Kevin Whitcher
Arsenal played their most convincing 90 minutes of football so far this season to get their season back on track after some questionable performances of late. The three and a half minutes in which they settled the game were reminiscent of Wenger’s side of just over a decade ago in their ability to kill a game in a short passage of play where their dominance left the opposition shell-shocked. For this brief period, the Gunners clicked completely and were a force of football nature. A pleasure to witness and significant that the returning to form Mesut Ozil and new boy Danny Welbeck were key in settling this fixture.
Villa pushed up the field and Arsenal exploited the gaps behind their defence. Paul Lambert’s men were not as adept at hussling their opponents as Dortmund proved, and paid the price. Mesut Ozil had more freedom to play his football, not least because there seemed little call on him to do any defensive work. Yes, there is fluidity in the Arsenal system, but when the team do not have the ball, the two wider attackers need to be mindful of what is happening on their flank. At times, with Ozil nominally responsible for helping the left back, it hasn’t always happened. And even if he does get back and help out, he is a lightweight in the tackle, brushed aside. So fluidity is all fine as long as when the ball is lost, Ozil becomes the spare man floating around the middle with the vague notion of picking up the other side’s defensive midfielder, in the hope that if it is someone like Steven Gerrard, someone else will pick him up when he moves forward.
Danny Welbeck is gradually developing understanding with his new colleagues and the benefits were obvious yesterday. Due to his ability to play and move at pace, he gives the side alternative options to Olivier Giroud, whose game is based on strength rather than pace. Giroud might have got into position to score the goal that Welbeck did, but he might have been a yard off. I do have a memory of numerous chances flying across the box where the Frenchman has agonizingly failed to make contact by a couple of inches. Time will tell, but it was important for Welbeck to score after his profligacy in Germany.
There is a view that Aaron Ramsey played a little deeper than previously this season, possibly because there was no pretence of the most advanced central midfielder (e.g. Wilshere, or Cazorla) coming back to help out his two colleagues. Or maybe his passing simply came off yesterday (we won’t speak of the late cross field ball that led to a Villa corner).
Ultimately, this was a reminder of matches last season where Arsenal went away from home against weaker opponents and achieved the result expected of them. For all the doom mongering after Tuesday, the Gunners were clear favourites to win this game with the bookies, who never get carried away with fan opinion when setting their odds.
It needs to be said though that Arsenal’s vulnerability in the air is still an issue, especially from set pieces. Szczesny pulled off a fine save at 0-0, but there was a feeling that he did not dominate his area, and that there were too often free Villa players lurking at the back post. Other sides will exploit this weakness and it is difficult to envisage very much changing with the current personnel. Whether Welbeck can defend in the air as well as Giroud can seems uncertain. Would David Ospina prove a more commanding keeper in the air? The Gunners don’t tend to mark man to man, and the fear is if they do, they would most likely lose their battles. It’s a problem that hasn’t gone away and does not seem to be being addressed. It does though, appear to be shaping up to be one of those seasons where the best teams simply score lots of goals, at the price of defensive solidity. So on the level of – we can outscore anyone – then Arsenal aren’t doing much very different from Chelsea… except scoring enough goals to secure the points. Presumably, the manager simply believes this will come.
It was a contest until Arsenal scored, and then became a bit of a training session. It was good to see the team close the game out comfortably, something I don’t take for granted after that Newcastle 4-4 match about four years ago. Villa are no mugs, as their win at Anfield last weekend proved, but they had no answer to the three and a half minute turbo charged phase of attack that settled this game. Just the tonic needed ahead of the North London derby next Saturday.
I am now on Twitter@KevinWhitcher01.
The new issue of The Gooner went on sale yesterday and can be bought at the Southampton and Spurs home games in the coming week. We should have details of the issue on the website by the end of Sunday. Subscribers’ copies are being despatched tomorrow. The e-edition should be available tomorrow as well.
DIGITAL ISSUES
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Further Reading
A sequel to Arsènal – The Making of a Modern Superclub and entitled Arsène and Arsenal The Quest to Rediscover Past Glories has been written by myself and co-author Alex Fynn. It takes up the story of the club from the last update of the previous book, and can be bought online here. Use the promo code ‘Gooner’ to get 10% off the publisher’s price of £8.99.
