Match Day Thread Arsenal vs Manchester City - Matchday Thread

I can't say that I was expecting much from our game against City and there certainly isn't any glossing over for what is in-store for Emery, a very long and hard rebuilding process.

Emery needs many more games under his belt to determine what his best team and tactics are, and get climatised to the PL.

 

All the issues you mentioned are the symptoms of a team that's not had enough time to gel. I could kind of get a vague idea of what the plan was, but we look a distant way off from achieving where we want to be. It's disappointing for sure as I am certain many of us would have liked bright start and possibly a score draw or a win. But realistically, we were second best by some distance.

 

Mixed feelings about this game. Didn't expect anything from it in terms of the result, but I was a bit disappointed with some of our play going forward, nothing seemed to stick and players didn't seem to be on the same wavelength. We also looked a bit sloppy at the back at times, so there's still a lot of work needed.

On the plus side. Lichstiener was solid, he should be a starter until Monreal is back. Guendouzi did okay, a few shaky moments but he moved the ball well, made some good tackles and kept driving us forward. Torriera looked solid when he came on and Lacazette showed that he can affect the game pretty quickly when he's on the pitch.

It didn't really come together for us today, but we were better in the 2nd half and started to make City make mistakes, if we could have grabbed an equaliser at that point in the game we could have built on that, but their 2nd goal killed it for us. Was pleased to see that our heads didn't go down though, we kept on trying. Overall disappointing today, but this project is going to take a season or two before we can judge.

 

Dogshit. Emery out.

 

I'm liking the passion of Lichsteiner and the energy of Buendouzi (Sideshow Bob?).

Didn't like Sokratis turning away from the ball.

Generally we weren't anywhere near as sharp with the passing and the large number of new players clearly showed that we need a bit more time to gel as a unit.

It's only one game and far too early to get mopey in any way. I feel a lot more hopeful for the game against Chelski.

COYG

 

I hear some Arsenal fans moaning online, but its Dick Emery's first game and it was against one of the best sides that English football has ever seen.
Most of your new signings looked promising so that is a silver lining.
Not sure why Ramsey was playing though, if I were in charge of Arsenal that kid wouldnt see another minute of football until he signed his new contract.
He either wants to be at Arsenal or he dont. Enough dicking about!

 

Well.

Bit of a strange game in some ways, as there were times when we looked very promising and we hassled/pressed quite well. Then there were other moments where we looked utterly hopeless and displayed symptoms of the defensive horror shows in Wenger's last season.

The result was pretty much as I expected. Although I was very disappointed with our play in the final third. Feels like we're still lacking a bit of sharpness.

Nevertheless, sometimes you just have to hold your hands up and accept the opposition are better than you.

This was one of those occasions. You can't judge how our season is going to pan out based on the opening game against one of the best teams in the world with arguably the best manager in the world.

One thing I will say is I was impressed by how well City pass the ball under pressure. In that first half in particular, we were trying to swarm Fernandinho and Gundogan in possession, but they are so technically and physically good, that they managed to bypass our press for the majority of that first half (barring a couple of times where we caught them in possession).

I was disappointed with our lack of width and you could see City exploited that. When we defended, we were far too narrow and they stretched us because the likes of Ramsey and Ozil weren't getting back quick enough. I said before that our lack of natural wide players will be a problem against this City team and it certainly proved to be the case.

Guendouzi had a very good game; confident tackler, great distribution, reads the game well and has the stamina to plug the gaps left by any players that maraud forward. Unfortunately, he made two quite major boo-boos - one of which resulted in the opener (though not entirely his fault). He was caught flat-footed when Sterling ran and took his shot and he made a big one getting dispossessed, which led to the Aguero 1v1. Thankfully Cech saved us there.

Leichsteiner looked good when he came on; certainly doesn't play like he's a 34-year old.

Bellerin performed better than I expected, didn't do too much wrong. Unlucky with that shot in the first half. Mustafi and Sokratis also performed better than I thought they would do, the former in particular didn't look like his usual clumsy self.

