Mr Arsenal Blog's tactics weekly. 

27/10/12 - reviewing the QPR match.

Well that was frustrating, but what matters is that we have won the game, and take three points from this match, moving us up to fourth in the table (for today at least). It was absolutely fantastic to see Jack Wilshere back in the team from the off today because (as I said in my article about him this week) we have missed him so much in the last year or so, and it's brilliant to have him back in our side, and hopefully he will make a difference to our form for the rest of the season. Was of course also great to have Bac back in the side as well, he is also a quality player. But in terms of the game itself as I said it was very frustrating, and for the most part it was a very slow game, lacking in quality. There were flashes of the talent that made Jack such a big hit in his first season with the club during his time on the pitch, but apart from that it was largely non-eventful. But why was this? This is what I will discuss now in this feature.

It is difficult to discuss anything other than what I discussed after the Norwich match and what we saw against Schalke in mid-week to be honest, other than the fact that we got a win this time rather than nothing. However as I said once again we were far too slow in our attack and despite the fact that we actually had more chances than last week, which you would expect from a home match, we still are not creating enough clear cut chances to score goals. We only really started to look dangerous towards the end of the match, after QPR were down to 10 men, which is a concern! The main reason for this was once again the lack of penetration in our passes, the lack of proper movement in the attacking 3rd, and the lack of quality balls into the box. I think this could be partly down again to what looks like a tired Santi Cazorla, who seems to be lacking the same guile and creativity that we saw earlier in the season which is worrying, but I am hoping that we can give him a bit of rest in the week so that he is back to his energetic best against United next weekend. I think we are also struggling without a proper winger on the field, which is why I was very pleased to see Theo (sign da ting) come on the pitch in the 2nd half, as I hoped we could finally see some proper wing play, and get some balls into the box. However it was actually Arshavin who put the best ball into the box of the match, which led to our goal. It was a a lovely floated ball, into a dangerous area, and was something that we certainly missed throughout the match, up to that point. Furthermore once again it was a concern to see us caught out down the left hand side defensively on a number of occasions. Andre Santos has had a shocking week, and in the first half especially he looked extremely vulnerable to the QPR attackers. I really hope that this is something which is worked on enormously on the training ground this week, as we absolutely cannot afford to go to Old Trafford being so vulnerable on one side of the pitch, because they will quite simply work it to their advantage with ease. I hope this improves!

But the main talking point from this game, and rightly so, was the return of Jack Wilshere to our team. Because it was a largely un-eventful game it is difficult to discuss much else other than the fact that this incredible talent was once again showing us what he can do, at The Home of Football, for the first time in nearly 18 months. His ability on the ball is just fantastic, and it's absolute fantastic that we can now have him in our side. The way he covers the ground with his dribbling, the way he just strokes the ball round the park, just makes him such a top talent. He is without a doubt the only English player that would look at home a Spanish national side. His technical ability is just outstanding. What I also love about him, as I said in my article about him, is his grit and physicality that he brings to the game for us. And this was once again evident in the game against QPR. He is never afraid to put his body on the line to win the ball back, or to hold on the ball for his side. This is fantastic, because at times we really lack "bite" in our midfield, and now with Jack back in the side I think we really have this.

On to the man of the match for this match. It is quite a difficult call for this game, because not much real quality was showed overall, however I am going to give the man of the match award to Arshavin, simply because he came off the bench, seemed hungry to change some perceptions, played a fantastic ball for the winning (and only) goal, and also tracked back and fought well for the ball when we were holding on at the end, which is not something he has been renowned for!!! I hope we can now see him come back to what he is capable of doing, and what he showed in the early times of his Arsenal career, and not the lethargic, care free performances we saw at times last season. On the whole I thought he was impressive off the bench yesterday, he has taken a lot of flack, so I think it was impressive!!!

Next it's Reading in the cup, then to Old Trafford next week, where hopefully we can show RVP what a stupid move he made!

COYG

@Mr_arsenal_blog

The return of "Jack the lad" (our new number 10) how we've missed his quality, talent and enthusiasm for over a season. What can we expect from him? Why is his return so eagerly anticipated? 

