The much anticipated clash between Arsenal and Manchester City is just a few hours away. This match promises to be an exciting one especially for neutrals who have watched their teams stroll to victory earlier on Friday and Saturday respectively.
Unai Emery takes on Pep Guardiola’s champions in his first game in charge of Arsenal. It sure is going to be a tough first test.
This is very important if the gunners are to get away with a positive result. As noted with Arsene Wenger’s teams, there is palpable tension and fear evident in the squad heading to big games such as the one against City.
They need to be positive going forward, and be very assured in possession. They need to take the game to City, if they do this – they will hurt this City team that looks to be flying at the moment.
Arsenal should forget the fact that City won the league almost flawlessly last season, and go into the game with the belief that they are beatable. Just as Unai Emery stressed in his press conference, they need to fight for every ball.
Last season, in games against Manchester United, Atletico Madrid and Liverpool at the Emirates, Arsenal made silly and unforgivable errors in defence especially.
Manchester City will try to put The Gunners under pressure as they seek to force Arsenal into making mistakes.
Arsenal needs to be calm and composed in their play in order to avoid a repeat of the recurrent blunders that plagued the side last season.
Throughout preseason, Emery stressed he wants to introduce a more aggressive approach to The Gunners way of attacking the opposition, it starts from pressing the opposition right from their 18-yard box.
Again, as exemplified by Jurgen Klopp’s team last season, Arsenal will need to counter attack the Cityzens at every opportunity they get, and be clinical. They cannot afford to be wasteful in front of goal.
With the searing pace of Aubameyang and Lacazette, Arsenal can cause City a lot of problems, especially because the likes of Otamendi at the back don’t have a lot of pace. Unai Emery has to ring this into the ears of his attacking players.
Conclusively,. Arsenal needs to defend better individually and collectively. They need to be very strong on the tackle, but sensible and disciplined, not giving needless fouls away – especially in dangerous areas.