After a fantastic start to life at Arsenal, Gabriel Jesus is currently on a run of five games without a goal.
Is it a cause for concern?
It didn’t feel that way when Arsenal kept on winning but after two dropped points against Southampton – a match that saw the Brazilian squander three presentable chances to double his side’s advantage – it suddenly feels like it might be.
For a striker who is desperate to be part of his country’s World Cup squad but missed out on selection during the last Interlull, the timing of the drought is far from ideal.
Quizzed on what’s going wrong for him, he told the Evening Standard: “I don’t know, I really don’t know. If I know I can tell you!
“But the only thing I can do is keep trying, keep fighting, keep improving. Like I said, I am here to score goals, I am here to help the team with the goals. I understand that. Of course, the goals are coming back soon.”
While the draw at Saint Mary’s was far from a disaster – Arsenal remain top of the table with a two-point advantage – Mikel Arteta and Ben White both underlined their frustration at the way the three points escaped following a strong start.
The manager said the Gunners stopped doing the simple things while his right-back lamented uncharacteristic sloppiness.
For his part, Jesus has urged his teammates to find their focus and stay calm as they look to close out the pre-World Cup schedule with a flourish.
“Sometimes you drop a little bit, but you have to realise and wake up. That’s what we have to do.
“We have to concentrate more, focus more, be more aggressive with the ball, without the ball.
“I think everyone has the same games. We are trying to do our best to win the games, to win them as much as possible before the World Cup.
“We have to turn our minds and come back playing our game. Of course up front me, Bukayo, Gabi [Martinelli] and everyone try to put the ball in the net.
“Now is the time, you know everyone is going to talk about us, about our performance, I just want to say to the team to be calm.
He added: “This league is tough, it’s difficult. Everyone is upset. Now is a difficult time I think, the difficult time is coming. Everyone has to be alert and then focus more.
“We have six games before we stop for the World Cup, so we need to come back stronger because that’s football.
“We are young and I am still young as well. So we have to be more focused sometimes. We created a lot [against Southampton] but we were not finishing good.
“I put me in that of course, because I had some chances today. I could have scored one or two – and then we win the game. It’s hard, it’s difficult, it hurts, but we have to realise and wake up and improve and come back.”
Converting chances into goals should be easier than turning water into wine, so we’ll give Jesus some space and let him do his thing.
Good attitude, I was worried the previous bash on the head affected him for this game.
Though what affected him more was the terrible refereeing that allowed their defenders to do pretty much what they liked to him. Any chance of that changing please?
Against Arsenal players?
I hope you’ve brought your flask and sandwiches; you’re in for a very long wait, pal.
Jesus has been unquestionably agile on each game, but I think he is fatigued. This is where we need another potent striker upfront to share the burden. With all due respect to Eddie, I think we need the additional firepower this January to be able to compete at the top.
He’s also getting brutalised by the opposition and they’re being allowed to do it. He was assualted on numerous occasions on Sunday for nothing, I remember in the 2nd half when he finally got a foul call and it seemed almost the least consequential of all the contact on him. Letting things play a bit is one thing, but the league is losing control right now. someone is going to get seriously injured this season… And it seems the league would prefer that to be an Arsenal player.
Yeah, we have to also speak about stupid referee decisions. Or maybe we just need to give back as much as we get. If the kinds of physical exchanges being inflicted on us are not considered fouls, then maybe we need to use the same. But I also think that it might be a good idea for the club management to raise these issues with PGMOL or the FA.
I totally agree, but I’d rather focus on what is within our control; our forwards improving their finishing or bringing in another player who can do that part better.
That ref was terrible- his officiating.
What’s more worrying for me is that our form seems to have dropped since the Leeds game. I worry that the squad is beginning to feel physical and mental fatigue.
Yes, I think you’re right and I’m puzzled why anyone would give a negative vote as the evidence was clearly there yesterday.
I also think you’re right, but I hope that rotation and resting key players will improve the situation. I also hope that MA learns fast that we cannot always ride our luck and that there are situations the players are tired, and we are not going to score more goals, so we need to protect the result in hand.