What an excitement it is to have Jack nearing a return to the first team squad. It seems like an absolute eternity since he was last in the fold, but it's great that he is back, and barring any unfortunate and of course massively un-wanted set backs, he should make his first team return within the next week or so. This is fantastic. I really believe his talent has no bounds, he really can be as good as he wants to be, we could have one of the best players in the world of the future on our books. But why is he so good, what about him have we missed? 

Well firstly his technical, distribution ability is top class. You can really see when watching him, that he has been at Arsenal since he was a kid, because his game is based on supreme passing and technical ability. He seems to have a kind of "ariel view" of the pitch, because his vision to pick a pass is outstanding. During his breakthrough season 2010/11, some of the passes that he pulled out were mind boggling at times. One that sticks in my mind was his ball to Nicklas Bendtner against Ipswich in the Carling Cup Semi-Final, at the Home of Football, where he picked him out on the wing from 50, 60 yards away, a perfect pass. He also has the ability to make short, quick effective passes as well, ones which can aid the teams general play, and stop the team's movements from becoming bogged down, limp and ineffective (e.g. Vs Norwich on Saturday). I believe that on many occasions over the last year or so, we have really missed this ability in our game. That ability to just pick a pass, unlock the door that previously could not be opened in a game. I was watching the Under 21 game Vs Everton the other day, and this ability was once again evident in his play. He can just pick out a player, with a great "dinked" ball out wide, over the top of a defence, with his relative ease it seems, illustrating his supreme talent, and pure technical prowess. This is something which he did on many occasions in this game, and the first goal came from such a switched pass. I believe that having the ability back in our team, to effectively and quickly change the point of attack, with one of these "big diagonals" is going to be most useful. Because as I mentioned above, Saturday was a prime example of how we would have benefited. We simply could not get in behind their defence, we could not open the door at all. Our passing was slow, ineffective and predictable, and with Arteta (who is also undoubtably a fantastic distributor also) and Jack playing in union, I believe that we won't struggle in this department on many occasions again, as the range of passing that we are going to have will be great! 

Secondly, driving runs. I am sure like me, one of the most memorable and exciting performances that Jack the lad put in during his breakthrough season with us, was that against Barcelona in the champions league knockout round at The Emirates in February 2011. What a game that was, and what a performance it was from this young man (same age as me!). And one thing that stuck out to me, like the proverbial sore thumb, as well as his passing skill, was the ability he demonstrated against absolute top top class players, to drive the defence backwards with fantastic, powerful, meaningful dribbles. During this match, especially as they (Barca) began to tire, he really forced them back at times with these burts forward. And I feel that again this is something that we have lacked at times. At times our attacks can be very slow, laboured, lacking in territorial benefit in terms of getting up the pitch quickly. I believe that this is something that he can bring to the team. It is something that in fairness Abou Diaby possesses in abundance as well, as he showed against Liverpool earlier this season, and is someone else we missed greatly at the weekend, but other than that we do lack this in our side, that ability to really force defenders backwards, frighten them and open up the space coud be a real asset to us going forward for the rest of the season. 

Finally I believe we have missed, and now will gain from, his absolute dedication and tenacity. To me he is a player with English grit and determination coupled with Spanish flair and skill. It is this English grit which at times I suggest we have missed, and it was especially evident against Norwich on Saturday (and I hate to keep reminding us of that game, but I have to), we had no bite in the middle of the park, we were light-weight, out fought and out muscled. And even though Jack is not the biggest lad on the park, he sure is determined and he is not afraid to put his body into the fight, as we saw in the 2010/11 season, and at times maybe we saw it too much (I am thinking of his red card against Birmingham at the Emirates where maybe he was too aggressive and too eager to get the ball back from his opponent). But nonetheless this is something which we will certainly benefit from now that he nearing his return to the first-team sheet! I am very excited that soon we have two players of great strength and power in the midfield in Abou and Jack, although I doubt they will play together very often due to the form of Santi, and Mikel this season.

