Moral boosting win today that to some extent papered over the cracks however all arsenal fans know where our weaknesses lie. To be honest our first half performance wasn't the worst i've seen us play at home this season. But the most obvious factor in our play is our closing down and our pace when we have the ball. In the first 10-15 mins we were working hard and closing villa down meaning that they would panic and knock it long or just boot it out of play meaning that we are able to regain possession the majority of time high in the oppositions half. But then that stopped and the grew in confidence and defensive mistakes put us in a really poor position. Then in the second half we started brightly and closed them down and moved the ball alot fast with players taking fewer touches and we managed to create chances. Its something we don't do enough and especially with the type of football we like to play if we let the opposition get comfortable in possession then they will begin to expose our defensive frailties, especially at home against lesser teams we are too relaxed both with and without the ball (obviously you need to be comfortable in possession) but individual players hold onto the ball for too long instead of releasing it quicker. Almost in the way that barca play when they don't have the ball, they are a rubbish team defensively but that is hardly exploited because obviously they keep possession very well and they close the opposition high up the pitch when they dont have the ball forcing them to punt it long. It was great to see oxo starting again and its clear just how much better he is than walcott and when gervinho gets back from acn hopefully walcott will be out the team, also good to see sagna make a return and we should look more solid defensively with him back in the side, we are just waiting on jack now and gibbs although it looks like it coul be the end of february before they are back. Another player whom i thought played well was coquelin, again playing out of possession but he was really good today although there was a few times when agbonlahor got the better of him but he is a hungry player who is very good both with and without the ball.
i actually thought it was one of our worst first half performances, we lacked spark, ideas, and were aimlessly passing the ball around. To top all of that off were the 2 goals scored by Villa, which was due to very weak defending, so all in all, it was a very bad first half, and we have had too many of them this season at the Emirates.
I've rubbished tippy-tappy for years............... No only kidding - its the beautiful game (if you can stay awake).
Nah i've seen us play a lot worse than that at home, against fulham and everton especially, i think its also the fact that villa scored 2 goals which obviously looked worse, but we looked like scoring in the first 15 mins unlike in other first halfs where we have just sat in the oppositions half passing the ball from side to side with no end product.
I think the "tippy-tappy" argument is a bit harsh. Barcelona get hammered for it as well. The possession game can be countered by a team working its nuts off to cover for 30-40 minutes. You have to be patient and let them run themselves into the ground. In my opinion, the Villa team despite being 2 up, were knackered after the first half. They sat for 15 minutes, got stiff, and just seized up after they came back out. Barcelona are really strong late in games too. I think the tippy tappy stuff is a necessary evil. What I did like is that in the second half, we mixed it up with some direct long stuff to stretch them out a bit, which is something we havent done some games.
to succeed with the ultimate tippy-tappy - you have to have REALLY good creative feeders to REALLY good strikers. (and perfect high-class cheats).
In the second half, we changed our style of play and reverted to our older style of more direct play. This is what was creating all the problems for Aston Villa and injected much needed energy into our performance. Having both OXO and Walcott on on the wings enabled us to really pressurise Villa with raw pace. There is nothing more frightening than seeing pacey forwards come charging towards you. I really do hope that Wenger goes back to this style of play, especially for the premiership. Our current possession type football is good but less effective when we lost Fabs, Nasri and Hleb. We simply do not have the same quality as those guys to keep ball.
I thought Walcott was excellent in the second half so not quite sure where the "clear Oxo is much better" comes from. They're different types of players but both were terrifying their markers last night. AOC deserves more game time (he's been spuerb recently) but let's not detract from a good performance by Theo.
Yes Walcott had a good game but OXO is clearly more naturally suited playing on the wings than Walcott. OXO has very good ball control and skill to go past players, whereas Walcott uses his pace mainly. I think Walcott should be tried in the central positions soon.
