Smith Rowe is hampered by injuries the rest of the season, we can play Patino?
I blame xhaka and partey for getting reds. They let the team down, xhaka more than Partey who should not have played in the cup match. Saka looks exhausted. I wish we’d sometimes swap our wingers during the match so they can play on the side of their stronger foot from time to time.
But if spurs lose today I’ll feel better.
It’s a great point.
A draw is the best result. Chelski are catchable
I’m sorry but this is why Lacazette just is not a starting xi player. He always plays well in spurts but can’t maintain it. Very useful squad player though
Start him for a few games in a row and it’s like he’s running through treacle, and his touch goes to shit
Arteta is going to have to bite the bullet at some point and bring back Auba
Looking at the table yesterday, Chelsea had 44 pints with 23 games played, and us at 35 points with 20 games played. In my mind, we were going to win the remaing games in hand and be on level on point with Chelsea on the third, with better goal difference. It had me excited, but when I woke up this morning and saw the scoreline, my excitement turned into disappointment 😞.
I’m also very disappointed, if we can’t beat the team at the bottom of the table playing at home then we don’t deserve to be at the top 4. 😢
The ESR bias becoming ridiculous.
2 notable contributions the entire time spent on pitch MADE HIM your our best player? – great.
Go look at stats amount of time Martinnely, Saka and Smith Rowe have been fouled each would give you a better idea as to where our dangers were coming from.
Wow, strongly disagree. ESR plays very, very quickly. A lot of one touch and then make an aggressive run. He quite literally has no one to combine with. Laca’s one touch play was awful today. Everyone else much too slow and static.
That was like watching the Arsenal of earlier this season – slowly trickling the ball around the defence, nobody has the courage to play it forward, and nobody in midfield prepared to make that option the obvious one. We played exactly how Burnley would have wanted, laborious, playing backwards, eventually lumping aimless crosses in for their grim trolls to mop up time and again. I know the squad is stretched and tired and the ref allowed them to foul us relentlessly and waste probably about 10 minutes of the 90, but we still should have enough to beat them at… Read more »
My 6 year old said Arsenal are like a rocket going to space and they have no fuel to get there.
It makes a lot of sense.
In space no-one can hear you scream for the ball
No Method, No Guru and… No Goals… 🤔
Why can’t we create any chaos in the box? I mean you don’t just have to cross the ball high. Get close, smash some shots, get on a second ball….this pointless build up that takes 10 mins and doesn’t result in any chances is so painful to watch. Too much Emery ball. Arteta simply can’t coach offence.
Had a bad feeling about today’s game
2 games in Feb:
Wolves away
Brentford home
With a full team, we’re capable of taking 6/6, time to regroup
To be fair – Sean Dyche has clearly been preparing his team soley for this game for about 4 weeks now
Getting rid of Maitland-Niles feels like a much bigger mistake than it should have been. He could have been a crucial midfielder this month.
He’s done fuck all last 3 years and suddenly he’s vital to the team?! Nah…he had his chance and blew it.
Personally thought Saka was very poor today. It was clear himself and Martinelli were getting no change out of the defenders, not sure why they didn’t swap wings even for five minutes. All in all, an awful frustrating game. Hope Burnley are relegated, they offer zilch to the league
The more teams in this league we should beat but don’t the better.
Complain abt Laca or Westwood all you want. You’ll be right. But Arteta is not up to snuff. 1.4xG against the worst club in the Prem. Back to our pointless crossing with no target man. Just rubbish football. Bring on the downvotes, but no club with real designs on competing in Europe would tolerate this amateur. He might be a good manager one day, but that day is not anytime in the near future.
Tierney and Odegaard always are overrated me thinks.
Tierney was like he was playing with hangover and MØ is slowing us down many times. He was part of some nice combos tho
MØ is the best player at Arsenal.
Please check again ESR contributions. Not only the end product which is better. But the speed of play, the positioning and off the ball movement when we attack.
Ages ahead of everyone
Lol.
Quite dispiriting, but not really terminal when I calm down. The more worrying thing is if this team can improve beyond this for a sustained set of matches.
If we’re honest, it doesn’t look like anything significant will happen in the transfer market. Maybe Melo who would be second fiddle to Xhaka and Partey in Mikel’s thinking. I’m not even sure he is an upgrade on Sambi.
Like all disappointed. I continue to thin k martinelli is hurting Arsenal as much as he is helping. The ball is sticking to him far too long. Attacking thesame space the same way solo slows the game down as effectively as passing around the back does. it looks more stylish but it isn’t anymore effective.
there was a comment about martinelli playing center forward. I would like to have seen that since we had no one driving down the middle.
I also think he could start at center forward. We used to play him there under Emory and he looked great.
Felt we were a bit lacking down the left to support Martinelli.
Would’ve been nice to see Tavares come on at halftime to give more threat down the left flank and give Burnley more to think about.
Xhaka cost us big time this month – his stupid sending off against Liverpoo meant an energy sapping 65 mins, then ironically him not being available made the second leg and this game unnecessarily difficult – desperately need at least a striker and midfielder or getting forth place will probably be too big an ask!!!
🤣 Liverpoo!
We need a striker ASAP!
Terrible analysis. Can I ask, were you here today?
I’m sure some people want to throw the toys out of the cot over that draw. But what I saw was a very good side (missing a few key ingredients to be a top side) dominating a well-drilled defensive unit. Arsenal are only a couple of players (and maybe half a season) away from being dynamite.
Disagree on Nketia – I thought he did bring energy and zip when he came on. Wasn’t as impactful as ESR, but brought more than a few others.
Tierney can’t join the attack if there is no left-footed midfield who can pass the ball to him, without being intercepted. That’s probably why we still employ Xhaka.
I think Tierney’s reluctance to venture forward more often on the overlap is probably just him following the coach’s orders. Not sure of the rationale behind this though?
Boy, just watched the Milan Juve game in which Arthur came onto the pitch in the 65th minute and played pivot for a side without the slightest bit of interest in trying to win the game. No wonder the guy wants out of there. He’s a CM.
We need a fresh striker or 2, a new midfielder or 2 and to discover a ‘plan B’… we’ve taken 3 steps back this year…
Burnley did well too though some of popes saves were good.
They were good value for their point and with a bit more ambition….
I wasn’t going to comment this morning but after looking at the players rating’s i saw that Emile was thought to be our best player!
I wish i could only turn up for the last 10 minutes of my shift and get considered to be the best.
Anyway i’m glad i didn’t have to pay to watch that-once again horrendous performance.
The only real highlight was Blog’s comment during the live-stream “Shut up Dyche you big testicle headed cunt” which mixes metaphors like a rogue blender. We’re now 6th. Let’s start throwing the toys back INTO the pram now please. This fanbase has colic.
I feel like people are too quick to have a go at holding. As a back up Centre back he’s exactly what you need. You can’t blame him for our attack not showing up yesterday
Ah without Xhaka committing fouls, how did we lose this? 😱