Ozil, Xhaka and Mkhitaryan were by far our worst players on the pitch. Ozil's touch and passing, which is normally top notch, wasn't on point at all. Xhaka didn't contribute anything to the game. And Mkhitaryan got himself into a lot of promising positions in the final third, but kept fluffing his lines.

Aubameyang didn't get the service at all, so can't be too harsh on him.

Lacazette did look sharp when he came on though. Linked play well and was dropping deeper to receive the ball/make challenges. Seems like he is keen to impress, which is always good.

Cech had a mixed game - he saved us with some important saves at critical times, but he isn't comfortable playing out from the back, nor is he reliable. If this is the style of play Emery wants, Cech cannot be our starting 'keeper.

Overall, I can't fault the effort - but the quality in vital moments simply wasn't there.

 

Oh, one more point I want to add - Whilst we could have definitely got something from that if our final ball had been better, they equally could have extended their lead with some of the chances they had. Swings and roundabouts. But don't think anyone can truly begrudge them the victory.

The chasm between our two sides is vast at the moment, but I'm hoping people don't get too downbeat about the performance/result. City were a class above us in every possible way, and although they dispatched us with relative comfort, they will also do that to 95% of teams they face this season, including some of the big guns.

The quality and depth in their squad is phenomenal - baring in mind they had de Bruyne, Jesus, Sane, Otamendi, Kompany and Foden on the bench, whilst David Silva wasn't named in their squad (injury I'm assuming).

They are one of the best Premier League teams of all time. Absolutely no shame in losing to opposition that are objectively superior to you.

It happens.

We still have a lot to look forward to

 

All those visiting teams to be flushed down the Tottenham toilet.Won't it be nice?

 

Agree with this. Disappointed with the result although it was expected. Going forward we looked rusty, which I'd expect to get better as we play a few mote games. Pleased with Lacazette's performance though, I'd rather Emery found a way to play him and Aubameyang together as we look dangerous when they are both up top.

For me in Midfield, Xhaka shouldn't be a starting player. I'd rather we played Torreira and Guendouzi in there and even though it would take time for them to bed in properly, I think they are both better and more dynamic players than Xhaka. Guendouzi in particular looks really confident and at ease on the ball and even though he made some mistakes yesterday, he didn't let it affect his play. Definitely think he could be our box to box midfielder with Torreira as a traditional DM.

Lichsteiner was solid yesterday, didn't flap at anything and showed that he's got bags of defensive experience. He's the sort of player that doesn't do anything flash, but is just neat and tidy and understands and reads the game well. Sokratis did okay, but he is a bit slow. Hopefully he'll improve as he settles in, but he doesn't really look like much of an upgrade on what we've already got.

 

Football isn't like golf, what your opponent does affects the way you play and how good you are. It is also a game about time and space. City didn't give our players any time and space, and we gave them too much. The better we get as a team at playing our new tactics the better our players will look like they are playing.

Right now everyone is still taking too long to make decisions and still not playing instinctively. That will only come in time. Arsenal fans all wanted change, or at least said they did. Change comes at a price and that price has to be paid. Fans have to let them get on with it and stay away from picking on individuals, or it is going to turn into a ****-show really fast.

 

Emery is something of a Europa League specialist having won it 3 times in a row.

I do wonder whether he was brought in to get us into the CL through the backdoor.

Honestly, looking at our squad objectively, it is probably the 6th best in the league. Which is quite astonishing given how much money we have spent. Looking at his track record, it would come as no surprises if we were primarily focusing on Europe.

He's drawn parallels with Benitez in some respects, as Benitez tinkers with his team and formation a lot in the league, but is seen as a tactical genius in Europe.

I guess we'll see.

 

I see quite a few people saying that it's ridiculous that arsenal fans are moaning already. But I havent actually seen any evidence of arsenal fans moaning. Have I missed something??

 

He is up against it but i don't think he has inherited a bad squad either. The PL is significantly more stronger than the La Liga so he will need more money to invest to get us top 4. I do agree that we're around 6th best with our team, but i don't think we are a million miles away from getting back to top 4. It will realistically take 2-3 transfer windows before he gets a team he can start working with. It took Klopp a few transfer windows to get where he has.

This season is persuading the current lot of players to play his way and then buy/sell whatever he needs in the summer.