Kevin Whitcher
On a wet miserable dog of a Saturday, Arsenal gave their supporters a bit of cheer with a convincing victory against Crystal Palace. Although initially, the results achieved under Roy Hodgson were not encouraging, the south London team improved and Arsenal had been the only team to beat them in the league for some time, in the game between Christmas and New Year at Selhurst Park.
Add to this that, finally, the Alexis Sanchez saga seems resolved, and we had a formation in which both Jack Wilshere and Mesut Ozil played in the front four. Notably, Granit Xhaka played further forward with Elneny holding, and creatively the Gunners looked far more potent than they have too often of late. Elneny looked like a better option in terms of protecting the defence, which has not impressed too much of late, with only occasional exceptions. At times, it has felt like the team’s style needs greater solidity, but there has been little sign of it. Perhaps Elneny might prove the answer, but if you feel like gambling as much as Arsene Wenger seems to with his tactics, you can join Royal Vegas and play free slot machines, where, as the Gunners sometimes do, you may get the desired result.
Interestingly, with the return to a back four, the first three goals all featured Nacho Monreal prominently. Monreal has played most, if not all of the season as one of three centre backs, and on his return from injury he demonstrated what he is actually best at. Scoring the first with a free header from a corner, and creating the second and third goals by getting the ball across the penalty area from the bi-line, it showed the benefit of experience of the position, and being left-footed in this position. The law of Murphy dictated he was withdrawn from the action before the interval with what looked like a strain, let’s hope it’s not something that will keep him out for long, although the second leg of the League Cup semi-final looks a long shot. Palace’s defending for the opening three goals – all avoidable – was reminiscent of latter-day Arsenal.
The Gunners’ fourth goal was a thing of beauty, with Ozil driving the play, combining well with Wilshere and teeing up Lacazette with a gifted backheel in the area. 4-0 with a quarter of the game gone. Ozil had a very decent game on his return from injury / his mid-season break (*delete as appropriate). In the remaining three quarters of the match a couple of very decent chances, and a few opportunities for Palace to get back in the game, but aside from a late and well-finished consolation goal in the dying minutes, that was that for the goals.
The team certainly didn’t miss Alexis Sanchez’ contribution, and there is an argument to say that the ball moves around a bit quicker if the Chilean is not involved, with his tendency to hold onto the ball. But this is only one game. The remainder of the season will tell us far more. With Sanchez involved, Arsenal registered a 5-0 win against Huddersfield back in November, and his contribution to the previous win at Palace cannot be ignored. He will certainly be missed, he’s too good a player not to be, but in the frame of mind he has been so far this season, when at times, he has not looked like a team player, it is probably best he leaves now, especially if it means the club can get a player in exchange, rather than nothing in the summer.
As for the team he leaves behind, we wait to see what the additions of Mkhitaryan (dependent on a medical) and potentially Aubameyang will bring. Are these last throw of the dice purchases for Arsene Wenger or influenced by the arrival of Sven Mislintat from Dortmund, with a view to the future. Both players built good reputations at Dortmund, although Mkhitaryan has not convinced at Old Trafford. If Liverpool win on Monday night, Arsenal will still be eight points away from fourth place, with Tottenham also in contention for a Champions League spot. There are 14 matches left. European involvement might favour the Gunners because the sides above them will play their first team players in the Champions League, not a policy we will see from Arsenal until the quarter finals unless they get a stiff draw after taking care of their next round Swedish opponents.
Aside from that, a couple of observations. One, Arsene Wenger spent much of the game uncharacteristically standing at the edge of his technical area, after returning from three matches sitting in the stands. Maybe he was trying to keep moving to remain warm? With his side 4-0 up so early, he didn’t return to sit next to Steve Bould until some time into the second half.