Don't disagree with that but AOC being better on the wings doesn't mean Theo is a bad player. I appreciate you're not saying that but it just feels like people want to disparage him no matter what, even when he does well. Like you (and apparently quite a few others) I'd like to see him being played more centrally. Maybe it'll happen if RVP gets retrospectively booked
The Barcelona way of tippy tappy football is nothing like ours, their's usually ends with a shot on goal, ours doesn't Barcelona play one touch in confined spaces, other than that, the ball moves a lot and they have "endless options" for passes. When we do it, the players don't have the speed of thought or options, our players don't move into places that allow them to receive the ball - on top of that, the Barca players are supremely confident when receiving the ball when they have "man on" - our players will lose the bloody ball. So we shouldn't be trying to play that style of football with the players we have. WE should be more prepared to go for goal when in advanced situations. The argument is, if we have possession of the ball the opposition can't hurt us. Very true. But if we are not creative enough on the ball when playing tippy tappy we make it difficult for ourselves. We need to be more direct, mix it up, the solution is simple.
I can't actually believe that arsenal fans, who watch our matches all the time are saying that oxo is not better than walcott, are you being serious? I've said all along that walcott is not a natural footballer, he just has pace, his control is absolutely abysmal, especially his close control when dribbling the ball especially when you compare him to the likes of robben pedro and oxo who keep the ball close to there body when dribbling walcott never seems to have full control of the ball and i'm sick of people sticking by him. He is a sprinter and that is why he is effective sometimes in our play but i really do hope that he is out the team as soon as gervinho comes back because walcott's decision making is so poor, just watch the next time he starts to dribble, the ball is at him side instead of in front of him and his skill consists of knocking the ball 10 yards ahead and sprinting after it, honestly no idea why he is even an arsenal player, same with arshavin chamakh and squillaci, but walcott is the most annoying because he starts week in week out and some are saying that he should play up front, are you mad? have you seen some of his finishing and he panics all the time when he gets in the opposition penalty area.
I know what you mean, a lot of people do go after Walcott far too much. The big problem i think is that Walcott so desperately wants to play as a striker, you can even see it the way he plays. I don't blame him but the system clearly does not suit him. If you watch him, he has good movement off the ball and is always trying to make runs into spaces. As i've said before, if Walcott played in our old Invincibles system, he would greatly benefit and get so many more goals...
OP - Walcott is a natural striker, this is where he played for Southampton. He has already demonstrated how lethal he can be when played up front, think back to the cup final against Chelsea where he scored and an outing in the Champion's League last season I think, away game, he scored. His pace is lethal and as a striker you have a different mindset to that of a winger where trickery is an advantage. If you have lethal pace as a striker and you play off the last man, as Walcott does, he only needs to think about making intelligent runs, getting the ball and beating the keeper which is something I think Walcott would be very good at.
Watching Theo yesterday, some of his control was great. Some wasn't so great. His chest control in particular is fantastic. He needs balls played in behind to run onto, that would play to his strengths, a few of those would push the full-backs & thus CB's right back, allowing more space for Ramsey / attacking midfielder to operate in the hole. Sadly Arsenal don't really seem to look for those...except yesterday...where Rosicky played in Theo, and suddenly he scored. Technically Oxo looks superior, but Theo has great qualities and when on form is awesome. I agree he very much wants to be a striker, which is why balls in behind would work very well, because he does usually have the finishing.
Bonstar, I agree totally As a winger I do not rate him one little bit, in fact I get that sinking feeling when he is picked to play there, but the thought of him as a striker makes me salivate !! I hope he gets his chance. The stick he gets is unfair but its based on what we see. We need to see him played in his preferred role but, with 4-3-3, he's got no chance of playing there
Our old 4-4-2 system would be perfect for him. We now have the players to break at speed like the old days. With Gervinho on the left, Walcott in the middle and OXO on the right, Arsenal would get many speeding tickets!
Thing is, do we really want to move RvP further away from goal when he is scoring an outrageous amount of goals? I'm not sure, in fact I completely do not agree that Walcott has the strength of mind needed to be the main goalscorer of the team. Too often he panics and messes up easy chances or passes when he should shoot. If we were going to play that system I would want us to buy a proven goalscorer rather than put Walcott there because he depends to much on confidence to be the main striker for a top team.
