Arsenal: Raya, White, Saliba, Gabriel, Timber, Partey, Rice, Havertz, Martinelli, Saka, Jesus
Subs: Neto, Porter, Kiwior, Calafiori, Lewis-Skelly, Jorginho, Salah, Gower, Sterling, Nwaneri, Trossard, Butler-Oyedeji
Arsenal kicked off their 2024/25 Champions League campaign with a lacklustre 0-0 draw against Atalanta in Bergamo, with David Raya stealing the show thanks to a brilliant double penalty save.
Mikel Arteta made two changes to the team that beat Tottenham on Sunday, with Declan Rice and Gabriel Jesus coming in for Jorginho and Leandro Trossard.
Riccardo Calafiori also returned to the bench after missing the North London derby win with a calf problem suffered on international duty.
It was a confident start from Arsenal who dominated possession early on, and had two sights of goal through Bukayo Saka and Kai Havertz although neither player was able to trouble goalkeeper Carnesecchi.
Carnesecchi was called into action shortly after, however, when he needed a strong right hand to stop Saka taking the lead with a sweetly struck free kick from 20 yards. Gabriel Martinelli also had a presentable opportunity after good play between Rice and Jesus but off balance, hit his shot way over.
As the clock approached 30 minutes, it became clear that Atalanta were curbing their natural instincts and sitting off the Gunners, although Charles De Ketelaere did fire over after good hold up play from Mateo Retegui.
When the referee offered us all the sweet release of half time, this already felt like both teams were comfortable with a point and happy to sit in their shape without attacking too adventurously.
Just minutes after the break, Atalanta were handed a golden opportunity to break the deadlock after Ederson was brought down in the box by Thomas Partey after a nice burst of acceleration.
The initial contact started outside but continued inside the area which required double-checking from the VAR team, and after a long check, the penalty was eventually awarded.
Retegui stepped up from 12 yards, only to see his effort saved by Raya – down low to his right – before the Spaniard sprawled across his goal to save the rebound which was headed towards goal from close range.
It was a brilliant piece of goalkeeping (clip here) that brought back memories of Wojciech Szczesny at Anfield, and even his incredible double save against Aston Villa last month.
Arteta wasted little time changing things after that, bringing on Jorginho and Leandro Trossard for Partey and Jesus – who unfortunately struggled to make an impact on the game.
Raheem Sterling and Calafiori were also introduced with 20 minutes left, replacing Jurrien Timber and Saka, and Sterling was involved straight away creating an opportunity for Gabriel Martinelli who was through on goal with just the goalkeeper to beat but blazed over again.
It was another disappointing effort from the Brazilian who seems to be snatching at chances in his desperation to impress. We are firmly in ‘need one to go off his arse’ territory with him.
The game fizzled out during the final stages despite some nearly moments from the Gunners but overall, they will be happy taking a point back to London against a well coached team – who happen to be Europa League holders!
Arsenal looked stiff throughout and far from their best, but this was about rotating, avoiding injuries and taking something back to London ahead of Manchester City on Sunday (which we did).
Kudos to Raya for keeping things level – get that man a beer!
I do worry that we are seeing the ramifications of life without Martin. Both on Sunday and tonight we created very little and I do wonder if we are going to have to quickly find a solution to our Odegaard problem. I don’t like to call out individual performances on a night like tonight because no one was great but that has to be the worst performance Jesus has given us in an arsenal shirt. Caught needlessly offside multiple times and totally unable to hold the ball up. Very frustrating. Martinelli also just so out of form and confidence. I… Read more »
I’m quite worried about Arteta’s reluctance to use Nwaneri there, he seems like the closest profile to Ode in terms of ability to drible and pass
I would get slaughtered for this, but it seems we are becoming too pragmatic for my liking. There are like for like replacements for Ode in the team, why not give them a go? A midfield of Rice, Part-ey (especially present day TP5) and Havertz lacks a bit of creativity imo. I feel Trossard should be the ones replacing Ø as the creative spark of the team, because it’s even affecting Saka and White! Or just trust Ethan!
