We didn't win... so a 'whisker away' or not, we conceded 2 goals and many other chances. That is not controlling a game. In the first half we had a lot of possession but no control of the game.
Right, cos in that case we controlled almost every game against Man U when Wenger and Fergie went at it but lost most of the time, but we now know that Fergie let us dominate possession, it was his gameplay to sit back and hit us on the break.
There are different ways to control a game, of course by possession is one of them - but not just having possession. A team can sit back and let you have possession and you have to try to break them down, if you don't create chances the team sitting back can say they controlled the game and they would be right. If you are the team with the possession and you don't create much you can't say you controlled the game. If you think back to when the game was 1-2, did you at any point from then think the game was won ?! I didn't and thats the reason you can't say we controlled the game. I was nervous, I was hopeful, these are not feelings that align to your team controlling the game. Admittedly, we did create quite a few chances in that second half but we also conceded a fair few chances, thats why I don't think you can say we controlled the game.
I don't think we controlled the game, the point I've been making is that that was the plan in the first half, to try and retain possession, dictate the play, and control the game. When we went 1-0 down we had to change that, which we did. But even at 2-1 I still felt we needed another goal, and said as much on the PL match thread.
Sunderland (a) is a game made for a rapid sub like Martinelli so it's gutting he wasn't there to come on for the last 20 minutes once we'd gone 2-1 up. Counter attacking with his pace up front as Sunderland pushed forward would have made them easy pickings I feel. Even Gyokeres is fast enough to offer that same running outlet. They are our only two pacey players so it's kick in the jaffers they're out at the same time.
