Our shaky start to the league season continues as Liverpool, this time, manage to hold us away for a 0-0 draw.
“Hold us away” is probably overly exaggerated, because despite our dominance in possession and chances in the second half, Liverpool could have easily pulled an upset on us yesterday. They had caught a ropey Arsenal side in the beginning when Coutinho rattled the cross bar, Petr Čech at his mercy. They spurned a couple of chances when Christian Benteke really should have put them ahead (lovely save by Čech though!) and Coutinho created a goal from virtually nothing, having a bold crack from an unlikely angle and making Petr work.
The defence without the Mertescielny pairing was appalling, with Calum Chambers’ regression particularly worrying. This time last year the “exciting youngster” was turning in MOTM performances against Manchester City and Everton – right now, he does not look capable of going past an entire game without making an elementary error. Judging by his age and the number of appearances he’s made for the club it’s still early days, but he needs to buckle up this season if he does not want to be coined as an overpaid flop, especially considering that Mertesacker and Koscielny may be out for long term.
Having said that, Chambers wasn’t at fault for what happened all by himself. Santi Cazorla – despite a world class assist to a disallowed Ramsey goal – lost the ball too cheaply too many times. Sánchez and Giroud were relatively anonymous in the first half, and even Özil was failing. We were incredulously fortunate to finish the first half level pegging.
The second half was much more enthralling from an Arsenal point of view as we took the game to Liverpool and tried to force the issue. However, systemic problems (like playing Ramsey on the right and starting to cross the ball AFTER Giroud was taken off) always pulled us back. That mustn’t excuse the fact that despite having their chances, Sánchez and Giroud were wasteful.
Watching late substitute Oxlade-Chamberlain give Jordi Gomez such a tough time made me wonder why he wasn’t given a start. Aaron Ramsey is not in particularly undroppable form at the moment, so why sacrifice one position in the lineup for a player who used to be in exemplary form OVER A YEAR AGO? I can’t remember the amount of times Giroud had the ball a little behind the D and looked at the acres of space on the right channel, only to realize no one was making a run in-behind.
Ramsey on the right had worked around 6 months ago (against Liverpool, incidentally) when Rodgers had employed a 3-5-2 formation. But that shouldn’t mean it would work against every possible team or system. Wenger must know this – then why hasn’t he looked to change it?
Unaware? I don’t think so, he’s been on the job eighteen years. Negligent, maybe. But it really seems like despite having his flaws, Wenger is passionate enough to WANT the league. To my mind, rigid seems a more damning and accurate adjective.
When will we learn? The question goes beyond that. No, we’re not winning the league, no we’re not signing Benzema and even if we did, he cannot win us the title. As long as Wenger is in charge, we can never learn.
This is conjecture and yesterday was another example why.
-Santi [Follow me on Twitter @ArsenalBlogz ]
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