Never Poke the Mighty Cannon, Vieira Reincarnated, Kai a Reflection of Humanity: Eight Observations.

TotalArsenal

Arsenal 5 – 1 Man City

Eight observations from a tremendous win that was a long-time coming.

  1. An early goal in a top game is often a mixed blessing. All the preparations paid off almost instantly, and what to do after that? You’d say keep going as before but it somehow does not seem that simple. The opponent got an instant kick under the Arsenal and will have got their focus sorted. Arsenal simply sat back too much. At first, it was effective enough as the great ponytailed berserker was isolated and as harmful as a hushpuppy. Raya was our master in goal during this period, and I think the little midweek break did him a world of good. But gradually Arsenal lost their intensity and purpose, and sooner or later a team will pay for this. We did, but…. then we responded.
  2. Every team needs luck, and we got it with the wicked deflection from Partey’s shot on target. It left the keeper with no chance. What was not luck is that our boys once again benefited from a studied and pounced on weakness in the way Man City play out from the back. It was an attacking masterclass from Havertz, Odegaard, Rice and co.
  3. How I love Thomas Partey this season. What a player we have here, and I wonder whether the club should try and sign him up for another few years. He gets it and was the best, most intelligent midfielder on the pitch. I think yesterday he played the most Vieira-esque I have ever seen him play. Crisp attacking passing, many interceptions, such physical presence, and master of transition.
  4. Rice grew into the game and at the end he was magnificent. He just makes me think of an AudiA4: reliant, sturdy, no-nonsense, and he enjoys himself more the longer he is running. Nothing too sexy, just blood, sweat and tenacity. On that note, and as Stu mentioned yesterday, is there a better midfield in the PL than Rice, Partey and Odegaard right now?
  5. Miles Lewis-Skelly, what a tiger we have here! His confidence on the ball is surreal for such an age; his ability to transition with the ball from defence to midfield is so impressive; and then he had the skill and confidence to score that goal, and then celebrate with that iconic celebration to make the humiliation complete. That will teach you Erling to poke the mighty Cannon.
  6. Has there ever been an Arsenal player who both frustrates and delights as much as Kai does? And as such, is he not the epitome of all of us humans? A work horse, a group of hyenas in one body, a bear in the box, a dreamer and believer: Havertz is all of this; and I love him for it. Missing big chances comes as a price with all of this, but the bigger picture is that he is a vital player in Arteta-ball.
  7. Ethan, Ethan, how sweet is your left foot? You can certainly curl it like Bukayo. Who would have thought that Arsenal would win today 5-1 without a top CF – will one arrive today? – and Bukayo and Jesus out of action? The likes of Miles and Ethan give Arsenal that extra level of energy, quality and excitement, and how Citeh would love to have the same right now!
  8. My final ‘obeservation’ goes to Martinelli. This was a very mature performance by a player who has quietly become a complete footballer. We need more goals from him of course, but yesterday he worked for the team all over the pitch for 90 minutes, and the most important thing he did was to allow Havertz to score rather than selfishly take a shot himself. That was class and sealed the game once and for all.

By TotalArsenal.

38 thoughts on “Never Poke the Mighty Cannon, Vieira Reincarnated, Kai a Reflection of Humanity: Eight Observations.”

  • It is so easy to relate to those positive observations.

    I would underline the last point though: we had 2 players out of position: MLS playing at LB (as he was always deployed at DM in the youth setups) and Martinelli, who had to deputize Saka at RW/FWR which he did really well. So he took one for the team, and didn’t diasppoint a bit. (Even his offside chip was an excellent piece of work, albeit [correctly] disallowed.)

    In fact it was maybe Trossard who didn’t shine yesterday, and maybe Saliba who was a bit south to his very best self. But this (9 out of 11 players performing at least at 8/10) would be exceptional against any team, and half a miracle against Manchester City.

    In the past few weeks Arsenal has often been the team that creates a lot of chances but scores little, often ridiculed as winning the xG league but losing many actual games in the process. Yesterday we scored 5 against an xG of 1.54. So we were partly lucky, partly clinical.

