Emery is a romantic as well. He has his ideas, and he won't change. His romanticism is that high pressing is the be all and end all for his team, and if Ozil undermines that, he's dropped. If he was pragmatic like Mourinho or Capello, Ozil would be playing
I think Emery is pragmatic enough to handle his somewhat languid defending. But the counter-press is critical to his style and ozil just seems like he refuses to participate adequately. It’s not that hard which is why it’s effective too and bottom of the league. But if one player near the turnover fails to press then that drags people out of position to compensate. If you don’t win it you are 4v2 at the back. And mourinho didn’t fair too well with hazard in similar circumstances a few years ago.
He did win the league with Hazard lol Don't forget Robben at Chelsea, and Ozil himself at Madrid. Won the league with both. Some people believe that Jupp Heynckes' greatest achievement was making Robben and Ribery into a pressing machine.
YES. I just watched Murder on the Orient Express the other night (from 1974?) and Emery's hair reminded me a bit of Hercule Poirot's!
Yes, he did. He also pissed so many players off that they tanked the following season to get him fired. Just like United and Madrid.
How is that relevant? We're talking about tactical pragmatism. Emery is extremely attached to his pressing plan that he won't let Ozil undermines it. Other coaches, which I've used Mourinho and Capello as examples (perhaps only at their peak), would find a way to accommodate Ozil, imho.
Ozil was known for his large sprint volume at Madrid - its why he used to be subbed out of games early
I don't have any stats to back it up, but he seemed to continue that work rate in his first couple of seasons at Arsenal. Recently those sprints appear to have declined, which may reflect an underlying physical issue.
Are his sprints happening during the defensive phase or attacking phase? He is still very active when we have the ball, always moving to find space and making himself available for a pass.
He wound it right back after his first half season at Arse - presumably on the orders of Monsieur He used to do 50+ peak sprints per game, and had the same kind of numbers at the 2014 world cup
You said they would get more out of him because they are pragmatic managers. I was pointing out that mourinho would have thrown ozil under the bus after we lost to city the first game of the season.
I don’t have the data, but from my eye test he still sprints a lot and runs a lot. He will also sprint back to position often. His biggest issue for me is that he has that 2-3 second “sulk” after a turnover, misplaced pass or uncalled foul, etc where he just shuts off. Because many/most coaches like Emery (and even AW) want to counter press immediately and aggressively at the point of turnover, if ozil is sulking or remonstrating with the ref then our counter press will fail. Because 3/4 of the league is set up to effectively counter attack these days, this is a big issue. AW tolerated it from ozil bc his offensive style got more out of ozil. But as we saw over the last few years, AW was unable to deal with the pressing of even mediocre league sides. One reason is bc we were relatively poor at the counter press.
We never used real ball winners either till torreira came Wenger never understood the requirement for either 2 truly elite 6s or at least one aggressive presser in midfield
Ozil was a great fit for Jose's countering style - and that was his career peak really He comes from a typical counter tradition - from a defensive block. This was also the way Germany played until the hybrid approach of 2014. Especially the famous wins of 2010 and the 1-0 loss against Spain were all from a low block. So it is true Ozil has never been a pressing player in the Spanish style, but he has tended to be a low/mid block pure countering player. Often starting stuff in his own half. Lots of 1-2 touch. A specialist at thru balls. Now obviously on teams like Germany, Arsenal and Madrid you can expect to see lots of possession. But the slow Arsenal style possession never suited Ozil, and the later german style of Euro 2016 was very much a new thing, where Kroos plus Ozil dominated games in tandem from deeper. Emery ball is clearly a different kettle of fish which requires a heavy press I am not sure these is anything about Ozil's career which suggests he is suited to that In 2014 Ozil had the 2nd highest sprint volume in the German team and also the highest peak speed. In short he worked his socks off on the left. But 5 years later that is obviously not going to happen. If that is what you want - then better get someone younger with a big engine.
I guess my main query is there is no evidence that leaving out Ozil is actually working to make the team defensively better.
This is what I keep harping. Emery is making people believe we are better without Özil and is citing defense and structure. There is no evidence of that other than Emery is not Wenger.
Yeah. Overall i do think there is an issue that if we play with 2 nines and also play Xhaka (who seems to be critical to the build up play) then there is no room for Ozil in the team. My ideal would be to see Torreira with Doozy at the base of midfield with Ozil ahead - but I guess Doozy's disty isn't good enough yet to run a game
Just me but I think the problem is there isn't much evidence that having Ozil in the lineup makes them much better, currently. Over much of 2018 the team has performed below Top 4 level, with or without Ozil. Bits and spurts but nothing so strong on a consistent basis as to say "Here we go!" So the pragmatist is thinking if Arsenal are going to be that team right now then at least do it with a more affordable roster. Because I don't think any manager is going to take the current roster and budget and make something that perfectly matches what Ozil needs.
We're stuck with Ozil, like it or not though. We have performed better with Ozil than without as well, if not as consistently as we'd like.