It has to be said Arsenal used the Europa League a couple of seasons ago to blood a chunk of their current team Would it be too early to blood Donley, Moore, Irow, Dorrington or Kyerematen? Perhaps - but on the other hand Devine, Parrott, Scarlett, Cesay, Santiago, Paskotsi and Soonsup-Bell are all players who would definitely benefit
Playing two full backs who can actually defend was a good idea. Emerson Royal was very good again. He may have been written off too early
Defensively he is a very solid player who will get better with experience. Limited going forward but he's a perfect example of what happens when you chop and change managers every few months. He was signed for a manager who wanted a traditional back 4 but shortly after had to play for a manager who wanted wing backs. Porro is the exact opposite: comfortable going forward but a liability at the back, which means he might become obsolete if our next manager favours a back 4 again.
He and Porro tend to excel at polar opposites. Emerson - great defensively, shocking offensively Porro - shocking defensively, great offensively If you could mould the two’s positives together you’d have a world class RB/ RWB.
Trent can’t defend for **** but has had a fine career as a RB. Just need to have a top CB or two and a decent DM if playing a back four… in our case we’ve had the likes of Dier and Sanchez, plus Romero who tends to go between brilliant and idiotic, having to cover any marauding WB, which doesn’t tend to end well.
...and have someone at the helm who doesn't understand this stuff or particularly care...if he thinks he's getting a bargain. Too many of our signings are made on the basis of non-sporting considerations. Nobody expects us to be breaking transfer records...but stopping the purchase of square pegs for round holes would be a start of turning this ship around.
Realistically it's Liverpool's midfield which is why TAA and van Dijk looked better than they actually are, because if teams can't get past the barrier in the middle of the pitch then the weaknesses in the games of those further back don't get exposed Similar can be said with Michael Dawson for us: plenty of people on Old606 wanted him binned off when he was routinely exposed by our porous midfield of Jenas & Zokora, but when our midfield was stiffened with Palacios, Parker or Sandro alongside Modric he was like John Terry without the racism
We won, kept a clean sheet and Kane broke a couple of more records. Emerson looked very good, despite it being his first game back from a long-ish injury. The new system worked, whether it was 3-4-3, 4-4-2 or some combination of the two. We limited Palace to a few scraps and they've been playing very well recently. Good to see Bissouma back on the bench, too. Any negatives? We failed to kill them off and wasted some good chances. Probably didn't create enough and looked a bit ropey in the middle at times. The subs wrecked our balance and we kind of limped over the line. Kulusevski didn't seem to know where he was supposed to play. Sorry for your loss, Brian.
Slightly odd Son highlight video: Still receiving the ball with his back to goal too often, for my liking. The video does show something of a new role for him though, I think. Played quite deep when we were taking set-pieces, using his pace to prevent counters. Made one very good header to intercept a ball over the top, which is unlike him.
It also helps when said midfield at Pool is free to cynically foul at will and is immune from red cards.