    I’m not sure about Partey’s suitors, but he really playes exceptionally – as long as he is not deployed at RB. He indeed earns a lot in wages, but if he can maintain this level we should really consider extending his contract with a year.

  • Just what you need on a very cold, grey afternoon, a positive post from Totaal, it fits perfectly with a mug of English tea and some Dutch pancakes.

    There is so much to like about this team, how it deals with pressure, how it exposes the defensive errors of the opposition, the intelligence of players running into space and stretching the opposition, the likes of Martinelli and Trossard who did the hard yards, put themselves second for the team, did the unglamorous work of holding onto the ball under intense pressure and bringing team mates into the play and affording our defenders a breather when City were threatening, nobody was playing for themselves it was all about the collective effort. You could see how the efforts of Martinelli and Trossard frustrated the City players by how often they were fouled – not that the referee always rewarded their efforts with a free kick!

    Bernardo Silva certainly left his mark on the game and on Trossatd and Odegaard themselves.

    Havertz was like the lighthouse in a storm, despite the mayhem around him he was serenity itself, plus those elbows when need be. I was so happy for him when he scored because it spoiled the narrative of all the weirdos online…

    The defence was resolute, MLS kept the £42m man on the bench – what on earth is Arteta thinking?

    At this rate his critics will have to revise their misguided criticisms of Mikel not liking youth players (fat chance). Of course he likes them, but he doesn’t use them for the sake of it they have to be the required quality.

    Less than 7 hours before the transfer craziness is over, the sooner the better I reckon…

  • Kai must have felt the love of the fans after his miss; not even a single whisper of abuse could be heard then – or so I think. That’s what’s sure to have given him the strength to keep on keepin’ on ’til he got the reward he deserved. What impressed me most about his goal was his run. I thought I was watching a re-run of one of the “Road-Runner” cartoons of my childhood, I didn’t think he had that in him. The left-footed stuff, then, almost felt like watching him practising his scales …
    Let’s not forget Raya, maybe … He was at his feline best, and bailed us out again twice. He has never let us down this season when our boat was rocked, not a single time. I find the intensity of his focus eery at times – but that’s a quality that runs through the whole team, actually, one of MA’s greatest achievements no doubt.
    One slightly negative word, maybe … I know marking Haaland must be like trying to keep a tiger on a leash, but when he scored, I didn’t have nice thoughts about Bill. I’m not talking about the header itself – by then it was too late; but Bill shouldn’t have let “Humbled” conquer those few square feet of space from where he jumped. Our boy looked like a little child, it made me think of Vince Carter’s “le dunk de la mort” over Frédéric Weis’s head in the 2000 Summer Olympics, and I didn’t like it one bit. But he’s strong, and clever, our lad, he’ll learn from it …
    Anyway, I feel like I’ve nurtured a delightful hangover for 24 hrs; as you often say, TA … Ooh to, Ooh to be, Ooh to be A Gooner! …

  • In agreement with this post, TA. When we scored early, my first concern was our recent tendency to revert to a defensive mode after scoring, a habit that gets fans nervous. Well, I didn’t need to worry too much about that as the boys kept the press going and nearly went 2-0 up twice in the first half. Harland’s equalizer merely energized the team further. We have to keep that momentum going till the end of the season to see where finish.
    Our midfield trio seem to thrive in the big games. They were unplayable on Sunday and made the City team look older and slow. This team can beat any side when they are up for it. Thomas Partey, most certainly, should be given an extension with a pay rise because he looks like he has a few more years left in him, injuries aside.

    A friend of mine and fan of the club was upset to have Martinelli start, instead of Nwaneri and I assured him Martinelli makes up for whatever criticism one may have of him with honest work, helping out his full back and involving himself in the forward press; a requirement Nwaneri may be too young to handle as well. City have good wingers and hard work was required to keep us in control. I told him Nwaneri will come on when limbs are tiring. He had to admit I was right after the game and the win. Martinelli was effective and immense that day, if not spectacular. Trossard also did his bit keeping that side of the pitch under some control. I liked the way he kept teasing and troubling the right side of the City defence, twisting, turning and just keeping possession well. Then, Nwaneri scored that beauty, after coming on.

