Kevin Whitcher
In truth, I was expecting more from Middlesbrough, such is the growing reputation of Aitor Karanka’s side. As it was, it showed that the Premier League and the Championship are indeed a league apart. Boro’s gameplan seemed simple. Organise and negate, and if there was going to be a goal, it would be a counter attack. I got the feeling this was not a side particularly worried about the extra fixture a replay would provide.
Initially, this proved successful, as the Gunners, although dominating both possession and territory, struggled to create many chances. But quality told with the opening goal, which apparently involved all Arsenal’s eleven players touching the ball in the build up. Cazorla picked out an excellent pass to find Gibbs wide, and Giroud connected well with his centre to establish the lead. The Boro manager will have had nightmares about his defence switching off at the corner that led to the second, although both the cross and Giroud’s finish were of the highest order.
After that, it was pretty much plain sailing. As close to feet up and slippers on as we have seen this season, largely because the opposition’s forays forward rarely produced much. A Szczesny save before the interval, and the header onto the post in injury time of the second half. But it was comfortable. Arsenal rarely needed to get out of second gear. Boro have spent many seasons outside of the top flight. It’s been over five years since they last played at the E******s, unless there was a cup game I have forgotten about. It’s a different game in the sense of the footballing quality of the top sides. Due to the home crowd, teams coming to Arsenal can rarely intimidate them the same way they can on their own turf. It might have been a different game at the Riverside, who knows.
Only Koscielny remained from the back five against Leicester. It’s difficult to make any conclusions about new boy Gabriel on this display. A yellow card, a later subsequent crunching tackle that had to be made near the goal. I did note that he held off one challenge that probably needed to be made after he had received his yellow, perhaps nervous of dismissal in his first match. Fortunately, his colleagues resolved the situation. Very much a case of wait and watch.
In front of the defence, the midfield base was Cazorla and Flamini, and both performed well enough in terms of dealing with Boro’s challenge. Creatively, Cazorla had another excellent 90 minutes. Ozil was played as the attacking midfielder, although switched frequently with Alexis. For entertainment, it would have been the icing on the cake to see more goals, but progress is what mattered most and it never looked in doubt once Giroud had done his business before the half hour.
Overall it was a professional, authoritative display with some good football and little by way of stress. Sometimes, for the team, it is good to have matches like these and several of the players would have benefited from the run out. As for the Bionic Mosquito that is Alexis, it does appear as if he is not going to accept missing a single match, even if it is for his long term benefit. Maybe he is an old style footballer who can play 60 games a season, but isn’t the game supposed to be more physically demanding these days. You can’t knock the guy’s application. It was good though, to see Walcott rested after what happened to Aaron Ramsey on Tuesday. There is no point in risking injury prone players when there are other options, such as Welbeck, available.
I am now on Twitter@KevinWhitcher01.
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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.