And it was sad to see the Young Guns ‘enclosure’ at the front of the Clock End lower tier reduced to one row. This hasn’t been helped by the club now changing the policy so that any minors under the age of 14 cannot go to the game unless in close proximity to an accompanying adult. Some call it progress, but really, how many of our readers attended a match at Highbury either with their own or along with mates of a similar age before the age of 14. It’s ridiculous. It’s fine for parents to decide whether their child can attend a game on their own at the age of 12 in my book, but for the club to start dictating it is a very sad state of affairs. And let's be honest here, the club are supposedly trying to encourage some kind of young fanbase to get into the idea of providing a kind of ‘end’ for them to congregate, but give them possibly the worst seats in the house, in terms of the view. Sure, some good close-up views of the Arsenal goals yesterday, but pretty difficult to figure out what’s going on at the other end of the pitch once the ball crosses the halfway line. As £10 tickets are also available for juniors in the family enclosure, I suspect most kids who do attend without parental accompaniment, having seen how poor the view from the Young Guns enclosure is, are choosing seats with a better view further back. Additionally, the club have never really gone heavy on marketing the £10 tickets for juniors, and no wonder, because the less of these places there are, the more Arsenal can sell full priced adult tickets. This whole area of developing future support really needs a good look at, and preventing 12 and 13 year olds attending without an adult is not going to help at all.
Anyway, at least the poor handful of souls who did occupy the front row behind the goal yesterday would have seen the action that mattered. Chelsea await on Wednesday and you would have to imagine we will see a side of similar strength to yesterday. Antonio Conte’s side seem to have rediscovered their goalscoring touch and during the recent run of draws, they were not conceding too many. Will we see a return to three at the back? Currently, it looks like a game that Arsene Wenger will, uncharacteristically in this competition, see as important. At the fag end of his managerial career with the club, it would be ironic if his final piece of silverware was a competition he has rarely been concerned about winning.
In case you have missed it, the campaign to keep The Gooner going beyond the end of the current season was launched last week. Please check it out if you did not see it then. We will give an update on progress in the editorial after the Chelsea game later this week.
The current issue of The Gooner went on sale at the home match v Chelsea on 3rd January and includes a free 2018 ‘Classic Gooner Back Covers’ calendar. It can be bought online here for £4.00 including postage. The price is higher if you are outside the UK due to the extra postage costs.
Alternatively, you can simply pay £4.00 (postage included) (or £9 for a three issue UK subscription which gets you all the remaining issues before we (possibly) cease publication at the end of the current season) via online bank transfer to –
Account name: The Gooner
Sort Code: 20-76-90
Account Number: 03004112
Please follow up the payment with an email to [email protected] stating your name and address, ideally with proof of payment such as a screen grab or pdf, or at least the reference that you used for payment (e.g. 269Smith). If the payment was made from an account with a different name, definitely inform us so we can match the received payment.
If you want to buy a three issue subscription to receive the current edition, you can subscribe through the Gooner’s online store here (or here for Europe and here for the Rest of the World)
Other subscription options are available including next season’s issues (if we do continue – we will refund any payments made for next season if we do not reach our target of 1000 subscribers). The list of all subscription options can be seen on this page
You also can bypass the online store by simply making a PayPal payment to the email address [email protected]. Pay either £4.00 or £9 for a three issue subscription. If doing this, please make your payment a 'friends and family' / personal gift payment – this helps keep our costs down. (Overseas buyers add £2 per individual issue for Europe or £2.50 per issue for the rest of the world. Three issue subscription costs are £15 for Europe and £18 for the rest of the world).
Finally, you can pay by cheque made payable to ‘The Gooner’ to the address below, for either an individual issue (UK £4.00) or a three issue subscription (UK £9) (see above for overseas prices)…
The Gooner
12 Buxton Court
Hanbury Drive
London
E11 1GB
DIGITAL ISSUES
The Gooner is also available in digital form, through The Gooner App on iPhones and iPads, the Exactly App for Android devices and now Kindle Fire owners can also get their fix by searching the Amazon App Store for The Gooner.
You can also subscribe at www.exacteditions.com and read it through your internet browser as well as receiving a code which will enable you to access issues on all the above devices.