    Having our two academy graduates (have they even reached the age?) score against Man City was the icing on the cake for me. In addition to having Manchester United poaching our kids (Chido-Obi and Ayden Heaven), those lads scoring must be a huge boost for those in charge of the academy. Pictures of those two celebrating their goals need to be hung in the hallways at Hale end.

    Next game is at Newcastle and the bar codes will no longer be feeling so good about their chances, after thumping us 0-2 at ours. Good thing the return leg was not the week after, or we would surely have been eliminated. One month is a long time in football as the two clubs have had contrasting fortunes on the pitch, lately, with Arsenal on the rise and Newcastle losing their last two home games. The result on Sunday should be the impetus we require to go out there and get the goals we need to qualify for the final of the League cup. Why not? I will be happy to win that trophy now, while still keeping the focus on the main goal: hunting down Liverpool.

  • I saw a clip indicating that there was a 36 pass sequence before that goal by Ethan Nwaneri. It was a thing of beauty.

  • I’ll put it down to the “delightful hangover”, LG, for after four years of reading your reflections I have finally come across a faute d’orthographe. Pardonnez toute conduite peu distinguée de ma part en portant cela à votre attention, mais je suis impressionné (in awe) par votre maîtrise de ma langue maternelle. Dites-moi, est-ce que l’un de vos parents a l’anglais comme langue maternelle ?

    That was quite a spring by Haaland, his feet must have been a metre off the ground. I read that he only had nine touches the whole match, completed just one pass and didn’t have a single shot all game. The level of concentration required to keep the “tiger” thus chained awes me.

    Thanks for the post, Total. I love the visual image you conjure up in describing our Kai as embodying a clan of hyena’s. He was, along with Martin, Leandro and Declan vital in the outworking of Mikel’s tactics. I hope we can see him remain fit for the run in, especially now that we have had a barren transfer window.
    I kinda hoped we’d get Ollie in, for the same reasons I always pined for the signing of Zaha. Both hugely talented and both born and bred Gooners.
    Kev, do we have any young strikers at the club who might fill a gap? Reiss could return from loan, but he needs to recover from a hamstring injury.

  • 82. Andre Harriman-Annous

    This lad has the most potential in my opinion Stu, but at 17 he is still a tad too raw. Other than him there’s nobody, Biereth might have been worth a go but I guess they didn’t think he was elite.

  • I like your “accent circonflexe” on the “i” of “maîtriser” a lot, Stu. Not that many French students still abide by the rule (I love our accents in general, they say a lot about the history of French). Well, I might write a word or three about my family and the English language during the upcoming break, when the lads are bathing in the Dubai sun after thrashing the Magpies out of the Carabao (and into oblivion, for all I care) … if you don’t mind my “ stickin’ my pen in my heart “ and some of my feelings to “ flood on the page “, in the words of the greatest r’n’r song ever (the one after which the phrase “ play a mean guitar “ was coined, I’m sure).

    Now, let’s take a look at the post-TW lay of the Arsenal land:
    GK: Raya-Neto-Setford
    RB/RWB: White-Timber-Tomiyasu (Partey ?!?)
    LB/LWB: LewisSkelly-Calafiori-Tierney-Zinchenko (Timber) (Tomiyasu)
    LCB: Gabriel-Kiwior-Calafiori (Tierney)
    RCB: Saliba-White (Tomiyasu) (Timber) (Rice)
    LD(BtoB)M: Rice-Merino (LewisSkelly) (Zinchenko)
    RW: Saka-Nwaneri (Sterling) (Martinelli)
    RD(BtoB)M: Partey-Jorginho (White)
    CF: Havertz (Nwaneri) (Trossard)
    PM: Ødegaard- Nwaneri-Havertz (Saka) (Zinchenko)
    LW: Martinelli-Trossard-Sterling
    out: Jesus (no blasphemy intended)