As of now MA and the team are going above expectations, but these have been raised,
Unbeaten during the reign of a Prime Minister is another record for us. Can we make it through another PM too?
You realize this was the first Premier League game since the Leeds game 😂
The boys are tired, no doubt. Just got to battle through.
Short term target: the break for the world cup. If we’re top and have qualified top in our EL group I’m super happy. Regroup for the 2nd part of the season and get some fresh legs in.
Fatigue. The team didn’t take their chances against PSV. Lots of misses. Same against Southampton.
Sloppiness and mistakes are also a sign of fatigue.
Jesus should have had a week off if not more after the Liverpool match based on that collision. Plus, he plays twice a week. Didn’t play that regularly at Man City.
No time to panic, although our bench is very thin.
Well said. I think Arteta had to play a lot more first team players against PSV that we wanted to because he couldn’t be sure of getting the win needed otherwise. But it’s a Catch 22 situation because you just tire out your key players more quickly and results like yesterday happen.
Really missing Elneny, Zinch, and ESR during this hectic period. Hopefully get through November and World Cup without more injuries – but I doubt it.
Let’s hope the goals do start flowing from Jesus himself and from the rest of the team.
A goal a game for the last four games isn’t a great return. Yes, we did win three of those (albeit the Leeds game pretty fortunately) but it didn’t work yesterday against the Saints. I don’t think we should particularly blame anyone – Jesus looked very tired to me – but we do need to start putting games to bed when we are on top as a 1:0 lead can be risky as we found out.
Everyone is mentally tired and he’s also been smashed up almost every game he’s played. He’s looking a bit tense and maybe trying too hard, and we’re not moving the ball quickly enough, so the opposition has time to set up against him. He’s very good and the goals will come, he needs a song.
It’s a lot easier to wake up when you’ve had a decent amount of sleep!
Violence 😂😂
Feel bad for him
Classic Jesus, calming the storm, telling people to wake up.
The goals will come for Jesus and the team.
Jesus is quality and will come good again. Arteta just needs to avoid overplaying him and letting him rest.
If he doesn’t make the Brazilian World Cup squad then I guess that would be good news for us, although really tough for him.
I think Arteta could experiment with Martinelli up front for the game in Holland on Thursday.
Optimistic again? The team have won you over! Seriously, I think you are right about Jesus–his footwork and quickness are back to normal (the intelligent, dangerous runs never left) and I think the goals will come.
Not sure about Martinelli in the centre though. His ability to make fullbacks look awful is pretty stunning. I think he is better when Tierney is on his side–though the Martinelli/Zinchenko/Xhaka combination looks brilliant as well.
People always think this and it never happens 😂
Only 1 point needed from remaing Europa games to top table is tempting to experiment but energy also comes from not losing games (see what happened after 49 game run ended).
Players don’t need to be told they’re tired; danger is that becomes a mindset.
Yeah, after the past couple weeks (and getting the win at home against PSV), my inclination would be to basically run out second-choice guys and some kids for the away leg this week–just let everyone who needs it to rest and prepare fully for Forest. But obviously this is a different mentality to Arteta’s, though while I get where he’s coming from and think the mindset change he’s enacted has had a lot to do with our success, this feels like the time when you can let the guys take a breather. It feels like the right moment and opportunity… Read more »
This is going to be a long, long season. You just can’t keep playing the same players. The absolute priority is the Premier league games and the big guns must play in them. Arteta must learn to be pragmatic now: we’ve already qualified in the EL. Even if we don’t win the group it’s not a disaster. Resting and rotating is vital now.
Topping the group means 2 less knockout games, I can see why he wants to make sure of qualifying as winners. If we can get to the world cup break there’s only a couple of games from the restart to the transfer window. I have a feeling we will buy a couple of players.
Arsenal under Arteta isn’t pragmatic.
