What Actually Went Wrong For Arsenal In The Match Against Manchester City

On Sunday, Arsenal seemed to be shaped in a 4-2-3-1/4-3-3 with Ramsey filling in the no.10 role whilst Özil and Mkhitaryan played as inverted wingers. This saw Mesut Özil continuously cutting in and roaming around the field to get the most of the ball. However, a disastrous performance followed. He made only two key passes throughout the game and had five bad touches. He barely created any chances and kept losing the ball. His continuous instinct to stay in the middle of the park didn’t allow Arsenal to use the width whilst his duty to maintain position didn’t allow him the freedom to express his creativity.

Mesut Özil has played at the central no.10 position before with great success. He has gotten an all-time high of assists in one season during the 2015/16 season where he played at that position. With the likes of Aubameyang and Lacazette in the team, a centrally placed Özil can continuously spray balls into the final third where the two strikers will be the most effective. Özil’s creativity on the pitch is second to none, he can see through-balls that no one can even imagine. Playing in a central position allows Özil to control the game as well as put his creativity to complete use.

Unai Emery played with two inverted wingers who don’t usually play out wide. While Mkhitaryan still sticks to the sides of the pitch, Özil tends to rotate around the pitch to get as much of the ball as possible. This leaves a hole in the wide areas of the pitch. In order to make up for this lack of width, the two fullbacks push up to provide width. This, in turn, leaves Arsenal exposed at the back and prone to quick counters. WIth a team like Manchester City that can turn defense to offense in a blink, Arsenal failed to cope with the speed and was many a time caught on the counter.

The fullbacks already had their hands full with the likes of Raheem Sterling, Benjamin Mendy, Kyle Walker and Riyad Mahrez and going forward to provide width made their day even more tiring. The four players mentioned above exploited this and occasionally found themselves creating chances in the final third of the pitch. All this, due to the lack of natural wingers in the starting 11.

Arsenal desperately requires a winger who can use the width and continuously feed balls into the box. Pierre Emerick Aubameyang who seemed to fill the role of left winger once Lacazette came on could do the same for the entire duration of the game against Chelsea. The failed pursuit of Ousmane Dembele could also see the youth such as Reiss Nelson and Alex Iwobi step up and stake their claim as serious wingers of the team. Deploying wingers will allow Arsenal to play a more spread out game compared to the compact game they were forced to play on Sunday

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