However as I have said numerous times on Twitter, squad rotation will never harm us, it will make us more effective. We have lot of strength in midfield at the moment, and with this addition from the treatment room, we will be a lot better indeed. Just think of the players we can call upon: Santi, Mikel, Abou, Jack, Rambo, Coquilen, and soon Rosicky (aka Little Mozart) as well. This is exciting for us going forward, and I hope you guys are you looking forward to seeing these guys available as well. 

It is amazing to think that Jack has never played with the likes of Rambo, Gervinho, The OX, Podolski, Giroud, Arteta, Cazorla, Santos, Mertesacker, Jenkinson. It just shows you how long the lad has been out for. But it is fantastic to have him so near to a return. It's important however, despite how much I have praised him here, to not expect fireworks from his straight away. It will take him a while to get anywhere near his level once again. That match "sharpness" will take time to return, but whenever it does we have one hell of a player on our hands!!!!! 

UP THE ARSENAL!!!!!!  

Tweet me @Mr_arsenal_blog 

                                                                  Welcome back Jack!! 

Mr Arsenal Blog's tactics weekly. 

22nd October - reviewing Arsenal vs Norwich. 

Well, that was an extremely frustrating game for us on Saturday. I can't quite believe how we lost that game, but the facts are this, we were poor, and we lost. It seemed we were complacent, and Arteta said it, "we expected to win", this concerns me. We absolutely have to improve for the game against Schalke this mid-week, if we don't we will loose. But what specifically was wrong with our game this weekend, and why did we become the first team to loose to Norwich this season? This is what I aim to discuss in this article. 

Firstly, before I start, the international break is NOT an excuse whatsoever for our loss. I have heard many people say this, both media and fans (both Arsenal and Non-Arsenal), but it simply should not be an issue. So, that's that out the way. 

On Saturday we were simply very poor, let's face the facts, we were playing a team that had not won a game yet this season, and quite frankly seemed to be in real "dire straits", whilst we had been in okay shape going into this game, so it was expected that the team would get a comfortable win at Carrow Rd. However the fluid, quick passing based game that we are very much used to seeing from our team, was (it seemed) a million miles away from our game. Quite frankly we never started, there were hardly any chances created. This was partly because of how Norwich played and how they tried to contain our threat, but also and probably more significantly as well, our passing was slow, predictable, and un-imaginative. We basically never, apart from Gervinho on one occasion right at the end of the game, got anyone in behind their defence. This shows a number of things. 1) We were not agressive enough with our passing, to look to get the ball in behind for players to run around on to. And 2) The passes that we did try to do were of poor quality. When The Gunners are at their best, the way we all love to see them play, (the sexy sexy football), we work the ball around the centre of the field, manipulate and suck their players in and then whip out, get it to the bye-line and hopefully square it effectively, to an attacker to tap in. This is something we saw many times last season with a certain United striker benefitting, and also this season as well. This what we absolutely did not do at the weekend. I cant remember any other occasions other than the one, and only one, that I mentioned above (for Gervinho). For the up-coming games this has to improve. The fact we did not break a team of Norwich's stature, especially with their form so far this season, is extremely concerning. To nearly 70% possession and not score, is worrying. We dominated the ball, we put in hundreds and hundreds of passes, but to no prevail. As I said, and I will reiterate this point, we hardly any threatened them, and with this much possession to not threaten them at all, is not good. I hope this improves, and to be honest it will. We wont be that poor again, I am sure (fingers/ toes crossed).  

Furthermore, and this is very much a regularly re-occurring theme this season, and to be honest a number of seasons before as well, this is our absolute lack of threat from corners and set pieces. Against Norwich. We had over 10 corners on Saturday, and we didn't not threaten John Ruddy from one of these moments. This is something which requires attention, I believe. I know that the club has a philosophy of keeping the ball, pass and move, interchaging of positions e.t.c. And this is clearly what we practice on the training field, and this season to be fair, we seem to have really been drilled in defending as well. But one thing it seems we do not to enough on, is offensive corners. I think I am right in saying we have only scored from one corner so far, Koscielney against City, and for the amount of them that we get, that would equate to an extremely low hit rate, thats for sure. I hope Steve Bould is given more of a licence to work on this because this is something that he was very effective with during his playing days, as we have heard many times with the near post flick on e.t.c. I hope the team starts getting more effective from these opportunities. We really have to, it's not good enough. On games like the one on Saturday, where we could not get any real chances, it would be great nick a goal from a set piece. That is what team of league winning quality and spirit do, look at City last year, often when they needed a goal to nick a win, they would nick one from a set piece, especially away from home, and this is my point. We must improve. 

