Gunners so close but yet so far

Manchester City 1-0 Arsenal

Arsenal ultimately lost to Manchester City on Sunday, but can be extremely proud of their performance, away from home to the world’s richest club and arguably best team in the league. Let’s not forget, this is the same team who earlier in the season, destroyed both Tottenham and Manchester United, at White Hart Lane and Old Trafford respectively. 

The Gunners arrived at the Etihad stadium without any recognised full-backs and therefore a reshuffled defence, which Manchester City sought to expose right from the start. They laid siege on the Arsenal back line, attacking with power and pace in the search for an early goal. Wojciech Szczesny came to the Gunners’ rescue, superbly denying Mario Balotelli from point blank range, following Mertesacker’s poor attempt at a clearance and then saving well from Sergio Aguero. The Argentine’s poor finish when clean through on goal had earlier also let the Gunners off the hook. However following this initial spell of intense pressure, Arsenal began to get their passing game going and were also a threat going forward. Joe Hart was extremely fortunate to see Gervinho’s shot squirm underneath him and just wide of the post. Then from the resultant corner, Van Persie laid the ball into the path of Aaron Ramsey, on the edge of the box, whose shot was destined for the bottom corner of the goal, but was well saved by Hart.

Arsenal were admirably matching City stride for stride, but then just before half time Johan Djourou pulled up with a groin injury from which he would not recover. Two minutes into the second half he was replaced by Ignasi Miguel resulting in a complete reshuffle of the entire defence. Vermaelen switched from left-back to centre-half alongside Mertesacker, while Koscielny moved from centre-half to right-back, allowing Miguel to fill in at left-back. This major reshuffle clearly led to confusion as the backline no longer defended as one, at times Mertesacker would step up in an attempt to catch the opposition offside, while Vermaelen would sit back, effectively playing the opposition on-side and vice versa. It was this confusion which led to Manchester City’s winning goal. Koscielny was nowhere to be seen as Nasri played the ball forward, into the space vacated by the emergency right-back, to Balotelli. The Italian international was met by Alex Song on the edge of the box, however rather than ushering Balotelli towards the touchline Song allowed him to move inside far too easily and he duly unleashed a powerful low shot towards goal which Szczesny could only parry into the path of Aguero. The Argentine could not connect cleanly with the ball however due to Vermaelen’s attempted clearance, which unfortunately fell straight to David Silva to fire into an empty net.

Silva scores for Manchester City

The rest of the second half was a wonderful advert for the Premier League as both teams attacked in search of another goal. Arsenal were cruelly denied the equaliser they richly deserved as in the dying minutes of the match Thomas Vermaelen went desperately close with two powerful efforts from outside the box. The first was well saved by Hart while the second sailed painstakingly wide of the far post. Arsenal had played fantastically well but ultimately lost due to their lack of squad depth. Although most teams would struggle to cope with injuries to four full backs, there can be no excuse for the lack of attacking options on the substitute’s bench.



Another woeful display from

Arshavin on sunday

Wenger decided to replace the ineffectual Walcott with Arshavin on Sunday, however the Russian only served to nullify the team’s attacking threat through poor control, wayward passing and pathetic shots. Why the manager continues to persevere with him is completely beyond me. Another underperforming player, Chamakh, was also introduced towards the end of the match and although some may argue he was not given enough time to make his mark on the game, I would argue he hasn’t managed to do this once in the past year. When a match isn’t going our way, there is simply no one on the substitute’s bench who Arsenal can turn to, to change the game. Yet Wenger has already suggested he will not spend in the January transfer window and rejected speculation linking him with a move for Podolski. If he hadn’t rejected this speculation outright, maybe those underperforming may have upped their game for fear of dropping further down the pecking order. However Wenger seems content with the persistent mediocrity from certain individuals and so it would appear we will have to see out another season with players who are clearly not good enough for this team, and we expect Robin Van Persie to sign a new contract? Don’t make me laugh!