Match report – Player ratings – Arteta reaction – Video
After a 22 game unbeaten run, Arsenal tasted defeat against one of the ‘big six’ yesterday, going down 1-0 to Liverpool at Anfield. Sometimes you’re well beaten – outplayed and deserving of nothing much from a game; sometimes you lose because of a single mistake or a moment of quality, and for me that’s the story of this one.
With Martin Odegaard deemed unfit to start despite traveling with the squad, Mikel Arteta chose Mikel Merino to replace him in midfield. It’s not what I would have preferred, but I have no idea why anybody would be remotely surprised by that decision. Newcastle gave Liverpool problems last Monday with a big, strong, physical midfield, and I think that played a part. Not to mention the Spanish international’s experience which I think saw the manager pick him over Ethan Nwaneri, an 18 year old who has played just about an hour in that midfield position over the course of his career.
We weren’t helped by an injury sustained by William Saliba in the warm-up. He suffered an ankle sprain, insisted he could play, but within minutes he had to come off, replaced by Cristhian Mosquera. When you consider the injury list, this was the last thing we needed, but the young Spaniard was one of the real positives of the day from an Arsenal perspective. His performance was confident, assured, and he wasn’t at all flustered by the quality of the opposition or the atmosphere. It was very promising from the 21 year old. I also thought Riccardo Calafiori had his best game for Arsenal, defensively at least, and I enjoyed that aspect of his performance.
Despite the loss of a key player … another key player, I should say… I thought we had the better of the first half. That said, it was low quality fare from both sides, and I think you could say the teams kind of cancelled each other out. I find a lot of the post-game narrative about how Arsenal being too cautious a little strange. There’s no question Arteta is a manager who will err on that side of things, but there’s a fine line between caution and common sense, and when you go to Anfield without Bukayo Saka, Kai Havertz, Ben White, an Odegaard not fit to start, an unfit Leandro Trossard on the bench, and then you lose someone like Saliba that early, it has an impact on how you prepare and what you can do.
I think Liverpool would be equally affected if they didn’t have Mo Salah, Cody Gakpo and lost Virgil van Dijk in the 4th minute. Yet they had those players, they were at home, and if Arsenal can be accused of being too cautious, why can’t the same be true of Liverpool? The free-scoring champions were at home against a depleted Arsenal, and beyond that moment of magic from the seriously impressive Dominik Szoboszlai, they didn’t really threaten us in any real way. There were a couple of shots David Raya dealt with easily, an offside goal (well offside too), and that was it. This was caution from both managers. If Arteta’s mindset was ‘first we don’t lose’, the very the same applies to Arne Slot.
If we’re properly analysing the game, that’s what I take away. If it’s just the result, then of course it can be framed differently. One piece of brilliance and Liverpool have the mark of champions and Arsenal’s mentality is questioned. I don’t think it’s as binary as that, but the reality is that they took 3 points, and we have none, and that hurts. I also don’t think the idea of Arteta being overly cautious stacks up when you look at the changes he made – bringing on two very attacking players with 20 minutes to go at 0-0 tells you what he wanted to do, but in the end it was a superb free kick at the other end which settled the game.
Where I would have some criticism is the timing of those changes. We don’t know exactly how fit Odegaard is (I suspect not very) and how much he was capable of, but there’s no doubt Eberechi Eze could have come on earlier to replace Gabriel Martinelli who had another worryingly indifferent day at the office. On the other side, Noni Madueke showed what a winger with intent and desire to really go at his opposite number could do, but the Brazilian looks a man shorn of confidence, in a kind of funk that has lasted too long to not raise serious questions about his place in this Arsenal pecking order.
Viktor Gyokeres struggled without much in the way of service, and our set-pieces weren’t as effective – particularly with Declan Rice forced to take out-swinging corners. That’s the opposite of what we always do, and perhaps another reason why today’s performance was lacking something from an attacking perspective. Again though, it was true of Liverpool too, and regardless of what you think of xG as a metric or a way of judging what we’ve seen, it tells a bit of a story. They produced 0.52 to our 0.49 – this was a really tight game with few chances of quality for either side, and it was decided by one superb strike of the ball.
On that, I think both Rice and Martin Zubimendi were caught out by the movement of Curtis Jones who ghosted between them, and I suspect when Arteta looks back at this game he’ll wince at how van Dijk was allowed to play a 40 yard pass straight through the centre of our midfield. Zubimendi played the odds and made a foul 30 yards out. He snuffed out the danger, took the yellow, thinking it would have to be something very special for Liverpool to score from there. Long odds, but Szoboszlai rolled a pair of sixes.
I’ve seen discussion of Raya’s positioning, but sometimes I think you have to acknowledge there are shots no keeper can save, and when a free kick goes in off the post from that range, this was one of them. We maybe had a chance to hit back when Eze got into the box but didn’t get a shot away, and I have to say I found the introduction of Max Dowman over Ethan Nwaneri a strange one. Yes, the story of the 15 year old is wonderful, but we needed a goal. Nwaneri scored 9 last season, primarily when deployed on the right hand side, and maybe Arteta got caught up in the romance of Dowman, and should have – dare I say – taken the more ‘cautious’ option of an 18 year old with a track record of scoring goals at the highest level.
Afterwards, Arteta said:
We didn’t do our gameplan to frustrate them; we did it to win it. I think we elevated the game and the dominance to a point that they had to raise it. They did, especially from the 60-78th minute, when then you could see that there were no margins in the game. When that happens, the game is going to be decided in two ways. One, with an individual error, and two, with a magic moment. Szoboszlai created a moment that was incredible, that has won the game, and that was the difference, nothing else.
As I said, I think there were tweaks Arteta could have made a bit earlier, but I don’t think he’s necessarily wrong about the way this one played out. Without that free kick, we take a solid, if somewhat dour, point at Anfield, go into the Interlull in pretty decent shape after the first three games, and with plenty still to work on. The latter remains true, but it’s obviously coloured by the fact we don’t have that point and Liverpool have all three. I will say the fact this game took place so early in season means while it is a blow, it’s far from a fatal one. There’s plenty of time to make up for this. Also, it wasn’t long ago Arsenal were routinely getting pummeled in fixtures like this, the fact this our first defeat in 22 games against the so-called ‘big’ teams (and Sp*rs) is worth remembering. Again, it’s that line between caution and common sense in terms of your approach.
There’s also plenty for Arteta to think about during the break. First and foremost, for me at least, is an injury list that is really worrying. We’re losing a player a game, if not more, and that can’t continue, regardless of how deep the squad we’ve built this summer. There are also decisions to be made about how we set-up going forward, so we can be more of an attacking threat, and I expect Eze to become a feature in the starting XI when the Premier League resumes again in a couple of weeks time. That left-hand side needs to click, because at the moment it’s like trying to run a race on one leg, and I think if we make it work, we get more out of Gyokeres too.
Right, that’s your lot today. James and I recorded an Arsecast Extra not long after the final whistle last night, so it’s available for you below now and in all the usual podcast places.
It is transfer deadline day today too, and having done most of our incoming business already, we’re going to eschew a live blog. The window closes at 7pm, we’re expecting the arrival of Piero Hincapie, and some departures before the deadline, and we’ll bring you all the confirmed moves as and when they happen on Arseblog News. For now, have a great Monday.
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