Normally at this point I would discuss and name my man of the match, but this week I am not because there were hardly any moments of quality in the game. The usual candidate this season, Santi, he was nullified and was no where near the form he has shown so far this year, Gervinho was effectively non-existent, and when he did get the ball he did some stupid and gave it away, Giroud hardly touched the ball. The one man who I thought could make a difference, The OX, came on and went off again basically straight away, so all in all, there wasn't a man of the match. It was a dire game. The only thing I will say on a positive note, is that it was good to Serge Gnabry given a run towards the end. This young German, is super super talented, and I am sure we will see much more of him this season and beyond, I hope we see him more alongside his countryman, Thomas Eisfield who has been doing very very well for the Under 21s, and also did well for us in pre-season. 

Saturday, was a day to forget. But every season, along the journey, there are always days like this really. It seems to happen to most of the big teams, and it shows why the Premier League is such a great league, everyone can loose to everyone on the day. We were very poor, that is the facts, but we will bounce back, hopefully on Wednesday against a very useful German side in Schalke. Seems like ages since our last home match (Olympiacos) and I can't wait to get to the Home of Football once again!!! 

COME ON YOU GUNNERS!!!! 

Tweet me @Mr_arsenal_blog 

Early season report of Arsenal and the rest of the premier league. Patterns emerging?? What can we expect for the rest of the season. The signing of the season and my predicted final league table. 

What a fantastic product the Premier League is. The season is only a few months old, but already we have had many great goals, controversies, end to end matches, players on great form and upsets "left right and centre" across the league. Some teams have surprised us both positively and negatively, and the same names are at the top once again. How is the season going to shape out? I expect the table by the end of the season to look very very similar at the top, as it did last year and many years before, but I do expect a number of teams to finish higher than expected, and some lower.

However let us start with The Arsenal, how have our team fared so far? I would say that we have had a strong start, but could do much better, and must look to do better. We must not forget that we have only lost one game so far this season, not a bad start at all, especially when you consider that Manchester United have lost twice. However some of our performances have not been convincing and despite being much more solid defensively on the whole this season to date, we are still far to weak at defensive set pieces, and our own loss this season, came as a direct of this problem. I am someone who believes massively in our team, in our club, in the infrastructure in this club, however if I could say one thing, it's that if we are to reach our potential and to win a cup or even the league this season we must not be vulnerable for set pieces. We have tightened up a lot in open play, we really don't look vulnerable when we don't have the ball anymore, and this is very pleasing indeed. I hope that we can maintain this, and of course, develop it some more. If we do this we have shown the signs of: character, technical quality, team spirit, goal scoring ability and strength, needed to be a very successful team indeed. If we continue to improve as we are, we will be up there at the end of the season and if we challenge this season and maintain this strength we can, I believe create a very strong dynasty once again, for our club. This has to be our ambition, we must look to continue to grow and improve this season and beyond. People said we would not survive without Van Persie and without Alex Song, well I tell this to them, we have and we will, and this will continue. Players like Carl Jenkinson I believe symbolise what our club symbolises, a determination to succeed and to come back from whatever criticism and stick we may get from wherever, he has been superb!

I am very proud of the way we have started this season, but as I said, I am aware that we must improve. We may not win the league this season, and to be honest we most probably won't. But if the start of the season is anything to go by, we have the strength, the talent and the ambition to prove people wrong and fight to get as close as we can, to the top. Perhaps win the FA Cup or Capital One cup along the way and go on a good run in the Champions League, and show that we mean business, and that we are not just "happy" to be in the Champions League.

