Following last night’s 4-2 win over Dundalk, a match that took Arsenal’s tally of goals in the Europa League group stage to 20, Mikel Arteta was asked if he’d consider splitting up his experienced attackers by selecting youngsters in the Premier League.
Presumably, the journalist asking the question meant sidelining one, two or three of Willian, Alex Lacazette and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang – combined age 92 – to make room for Eddie Nketiah, Folarin Balogun, Reiss Nelson, Nicolas Pepe and the returning Gabriel Martinelli.
In fairness to the boss, while Aubameyang has retained ‘untouchable’ status since he arrived, he’s not been shy about giving minutes to the younger lads at the expense of more experienced players. But what about regular starts in the big games?
“When I feel it is the right moment to do that, I have to pick the players, or we as a coaching staff, have to pick the players that we feel have the best chance for win the game,” replied Arteta. “It has to be yes.”
Arteta is under no illusions, he knows his strikers need to find form. After Sunday’s derby defeat, when we again struggled in front of goal, the boss fired a few shots of his own.
“At the end of the day, it’s about the end product,” he said. “This is why they [Spurs] are first in the table. They created two situations and scored two goals.
“I think we had 54 crosses, I don’t know how many shots, only two on target. This game is about doing that. We have to carry on, keep fighting and be the team that we were today but improving, obviously, those details.”
He picked up the theme last night when he was asked about our league woes.
“There have been a lot of games, especially the ones we have played at home, where small details have made a huge difference,” he reflected.
“At the end of the day, we haven’t scored enough goals and without doing that, we cannot win enough football matches. It is as simple as that.
“Creativity is linked to the chances that you are able to create in different positions around the box or the final third. We are working on different aspects that we have to improve certainly.
“The profile of the player depends on where they play as well and that brings you one thing or another. Depending on how they play, we will try to expose certain areas [on Sunday].”
I hope Nelson’s absence last night means a league start at the weekend.
Nelson had a clash of heads on Wednesday apparently.
However, even if fit, he won’t get a look in.
Willian is sure to get a look in though
Wish he’d get a foot in sometimes.
Starting to lose hope in Arteta mixing it up to be honest. At this stage I feel like we’ll see him dizzying into insisting on the same thing over and over.
And that’s where I take issue with it. Look at City, with all the billions spent and having a bench arguably better than our first XI, are also struggling to make top 4 at the moment. We don’t even have half the personnel and we still insist on playing Pep style football, mind boggling.
We’re not playing anything remotely close to Pep style football. We’re leaving all our midfielders back as DMs and then pinging in crosses from the wings. Pep style football would at least be a style we want to play and over time we could replace players who don’t fit.
Balogun as a mobile no 10. There to score but also hold up the ball in the box to set up on rushing midfielders and Auba (who I believe just needs some service to start scoring and get his mojo back).
Only cross when the defence is not set, otherwise its too easy. We need to pass the ball into the box. Cut backs from the dead ball line are much harder to defend.
lol we dont have rushing midfielders. we have snail midfielders.
Balogun is a full on striker with the confidence to go with it. I doubt he would complain about a start, but I can’t see him as a creator. Just look at his goal on Thursday.
No, no Lacazette just showed us, to be 9, you must be 10. Then maybe you get a bonus 11 in your skills.
Somebody buy me Football Manager so I can teach.
We could use Wood and Barnes with those 54 crosses
HFB Giroud would fancy them, too..
We wouldn’t have had Aubameyang if we hadn’t sold Giroud
Maybe we could have sold laca in tha merry-go-round. If would have been a brutal move, but in hindsight taking Auba and sending Laca plus some cash back to Dortmund (leaving Chelski with Batshuai (sp??)) would have been ideal. Auba and HFB would have potentially been a great partnership.
He says this but the reality is when that line up is revealed on Sunday evening we’ll see ‘Aubameyang, Lacazette, Willian’ up front
That is exactly what he will do
dont forget xhaka and ceballos just behind them.