I absolutely agree. And remember you’re not only replacing his creativity, you also have to replace his engine.
We have to be more than just a good defensive side now. Arteta has to trust Saka with a bit more freedom now.
We needed to try and negotiate an extremely difficult opening run of away fixtures.
So far this season and without too much damage Arteta has got us through it despite some awful fortune on the fitness front.
This period hasn’t really been a time for throwing 17 year olds into the furnace or playing fancy flowery football, that’ll come later when we face some of the lesser lights of the Prem and maybe CL.
Well done 👍 guys.
Brilliant defensively again (Partey moment aside – raya take a triple bow). BUT we were utterly utterly shite going forward. No Odergaard, nobody to link the attack with the midfield. No creativity. Why are we not playing a natural number 10? I thought Nwaneri was ready? Either play him or why is he is in the squad? What’s the plan here? We were clearly going to be without Odegaard for at least a couple of months. Shithouse our way to a draw/1-0 win every week with 1 XG per game? It’s one thing to shithouse a win at spurs. They… Read more »
Firstly, David Raya, WTF???!!!! Keep ’em coming, son.
My word, who realized how much we would miss our skipper? Granted, Atalanta are a BRILLIANT pressing team, but we were shocking in midfield.
I hope Artedu are looking for a Martinelli replacement. We sold ramsdale, ESR, nelson etc cuz we moved to another level. I don’t see why Martinelli should be an exception
Martinelli is one goal away to be back at his best! It’s in his head.
You get downvoted hard because people are nostalgic. What has Martinelli done since the beginning of last season? Absolutely nothing.
I love the guy but at some point we need to improve.
The goal vs Cheaty, the goal vs Pool may not be enough but ain’t nothing. He’s running his socks off but finishing isn’t there – maybe he is learning how to manipulate defenders rn?
Support him and the rest of the team in these difficult times. We’ll come through stronger!
He is in a bad spot surely, but this is where he needs us the most. I am very angry with his lack of brains lately, but maybe it’s time to give him a little break to clear his head and use Raheem a bit more… We’ve all seen what a confident Martinelli can do, and not long ago he was one of the top young players of the world
Remember…. form is temporary, class is permanent. Marrinelli will come good, just needs to fluke one and get his confidence back.
Or martinelli even… damn spell check
Martinelli works his arse off defensively in a way that ESR and Nelson have never been able to do. He’s a fantastic all round player who’s trying too hard in front of goal. He’ll be back, he just needs to relax a bit in front of goal, that’s all.
Partey has been woeful. He needs to be benched against City. Raya saved us. We are missing creativity in the final third. Sterling needs to improve defensively and integrate ASAP.
The report should end: Get that man a cerbeza!
Oops I meant cerveza.
The poorest quality performance Arsenal have produced all season by a mile. Raya absolutely heroic. We massively missed Martin Odegaard’s creativity and energy tonight. The whole team looked off it.
“The whole team looked off it.” It is why I think we need more rotations. I would always make reference to Citeh… Yesterday they had Walker, Stones, Foden, Gundongan, Kovacic on the bench. Pretty sure at least 2 of ’em start against us on Sunday. We played a gruelling game against Spurs on Sunday. Was expecting a rest for Timber, Parte-y, and Saka today (I mean, Cala, Jorgi, and Sterling are decent options.) The season is just starting and some of our guys already looked tired. Imagine Havertz playing out another 90 minutes today.. and doing the same on Sunday… Read more »
What a terrible game to watch… Martinelli looks like he was swapped with a doppelganger, so so terrible. Partey was looking like a 50 yo playing champions league. But damn what a back line we have… Saliba last ditch tackle on Lookman was out of this world, and I don’t even have words to describe Raya, who is Neuer next to our little spanish Yashin?
