Could've scored 1898. Great performance. On it from the get go, hope Martinelli injury isn't serious. Onward and Upward.
It's pretty good news - Arteta tells Sky Martinelli's injury is just a cut.— gunnerblog (@gunnerblog) March 4, 2024
Saliba completed more passes (169) than Sheffied United (142). Most ever for an Arsenal player in a league match, only exceeded by 3 players (all from City) since 2003. He was basically a midfielder in this one.
Fun facts from todays match that I have seen floating online... Kai Havertz now has more no-penalty goals in the league than Rashford and Palmer, but other boards/sites like to remind me how shit he is First time in English football history a team has scored 5 goals or more in 3 consecutive away games. Just breaking more records. Astounded that 115charges FC or the Chelsea Moneylauderers never did that. We have now scored more than 10,000 goals across all competitions as a club. Kai's goal was the 150,000th goal scored in English top flight league history. Its the second time we have scored 5 goals in first half of a PL match, the last time was against Soton in 2003. Our goal difference is higher than Man Us points tally
He started slowly with us, but people like me who saw him before he was bogged down at Chelsea knew there was talent and I was in the group of people who said "if Arteta is really a quality manager, he will get performances out of Havertz." But lets be honest, there was always the chance Havertz turned into a Willian. Instead we see that Arteta IS a quality manager, and he IS getting performances out of Havertz, and there will be a LOT of humble pie in the near future.
Arteta had three players returning from injury that needed minutes in their legs and Trossard has earned the playing time. The only questionable sub I saw was Cedric and Arteta seems to be managing White’s playing time, for whatever reason.
That was in his game last year, before his injury, in fact it’s been in his game for quite a while, but the presence Raya and Jorginho gives Arsenal other options to make those passes.
Walters hasn’t been in the last couple of game day squads. I believe I read somewhere that he is injured.
If White gets hurt, it would probably be Cedric starting vs Brentford in 5 days. Better to choose to play Cedric when up 6-0 than to have to play him from the start. Granted, he'd be pretty screwed if any other defender got hurt. Need Tomi back or return to the Partey at RB experiment when he gets his legs back. Does Zinchenko walk back into the starting XI? xGA has been ELITE with Kiwior back there and the attack is not missing a beat without him. I'd start Kiwior and go to OZ if a goal is needed.
I don't know how you can drop anyone at the moment, the starting 11 at the moment is utterly dominant. Really the only thing we should be doing at the moment is rotating to keep everyone fresh but right now you couldn't drop Kiwior for Zinny because Kiwis form is incredible. Even if its just a purple patch, milk it for what its worth and if his form goes to shit then bring Zinny in. In the meantime, I would be bringing Partey and Zinny on into the MF to rotate for Rice/Jorge/Ode when the game is won to get minutes back into their legs.
Yeah, with no Tomiyasu still, I have no problem with Arteta subbing off White and bringing on Cedric in that situation.
No shade to Zinchenko, but it's honestly hard to envision what he adds for us at this point. Like is there really any world where he makes us significantly better than we currently are?
The sense I have is that I’m seeing more Saliba thruballs like that this year compared to prior. Would you disagree??
Offensive creativity, whether inverted or not? But I’ve always rather had defenders who are primarily defenders than attackers. And Zinny never seemed that guy. I’ve always seen him moving to midfield, whether with Arsenal or somebody else. Kiwior seems more defender. Or at least more balanced. (he did have a nice assist tonight)
I feel the same way about Partey at the moment. He hasn't played in ages so I'll cut him some slack, but he was so careless in possession compared to everyone else in midfield over the last 2 months.
I never loved Partey but when he’s been fit and playing at peak level, he’s been a huge positive factor. Bigger than Zinny was I think. But there are just so many critical questions surrounding Thomas. Can he stay fit? Will he return to peak form and stay there? We’ve evolved our system since he was last in it… will he still integrate well? And then there’s the legal cloud over him.