I think Arteta is restricted with his options with Pepe and Nelson apparently not available . Think he will play all 3 of Xhaka Ceballos and Elneny in midfield. I somehow have a feeling we will win comfortably with Laca scoring.
Laca
Saka Pepe Nelson
Partey Elneny/Cebalos
…
Directness, mobility, creativity and legs
But we won’t try this because Auba who sucks at the moment at the only thing he is good at (finishing half chances) is undroppable.
Pepe’s three-match suspension carries through to the Burnley game. Even if he was available, his performance yesterday was not enough to justify him being picked on Sunday. Partey’s currently injured, and out of contention. Ceballos, I don’t think he’s 100% fit, but might make the bench. Arteta seemed impressed with Arsenal’s performance against Sp*rs so he’ll probably stick with 4-2-3-1 with Xhaka and Elneny in midfield and Saka, Auba, Laca and Willian completing the attack. AMN and ESR on the bench based on their recent performances. But if our gameplan against Burnley is to lump 54 crosses into the box,… Read more »
Wouldnt mind seeing a 60 minute Balogun substitution in Lacas’ position. Balogun could prove a fresh breath
This football manager malarkey, likely isn’t as easy, as some people seem to think. Our problems likely go way beyond coaching and tactics. It’s a bit like the film Independence Day, when they give the alien ship a virus, and then let the word out how to bring the aliens down. We’re so easy to play against, and defend against, just give us the ball, and the pick us off. The more we have the ball, the less dangerous we are, and the more dangerous our opponent becomes. We’ll see this tactic all season, and I’m not convinced we have… Read more »
I felt that since the switch to a back four. Fans were crying out for more numbers in midfield, it hasn’t made a difference. Fans cried out for Auba to play central, it hasn’t made a difference. The only difference is we concede goals now.
Only now do fans realise just how poor our squad is and why 3 at the back, knick a goal football was the road ahead for us this season.
“The profile of the player depends on where they play as well and that brings you one thing or another. Depending on how they play, we will try to expose certain areas [on Sunday].” This really should have been preceded by “Good Ebening”
Arteta.has to drop abu and William from the next match. Youngsters will do a better job.
The reason Sp*rs scored two goals with two chances is because they weren’t lumping 54 terrible crosses to a player that can’t head the ball.
Really hope we see ESR or Nelson over Willian and Elneny over Xhaka. Everyone else isn’t as terrible as the fans are making it seem. These changes seem realistic compared to what we have seen in the past.
I’m not an ozil fanboy. But seeing arsenal try to work the final third is so frustrating. I would totally understand if arteta came in and we went full Liverpool style gegen press football and ozil being left out is somewhat understandable, but we’re not doing it, neither are we picking locks to find the line breaking passes via our midfield play, surely it makes sense to squeeze something out of him before he leaves inevitably for free next transfer window. Also the number of people placing an enormous amount of blame on solely on the players and their quality,… Read more »
Completely agree. From a pragmatic perspective and for squad balance leaving out Ozil was insane ego driven shite. If Arteta still has a job he could do far worse than bring Ozil back. Like playing the same failures repeatedly. No harm giving ESR a decent run either.
If he doesn’t reinstate him to the squad and we still continue to struggle, then that’s it for me; Arteta can pack his bags and walk off into a non-negotiable sunset.
I also believe Sokratis deserved a place as we transitioned. A good defender jettisoned.
Top post, well said.
Eddie to start, top scorer,
We need structure up to a certain point. But after a certain point that structure can be used against us, no matter the current personnel.
The key is to give us structure up to a certain position in the pitch and then allow variety, decided by the players at the time.
More jazz!
Arsenal should think of young strikers in January. The likes of Aubemi, Willian are retired. Arteta think of young good strikers from English premier league like Adams, jota, ings, and get some from astonvilla . Aube, willian, Belarin are making arsenal to loose. They are tired, cannot compete in that league. Lacazatte is okay.
Xhaka is fond of playing back passes when arsenal is attacking.