    Well … that looks strong enough to me – thanks to the versatility of many of our boys. Timber in particular is not only a fierce warrior (I love him), he’s also a Swiss Army knife of a player if ever there was one. I was tempted to “register” him as a RDM as well.
    My only worry about this squad is not goalscoring, it’s the level of Raya’s backups. How I wish we had at least kept Arthur Okonkwo at Colney. The other moves (Martinez-Leno-Ramsdale-Hein) I think I can see the rationale of, even if I don’t agree with it; but letting Arthur fade away without even giving him 45 minutes of playing time, that I can’t get my head around … Let’s pray hard, over and over again, for Raya to be kept out of harm’s way ’til the end of the season.
    Otherwise, everything’s gonna be alright, starting tomorrow night.
    “It’s only The Arsenal, but I like it, yes I do.“

  • I agree with TA and LG regarding the – unmaterialized – transfers and reinforcements.

    You know me, I have no inhibitions when it comes to Arteta or the club executives IF the critiques are justified. But I think they are not in this case.

    1. Even without Saka – but apart from that with our strongest players – we beat City like a rented mule. (Fun fact: I was searching Google for a proper metaphor for such beating, and the most popular result was ‘like a red-headed stepchild’.) Our teenagers have demonstrated that they are last resort or desperation options, but already decent gunners on their own merit.

    2. I’m not sure if we left the Watkins negotiation because of his recent injury, but I prefer the narrative that we didn’t give in to Villa’s bullying and pay twice of the fair price for an otherwise decent player. We were so often the punchline of those jokes about overpaying players, so I can’t help but feel proud to turn them down (and slightly curious what will Emery do with 6 attackers demanding competitive minutes).

    3. I think our current Arsenal squad is already close to complete. There are not many players who can walk into the first team. So I share the approach to only buy someone who instantly elevates the team and not spend money, energy and minutes to some attackers just because they were available. I don’t doubt that these are all fine players, but I happy that neither of Wissa, Wahi, Vlahovic, Lookman, or Ferguson are playing in red-and-white.

    4. There were a couple of players who swapped clubs this window that could have join us. Primary Simons and Marmoush, maybe even Durán. But either Mikel & Co disagreed or there were never a realistic scenario of them joining. Both can happen and both are fine.

    Let’s wait for the summer and decide whether we need einforcements to many positions (DM aside) striker, a backup for Saka and a deputy for Odegaard, or if we need a Swiss Army knife player up front who can play in any of the attacking positions (Pedro, Kudus, Cunha). And bring only a player that brings us to the next level, and forget about broadening the bench with guys who are available, but not necessary worthy.

  • Our teenagers have demonstrated that they are NO MORE last resort or desperation options, but already decent gunners on their own merit.

  • Really nice to read a variety of comments and mostly agreed.

    I certainly would have loved for us to have signed a quality CF. I think the club tried but it wasn’t to be, and I have a feeling THE TEAM said to Arteta they are all responsible for scoring, and they will not let him down.

    The 11 Musketeers All for One, One for All.

  • Listening to a variety of podcasts since Sunday and bathing in the reflective glory of our team, but an interesting snippet I heard was when the club travelled to Spain for the Girona tie last week, the recruitment team had some more chats with Espanyol over Garcia and spoke to his agent. Face to face is often preferable I feel so that was all good.
    Apparently the agent also represents Alvaro Morata and a loan for him was put to the said agent. The agent or Morata himself wanted a permanent transfer so that deal didn’t go anywhere as Morata is 32.

    Arsenal don’t, it seems, get on with Aston Villa, at many levels. Remember how they tried to get Smith Rowe on the cheap and when we went for Douglas Ruiz they high-balled us continually.

    Those guys in Aston seem a bit chippie when it comes to Arsenal. Happy enough to sell to Liverpool or Man U but not us…

  • Likely derives from the Vulgar Latin from which most of the romance languages arose, LG. I learned to appreciate accents during my years in the Czech Republic.
    It “would satisfy me” to learn something of your origins (whakapapa is big among Kiwi’s and bible scholars alike). I’ll put some Stones and Floyd on the turntable in anticipation. And, perhaps take my mates Jaguar for a spin while doing so.

    Love the “static tower” allusion, Total. David Squires is a clever clogs.