As Jonathan Liew said, pragmatic means we sell Xhaka. Pragmatic means we give Pepe as many chances as he needs to come good. Pragmatic means we don’t buy a keeper who’d been relegated twice. In fact, pragmatism means we don’t even hire Arteta and got Max Allegri instead.
We are where we are because we are not pragmatic.
Starting Martinelli would do nothing good for Nketiah’s confidence.
I have big doubts about whether he’d ever be up to the quality that we need, but he has to at least be given a chance
To be honest: F**k Nketia. He isn’t and never will be good enough for Arsenal. I just want the team to be successful. Sooner or later Arteta will smell the coffee and then quietly sell Nketia. I can’t wait.
If you’re going to slag of our own players atleast keep it constructive and refrain from swearing at them. I also don’t think it helps that Arteta has played him out of position for the last couple games. Feel like it would be better if Jesus moved to the wing and Nketiah central.
Yes, Nketiah doesn’t have the attributes to play out wide
I think Nketia should start some games, people forget he performed well when starting central just last spring. Bring on Jesus for the last 30 minutes if needed.
If Xhaka can come good, almost anybody can
Trying too hard – just relax and they’ll come x
When everyone is so upset because we had a draw away at Southampton (which for some reason always give us problems), we know the level of expectation from inside the team itself has been raised. We keep on fighting! COYG!
Should of added: “I could feel, you know that croatian prison break gangsta style CB with two hands round me like the senioritas in the club back in sao paolo, you know, hanging out with big dinho, At city, i used to be so happy, u know, sheik mansour call mike riley every weekend- ” – g.j
It is fatigue. Cumulative effects of playing games every 3 days. And it is happening to every top team in the league now. Does it surprise us that it was only Man City, out of the top 6 clubs, that won this past weekend. Liverpool lost, Chelsea and United had a draw, Arsenal drew, Tottenham lost. Only Man City had the max 3 points. Arsenal is suffering from lack of squad depth to enable efficient rotation. Nketiah and Veira did practically nothing when they came on yesterday. Our subs needs to up their game to allow the first 11 to… Read more »
It’s not just fatigue.
The attitude of the team in second half seemed to be that they
expected to win – so played at reduced effort.
No matter how your team is doing (results wise); it is imperative that the team keeps pressing and putting these so-so teams to bed. No teams are willing to to just play out the game when they are behind. The key is to keep pushing – no matter how
you believe the game will turn out.
It’s a mind set – no team wants to capitulate – you have to make them.
I disagree, I think the apparent sloppiness was fatigue. When your tired first thing to go is the brain, and then fine control. They could still run and fight, but the awareness and the subtle touches which makes them so good normally, stopped working.
We weren’t in Europe last year this number of games is a massive shock to the team. Even Jesus was only making sub appearances last year, not playing almost every minute.
I think the drought is getting to him. He is snapping into shots these days. All he needs is a cool head and the goals will come.
The good thing is that he is getting chances
As much as I like Jesus and Eddie, it would be nice to have a more physical striker in the squad to change things up. It’s neither of their fault that teams get away with rugby tackles against them, but in those cases it would be nice to be able to bring on a player to combat that type of play. I was a huge Giroud fan simply due to his strength and ability to hold the ball up and deal with those games where the ref has decided anything goes. Haaland is on another level obviously but it’s clear… Read more »
Agree, this is where I think our interest in Calvert-Lewin came from. Not the most ruthless finisher, but a huge presence like Giroud and also really fast and also young. Wouldn’t suprise me if we went back in, although his injury problems worry me slightly. I know you can’t harp on about those “the good old days” constantly but remembering we had Kanu, Bergkamp, Henry, Wiltord when we were THE force. Eddie is decent but we need better & more.
He and rest of the team are looking a bit jaded in 2nd half of last 2 premier games, ok both were away and we were 1-0 up and both times he could of put it to bed so we didn’t have the expected 2nd half response from home teams, got lucky at Leeds & unlucky at Saints we should of been 3-0 up even with some dubious ref decisions, not going to criticise as every game is a battle in PL and we are still purring, hopefully we gain the 3 points Thursday so we can rest up our… Read more »