Declan Rice has dismissed claims Arsenal’s tactics at corners amount to cheating.
Following the recruitment of set-piece coach Nicolas Jover, the Gunners have established themselves as the Premier League’s most ruthless side from dead-ball situations.
In the last 10 days alone, Arteta’s players have scored three times from Bukayo Saka corners with Gabriel Magalhaes heading in at Sp*rs and Manchester City while Leandro Trossard forced a stoppage-time own goal from Leicester’s Wilfred Ndidi. Since the start of last season, Arsenal’s total set-piece goals is 26, five more than Everton who are second on the list.
While prowess in the air has proved important, the Gunners’ ability to manoeuvre space for their intended recipient includes late runners, blocks and repeated attempts to unsettle goalkeepers on their line. Some critics believe Arsenal’s behaviour is unsporting but Rice is having none of it.
“Look, there is always going to be conversations about us blocking and making fouls, but I think the goals we have scored from set-pieces this season, I don’t think there has been one foul involved,” Rice told the Evening Standard on Saturday.
“Sometimes people look for a foul or people are mentioning that we are cheating in a way on set-pieces because we are blocking, but it’s part of the game. Teams do it to us and we are just trying to exploit other teams’ weaknesses. We found a way to do that again [against Leicester].”
Rice also reflected on the importance of securing all three points against the Foxes after securing hard-earned points on the road the week before.
“I think we knew today coming into this game how big it was, that we had to win. When it went to 2-2, it was tough.
“You look up at the clock, you think, ‘we’ve still got time here’ – but you have also got one thought thinking, ‘we cannot drop points, we cannot drop points today if we want to compete at the end of the season and win the title’.
“Look, we kept going, kept believing and in the end three points was massive. Mentally it is tough. The anxiety is through the roof! You know the pressure of playing for Arsenal, you have to win every game.”
It is cheating to be soo good!:)
The Arsenal players and Mikel should bluntly avoid answering these rhetorical questions. We are just good at what we do and that is about it. And just as a thought, we should start mixing it up with say.. short corners adding a bit of a surprise element before teams start working out a way. Just become extremely unpredictable.
Yeah, I suspect Jover has already thought about that mixing it up stuff.
It’s not that long ago that we were criticised because we could get a corner past the front post defender. So stuff ’em all, I say!
Exactly, it wasn’t that long ago teams were more than happy to concede a corner to us because we’d almost always play a quick, short corner and end up on the halfway line. I was chatting to my dad yesterday about this and he wondered what Wenger would think of Arteta and his approach, as he does pretty much the complete opposite to what he used to do. Where Wenger would collect small, skilful attackers, Arteta has loaded up on big defenders. Wenger’s teams were built on improvised attacking play, Arteta loves a choreographed set piece. I do wonder if… Read more »
I would say Mikel clearly knew what we were lacking. I mean he clearly has been here as a player and played through our comical years. It almost looked like his first and foremost priority was to fix our flailing backline as soon as he took charge as the manager.
Until i saw Merino in the team photo i hadn’t realised quite how massive a fucking brick shithouse he is.
Whatever the reason, no doubt we are building a super solid spine and defensive platform. And even our ‘flare players’ in Saka and Martinelli are tenacious in their defensive work
I do find his mentality interesting. When he came everyone seemed to expect the kid that came through Barca academy and went on to be Pep’s apprentice would play idealistic, beautiful, free flowing football. And at times there have been some elements of that. But he also spent formative years under Alex McLeish and David Moyes. He played more games for Moyes than any other manager.
He definately had a heavy pinch of pragmatism in his make up.
He’s just relentless in the pursuit of winning and constantly learns and improves, hones and tempers his teams to the ultimate ends of what is possible, as long as it contributes to winning. He has learned the best parts of Moyes, of Wenger, of Pep and others and he uses those to achieve his goals. He is none of them but carries parts of all of them.
Well actually think back to the teams that won the trophies under Wenger. They were some big, mean mofos. Adams, Bould, Vieira, Gilberto, Petit, Edu, Keown, Lauren, even Henry. I don’t think opponents fancied duels against those chaps. It was after 2005 that Wenger pivoted to predominantly smaller, more technical players not just in attack but midfield and the back too. He over valued technique and under valued physicality during those years and that’s when our reputation as lightweight artists came to be. Arteta knows how important physicality is and he has built a team full of monsters, but monsters… Read more »
This whole cheating thing is absolutely laughable. Not to mention how cheated we felt with those 2 red cards, while most justified them. I am 100% sure if it was ShitSp*rs, Poon*ted, 115 or any of the orcs in the league, they would be praised and we would be called soft, weak, boys and all those other lazy phrases they used for us over 20 years. But now The Arsenal is on it witha young team still, they are all up in arms spewing all this shit. Let them feed us those tears. We will do all that, and still… Read more »
It’s kind of silly that Rice has to say this stuff. Essentially, how dare you be so good at set pieces? You must be cheating. Somehow. Even if you’re clearly not.
I’m not sure we should even give oxygen to idea winning corners and scoring from them is cheating. What next? Incels complaining that meeting women, being pleasant to them and having successful relationships is hacking the system?