But what about the rest of the league? When I watch teams other than the Arsenal play, I watch as simply a fan of the game, a fan of our league. I love watching it. There are a number of sides that I have been watching with great interest so far this season. Swansea had a great start, topped the league even for a while at least, Everton have played some fantastic football, beat Manchester United on their opening day, West Brom have played way above what anyone expected of them and are looking in great shape. However the likes of QPR have struggled. When a team spends big money on trying to develop a team, create a successful period for their club, to stave of the threat of relegation people take notice. That is exactly what QPR did, and I was expecting them to do well this year. However they simply have been awful. They sit at the bottom, unable to register 3 points, and Mark Hughes is rightly under huge pressure to turn it around. I do believe however that QPR's quality will come through and they will be safe, perhaps with Redknapp at the helm. Its been a similar story for Liverpool, they too struggled last season, of course higher than QPR but struggled nonetheless, and many expected (for some reason) them to be a lot better this season. Despite a demolition of Norwich and a brave performance against Manchester United, where they were very unlucky, they have not started well. Brendan Rodgers is however a very intelligent, young, dynamic manager and over the a number of seasons will probably rejuvenate the club. I believe that Norwich, Villa and Reading will be going down. The choice of Villa is probably a brave one, but I just can't see them picking up enough wins, and they look in trouble, they really do. Lambert did great at Norwich but I cant see the same occurring at Villa Park.

It is however sure going to be a very interesting season in the Barclays Premier League, I expect the top 4 to be the same as it was last year, but probably in a slightly different order, and I also expect one of the Manchester clubs to finish lower than expected, as I believe that there is a weakness in both teams. Manchester City however will probably go and buy more in January, so they are my favourites to win the league, and I expect us to continue to improve, and it may just be that without the expectation that the other "top 4" clubs have to succeed and the pressure that brings we will improve on last seasons' 3rd place finish.

This is what I think the Premier League table will look like, with the top 4 and the bottom 6 to be very very close in terms of points:

1. City
2. Arsenal (brave I know) COYG!
3. United
4. Chelsea - (started well but lack of options up front will hurt them)
5. Everton
6. Spurs
7. Newcastle
8. Liverpool
9. Fulham
10. West Brom
11. West Ham
12. Stoke
13. Sunderland
14. Swansea
15. QPR
16. Southampton
17. Wigan
18. Villa
19. Reading
20. Norwich.

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Mr Arsenal Blog's tactics weekly. 

6th October

Welcome back to my weekly tactical review of The Arsenal's premier league games. Apologies for there not being a blog last week, but I had many things to sort out and simply didn't have time. Apologies. Well, what a great comeback that was by the boys this afternoon. We started the game so brightly, created many many chances to score the 1-0 we didn't take them, however we were looking very threatening and very sharp indeed. However which ever way you look at it, we were not clinical enough at all, were hit with the "sucker punch", and we were punished. This is something that we must improve on, because it seems to happen far far too much, and it could cost us at some point the victory, luckily today we pulled through. In the end we won the game (3-1), which is excellent, but what were the key tactical points we can analyse from this game? Why did we win the game? Why were we put under pressure at certain times? Was there a tactical experiment on the part of Arsene Wenger at the end there? I will discuss these things now.

First things first we have to talk about the issues that Andy Carroll caused our defence throughout the game, How should this have been dealt with? Well for a number of years Arsenal have often been vulnerable to teams who play with a big strong, physical centre forward who looks to get on the end of long balls into the penalty box. This was the case today. As soon I saw the Hammers' team sheet today, it was clear that this was going to happen, as often as possible, to really subject our defence to pressure in behind, especially between the centre half's and the goal keeper. Sure enough for lots of the game, West Ham bombarded the box with balls for Carroll to either attack himself and shoot, or, lay it off to the likes of Kevin Nolan in that "second striker" role, or Diame e.t.c, whipped it from the wide areas through Vaz Te or Matty Jarvis. The way Arsenal dealt with this was going to be key to the way in which this result panned out! As it happened we were sceptical in dealing with him at times, but overall despite the fact that he did cause us lots of problems I think we did deal with him reasonably well. He is the sort of striker that will always cause problems for any defence. But I do think we could've worked harder in the centre of midfield to really hassle and harry West Ham to stop them having the space and time required to launch those balls into the box, and at times we were guilty of allowing too much space for Carroll to get into good attacking positions for his team. But I was pleased with how we always fought for the second ball at the back.