That was a tough, tough watch. Not once did I feel we would score tonight. It felt like we came there to defend and see if we could get lucky on a set piece. Almost like winning the game was an afterthought. Does this come from Arteta? Some people may like it but we often resemble Mourinho’s Chelsea, without the success (yet). The goal is first to defend, and the attack is an afterthought. Sort of shows with our transfer window where we are always happy to go heavy in spending in defence but the attack is an afterthought (Sterling… Read more »
Still struggling in Europe!
This is why I was so surprised when everyone welcomed our draw. Sure, it might be about as easy a draw as could’ve had, but no one we face are slouches. Wasn’t long ago we were losing to Ostersund. I think every league phase game will be more or less like this. People are thinking Shaktar for example will be fairly easy. No chance it’s east, they have a better CL pedigree than us anyway. Our attack needs to click fast, we’re by no means shoe ins to avoid the playoff round.
It’s so easy to point at Odegaard as the missing link. But we’ve been like this for a while. We won’t play. We won’t allow the opposition to play either. So we end up with either a nil-nil or the odd goal with raya or one of our defenders emerging MOTM. I hate this current iteration of the artetaball.
How is that the case? Do you remember the outrageous scoring run we went on at the end of last season? And we’re five games into this one.
We’ve had a run of really difficult games with key players missing. We’re still unbeaten despite the best efforts of PGMOL and the scheduling devils, so I’m prepared to cut the manager and the players some slack. This isn’t how they’d prefer to play but it’s pragmatic and getting the job done. It was a tired performance, sloppy in possession, but another hard fought point and huge effort, proud of these players. There are easier games coming when we’ll see free flowing football and lots of goals but we need to stay strong while the going is tough.
Yes it’s awful football tbh. We run up the score against shit teams, but we don’t really score pretty goals anymore. It would be one thing if we won a trophy but still only have one trophy in the 5 years and ironically enough it was with players Arteta did not want
Hey Arseblog, my comment is awaiting approval. Why is that?
Because your username is an anagram of Gonorrhea Cop. And no one likes gonorrhea…
I’m not gonna lie, I’m a bit worried about the form of our midfielders and attackers. Partey has 1-2 mistakes in him per match, Rice looks exhausted, Jesus isn’t match-sharp and Martinelli is so low on confidence in front of goal.
Really, really grateful for our back-5 (Raya has been immense). Our work off the ball is terrific, as always, from all players involved. I just get the sense that our defensive solidity is papering over some Merino and Odegaard-sized cracks right now.
Structure’s there. Defence and work ethic is there. the passing though… oh my word… it’s incredibly poor. how do we fix this?
Dear lord that was dull.
What a snoozefest! Raya man of the match and easily our most in-form player this season. Also, I’m really excited to see what Calafiori brings to this team. That little cameo from him was very interesting.
Rubbish, boring game but a decent result.
As usual we were very solid defensively and denied Atalanta almost anything. Their only chance was that extremely dodgy penalty that was brilliantly saved by Raya.
But up front we were nonexistent. We seemed to have completely lost our cutting edge and barely created anything. Martinelli was pathetic with the best chance that we did make.
We are badly missing Odegaard.
Raya MOTM
Was it dodgy? Yes. But damn, Partey simply turned off his brain there, there was absolutely no need to give the referee something to think about
Martinelli has been like this for almost 2 years now. He has no business starting any game ahead of Trossard. I wonder what Arteta is waiting for to start benching him.
When Trossard started he did nothing, he’s better as a super sub. Martinelli will come right.
We looked like a league 2 side playing a prem team In the FAC. Using organisation and effort in the absence of skill.
Jesus Marti Partey continue their slow walk out the club.
We are living on our back line without Odegaard.
You can blame Martinelli for wasting two very good chances, but he was there to try. Our other attackers were really quiet today.
The best I can say about tonight is: Its over, we didn’t lose, and Raya pulled off another amazing double save.
In the context of this week, that means 2 games so far without losing.
In the context of the Champions League I go back to one of Wenger’s statements. If you win your home games, anything away is a bonus, making tonight a decent result in the greater scheme of things.
On to Sunday and City.