Mr Arsenal Blog's "tactics weekly"

17th September

WHAT a performance on Saturday, The Arsenal sure did deliver for us and I thoroughly enjoyed it! Why did we do well however? What were the key tactical points, the key performances that we can take out and discuss from it?

Clearly in a game where you win 6 - 1 the "attack" has to be key. The way that they attacked moved and almost "toyed" with Southampton, was incredible. But what was the most significant for me was the way the midfield and the attack moved and integrated together. For me the movement and link up between the attack players (Cazorla, Gervinho, Podolski and The Ox) completely bamboozled the Southampton defence. Can you imagine being the opposition manager trying to work out how to mark the opposition? Because you have no idea where each player will actually pop up!! This balance was a key point in our win. Yes Gervinho started as the CF, however Podolski, The Ox and Cazorla also popped up in the middle as well as on the wing and in "the hole". Southampton didn't know where to turn next. Couple those things with Gibbs rampaging around the "corner" from the left, and Jenkinson (who by the way his improvement over the last year has been superb) from the right and Arteta and Coquilin/ Rambo pulling the strings behind, and you start to get the picture as to why Southampton were so bamboozled by us!

Furthermore as far as "off the ball" action is concerned, as I discussed in my feature last week after the Liverpool game, our shape was excellent. This was evident again. As our Skipper (The Verminator) said in his programme notes on Saturday "I think you can see, that the whole team - not just the defence, but every area - is working really hard at shape and organisation". And as I said last week, the whole team has to get into the right discipline defensively, and NOT just the so called "defenders". Every time we lost the ball we got into 2 banks of 4 and were disciplined in this shape, and more often than not we won the ball back eventually without any real issues! This was down to the whole team defending, players like The Ox and Podolski tracking back and likes of Arteta and Coquilin in the middle working their socks off to keep the shape! Once again this was very evident. As the skipper says, the whole team has to defend and this is what so far this season I believe we have really got the knack off, and for me that is excellent. Because we all know that Arsenal can score and WILL score. But in the last few years, we have always let in stupid goals. If we can maintain this shape when we do not have the ball, we will go FAR! This for me is obvious. I just hope we maintain this, and keep concentrated throughout, throughout the season!

As I have a banged about on twitter, the amount of options we have at the moment is absolutely outstanding and in my opinion this is the best "squad" that we ever had. I genuinely mean that. YES the team itself is not as good as the 04 team e.t.c, but the squad has so many options which quite frankly excites me. This again was key against Southampton. Diaby could have played, he was rested in came Coquilin and Rambo later on, Giroud was rested so on came Gervinho/ Podolski, Theo came on later on, Koscielney was on the bench. Wilshere is coming back, Rosicky is coming back, Sagna is coming back. There are players available in every position! And this means we can rotate and keep players fresh and ready for the whole season, and shouldn't "burn out". Competition breeds success. This is excellent. And for this reason I believe that we will go far. The Southampton game outlined this, we made a number of changes, left players on the bench e.t.c and STILL scored 6, this is very very exciting in my opinion. The team seems ruthless and hungry, and I believe this comes partly from increased competition because the players know that they will get dropped if they don't perform. This makes me excited!

Finally I wish to talk about the Mr Arsenal Blog's player of the week. Now after a game where the team wins 6-1 it is very difficult to decide on this, but for me because of the vast improvement that he showed on Saturday, Gervinho is my player of the week. He was just like a player "re-bourn". I was just so pleased with the composure and the intelligence that he showed throughout, because so often his decision making or "final ball" if you like, was off the boil which often cost us goals and ultimately (and more importantly of course - points)!   On Saturday however he was played through the middle and he caused the opposition absolute chaos throughout through his movement, his intelligence and at last his distribution. He was putting the ball into the right areas when he needed to, and he also shot when he needed to and got 2 goals. This was something which seriously frustrated me last season that he didn't shoot when he should've or when he shot when he should have passed. His improvement shone through on Saturday, and this was massively pleasing! He is my player of the week. However, special mentions must go to Gibbs, Podolski and Santi "The Magician" Cazorla, who were all also absolutely outstanding and through remarkable (at times) link up play, they carved the opposition to shreds.

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