One thing that a team must do in terms of their defensive organisation is to communicate constantly and create and maintain, a flat back 4. For lots of this season we have been disciplined and strong off the ball. However there was that moment today where Kevin Nolan was played through by his team mate in behind the back 4, was clean through on goal, and would surely have scored, were it not for a great tackle by the big man, Per Mertesacker at the back for us. The reason why I mention this in this review, is because of the way in which he was played onside by Carl Jenkinson on the right hand side. This could have been a really big moment, and could really have cost us, thus it's something that we have got to be mindful of in future weeks and months, in the games ahead. The back 4 must stay disciplined, and not switch off and allow people in behind them, onside, like we did with Nolan today, and probably should have gone 2 1 down. That clearly would have changed the game completely!

Another interesting tactical point from this game, arose from a substitution that The Boss made after we got to 3-1 in the lead. He took our winger Lukas Podolski and brought on the centre half Laurent Koscielney. Thus we went to a 3 at the back system and it also seemed that Walcott went to a more central striker role. I found this very interesting indeed, and I believe that whilst this was clearly intended to really close out the game, which is not something we see often from The Gunners in the Arsene Wenger era. However in addition to this I believe that Arsene may have been "tinkering" a little bit, and perhaps experimenting with a new tactical idea. What would this mean for the team? Well if we say that it was 3-2-3-2 kind of shape with, 3 centre backs 2 wing backs 3 midfielders and 2 strikers, what could this mean for the side? Well firstly obviously on the face of it would allow us to play 2 strikers which is something that we have not done for some time. This could be good, at it would also allow us to play Theo up there alongside another stronger striker. This is something City have tried as well as the likes of Italy and Juventus in particular as well. I don't like this shape however, as I believe that it leaves you very vulnerable in the wide areas, both offensively and defensively, think it can leave you very narrow in attack and then defensively I believe you could get caught out easily and get outnumbered. Will be interesting to see whether or not Arsene does ever use this shape!!

However on today's game overall (as you can see with the picture below, we dominated the game created many many chances and deserved the win. I believe that the three goals that we did score were of a great quality. It is a pleasing win, especially when you consider that on the whole we dealt with their arial and physical threat, and in the way players like Santi moved the ball around was fantastic. Hope we can continue to get wins at tough away grounds.

Now leaves me to discuss my man of the match and my man of the month for September. Man of the match today for me Santi Cazorla. This player just epitomises what is great about Spanish football right now, and he isn't even guaranteed to play for them, which is quite a thought! But today he once again showed his incredible balance, technique, vision, awareness, skill. Put simply the boy has got it, whatever "it" is, he has it! He can do everything, and I am so excited he is playing for The Gunners, and I hope that people up and down the land, and around the world begin to acknowledge just how good this lad is. He is TOP TOP class. Some of the passes he has made and the vision he has shown, for example his pass through to Giroud today, have been incredible. Such a great player!

My player of the month for September, easily could be Santi because as I said he has been fantastic for us really all season. But it is in fact Carl Jenkinson. I think he has been absolutely exceptional all season so far, and his improvement on last season is just staggering quite frankly. Against Man City he was outstanding, against Chelsea last week despite the fact that we lost he was exceptional. His work rate is great, he is extremely athletic, and defensively he has improved immensely. He doesn't lunge into tackles and get manipulated as maybe he did last season, and all in all he has been great for us. When Sagna is fit and ready for the first team, the boss is going to have a real headache to decide who to play at RB. To be honest on the evidence of the season so far, I would play Jenkinson, I think he has been nothing short of outstanding.

Now we have the international break, and after which we have Norwich away, where hopefully we will play well again and get a good 3 points.

Thanks for reading, and GOODBYE!!

UP THE ARSENAL!!!

Do tweet me your thoughts @Mr_arsenal_blog