The first time in over 21 years (November 1996) that Arsenal have lost a league game without making a substitution. Meek acceptance. (h/t @Orbinho)— Daniel Storey (@danielstorey85) March 1, 2018
Per Ornstein, after about 5 games. http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/03/05/arsene-wenger-and-steve-bould_n_2809779.html
I agree the deep midfield play is awesome against the high press - but the way Kos gets owned is amateurish. The whole defence should not implode from one pass into midfield like that. But as usual we come back to fundamentals - do Arsenal have the central defenders & 6 to play so high vs City? Clearly no.
The role of Xhaka in the first two goals is pretty clear - he's just never holding in his 6 zone and gets bypassed Play comes from wide via the half space into the hole and suddenly Arsenal poor zonal play is revealed It's interesting on the balls out to Sane, how many players get sucked out there. On the one hand its a good idea to compress the space - but Xhaka in particular is far too slow if he gets caught in the half space - then suddenly the whole 6 zone is empty. Of course Ramsey is nowhere as well Although Bernado will score this goal, Sane could equally have passed to KDB who was wide open on the D And again - slightly different buildup but Xhaka is nowhere defensively when the ball finally comes into the hole, or if that is not his man - why has one of the centre half's not held in that zone It's absurd that 6 Arsenal players are there - but the City players have so much space
Pep is the master of owning the half space either offensively or defensively. One one play we saw Silva play off the shoulder of the defender who turned and followed Silva to block off the half space, only to get caught ball watching, and then have Silva run in behind in the opposite half space. We are so behind in all fundamentals of football its staggering. When you half way know what shit is supposed to look like watching Arsenal makes you realize how ill prepared the team is. Again I find it absurd that this has always been laid at the foot of the players but hey not surprising since 90.5686% of fans are drooling morons.
100% agree on the fundamentals... it’s the detail that most professionals hitting their advanced age lose sight of (no pun intended) no matter what profession Wenger has completely lost the plot His sheer stubbornness and arrogance and unwillingness to let go has caused this club to decline