    My sister was a “red haired stepchild”, PB. Bucking the trend, she was always my stepfathers favourite.

    LG’s and PB’s appreciation of our squad, offers, in the term oft employed by our mate over on Le Grove, some “hopium” for our post TW peace pipe. I may have to puff on it for a while. And listen to some “love songs so divine”.

  • PB, I’d prefer “like a rented mule” since red haired step children may be deemed abuse. 😜

    Unai Emery’s foray in the market late on led some arsenal fans to believe there would be a late, late move for Ollie Watkins; I, for one, thought it was a sign they were resigned to their fate, losing Ollie. Well, now we may have given him an unwanted problem fitting in so many forwards in a team that’s already used to his style. Except Asensio, perhaps.
    Honestly, if we could get any of those names you listed, at a fair price, I won’t scoff at just having the bodies available, given all we have to play for in the next 3 months or so.

    Now, it’s fingers crossed for the fit players and those recovering. We cannot afford to be a talking point at the end of the season.

  • I find it interesting that Mo Salah plays almost every Liverpool game and plays pretty much the full 90+ minutes and no one anywhere that I’m aware of questions Slot or Liverpool in using him that incessantly, nor do we read of concerns about his fitness or burn out and Liverpool have as many games as us, more even as they’re still in the FACup.

    I know that they have more options off of the bench and goals but their main characters play pretty much all the time.

  • Teams:

    Arsenal
    Raya; Timber, Saliba, Gabriel, Lewis-Skelly; Partey, Rice, Ødegaard; Martinelli, Trossard, Havertz.

    Subs: Setford, Kiwior, Zinchenko, Calafiori, Tierney, Jorginho, Merino, Sterling, Nwaneri.

    Newcastle
    Dubravka, Trippier, Burn, Botman, Schar, Hall, Tonali, Guimaraes, Murphy, Gordon, Isak.

    Subs: Pope, Livramento, Targett, Krafth, Longstaff, Willock, Miley, Wilson, Osula.

  • Well, Arteta isn’t giving any rest to any of the lads who started on Sunday. Same 11 that started against City. Understandable, as we have a 10 day break after this.

    Message must be to simply give it everything and go on the deserved rest after this one.

    COYG!!

  • Happy to see Joelinton not on the sheet. He was a monster in the first leg. Looks like a back five for the Geordies.

  • After the game on Sunday, maybe Arteta needed to have freshened things up a bit. These boys have got to be tired. Ethan is coming on too early, for a. Game like this, in my view but all he needs is one opening.

    We do look jaded.

  • I really would want to see us play our own game in the second half, hard as the home side are making it.
    Havertz needs to stay calm. That foul and yellow card was not necessary. If we go on like that, it may be a good thumping.

  • So, if Nwaneri can play so confidently here, why did he not start over Martinelli, seeing as we had a game to chase, so not requiring his defensive nous?
    We have not been poor, just tired and playing against a good Newcastle side who, on their day, will beat most sides. If we find a way to play our game, we can still win this game but the tie may be a stretch.

    We should bring on players with nothing to lose, like Sterling and Zinchenko let’s see if we can make something happen.

  • Let’s get an early goal in second half and then it can become interesting. Magpies sitting back as expected but the boys are trying everything.

  • Can anyone see the Arsenal fans in the stadium? Why are Newcastle allowed to seat Away fans so far up the stands, in one little corner, so their team can’t hear them?

    Not making or seeking excuse; just a frank enquiry.

  • Saliba has been out of sorts today. Nerves, I guess. What we don’t need is to be a man short.

  • It does feel a lot like Arsenal playing a Mourinho team. Nothing wrong with Howe’s approach, but we just have to get smarter and play deep(er) against them next time round. Beat them ugly if necessary.

  • Well played, to the home side. Newcastle have given Arsenal a taste of their own (high press) medicine. They were good, got their tactics right and probably deserve to be in the final. Arsenal lost it after losing 2-0 at home. This was always going to be a tall order, anyway.

  • Yes, TA. We needed to score early. I. Am certain they won’t be beating us again, the next time we meet..

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