Aston Villa (1) 1 Arsenal (0) 0

Premier League

Villa Park, Trinity Road, Birmingham B6 6HE

Saturday, 6th February, 2021. Kick-off time: 12.30pm

(4-2-3-1) Mat Ryan; Hector Bellerin, Rob Holding, Gabriel Magalhães, Cédric Soares; Thomas Partey, Granit Xhaka; Bukayo Saka, Emile Smith-Rowe, Nicolas Pépé; Alexandre Lacazette.

Substitutes: Dani Ceballos, Martin Ødegaard, Willian Borges da Silva, Alex Rúnarsson, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, Calum Chambers, Pablo Marí, Mohamed Elneny, Gabriel Martinelli.

Yellow Cards: Thomas Partey, Granit Xhaka

Arsenal Possession Percentage: 66%

Referee: Chris Kavanagh

Assistant Referees: Daniel Cook, Constantine Hatzidakis

Fourth Official: Darren England

VAR Team at Stockley Park: VAR David Coote; AVAR Sian Massey-Ellis

Attendance: A maximum of 300 attendees due to UK government coronavirus restrictions

Because of the events surounding the match at Molineux last Tuesday, we do not have the services of either Bernd Leno nor David Luiz today, so Mat Ryan makes his Premiership debut in goal for us here. Also Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang and our loan signing Martin Ødegaard are on the substitutes’ bench this afternoon; in the case of the former, he may still not be ready for full first-team action yet. Let’s go!

Within two minutes of the start, an appalling mix-up between Cédric Soares and Rob Holding led to Ollie Watkins having the most easiest of chances to put the home side one-up. A slow start, and not a great one. However, having said that, the combination between Nicolas Pépé and Emile Smith-Rowe was working well in the early stages, and although we are struggling to get a rhythm going, there are one or two positive signs around out there today. It really is a tough, uncompromising match at Villa Park this afternoon, with both sides struggling to get things moving. The goalkeepers at either end were being tested by the strikers constantly with life-or-death saves being the order of the day here. What is deeply concerning, however, is the ease in which the Villa midfield appear to have, with regards to the ability to open our defence up with incisive balls, and the difficulty in which our back four have in clearing trouble. Just before the half hour, from a free-kick, Granit Xhaka hit an absolute blaster in which former Gunner goalie Emiliano Martinez had difficulty in keeping the ball out of the back of the net. In reply, a few minutes’ later, Bertrand Traoré was denied a goalscoring opportunity when Mat Ryan also made two unbelievable saves in stopping a Villa second goal, which is something we really do not need. Soon afterwards, Rob Holding came close with a superb header from a free-kick, after a bad foul on Bukayo Saka, and it is becoming evident that the home side are an incredibly difficult unit to break down. Just before the break, Nicolas Pépé was desperately unlucky not to score when a right-footed shot from close range flew past the Villa left-hand post. Despite three minutes’ injury-time, and some good movements by Arsenal, we went into half-time one-nil down, sadly.

No changes for us at half-time, so we go into the second half with some concern. And so we should do, too. The home side are applying pressure on us at the opening stages of this half, with several attempts on our goal that were worrying, to say the least. Nicolas Pépé was unlucky not to score (or even hit the target) a few minutes’ later when his tricky shot went just wide of the mark. Ten minutes after the restart, Hector Bellerin was also unlucky not to score, when a left-footed shot was smothered by Emiliano Martinez, and as good as these chances are, we really need someone with the right key to unlock that Villa door. Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang replaced Alexandre Lacazette just before the hour, and with the formation staying roughly the same, we have to hope that the return of this popular player will harvest good fruit this afternoon. Cédric Soares was replaced by Martin Ødegaard with twenty-five minutes of the game remaining, and the pattern of our attack has now been shifted to the left-hand side, where there appeared to be a weakness in the Villa team. Willian replaced Thomas Partey after seventy-four minutes, when he was looking like he was carrying an injury, and we still attempted to break down the left-hand side with fresh legs, hoping that something will crack eventually. However, Mat Ryan kept us in the game when he saved a strong shot from Jack Grealish with twelve minutes of the match remaining, and back at the business end for us, the more we try to score, the more it disappears. Martin Ødegaard had a great chance to score with a perfect ball which was handed to him on a plate by Emile Smith-Rowe, but his strong shot went way over the Villa bar. We threw everything bar the kitchen sink at Aston Villa in the remaining minutes of the match (including five minutes’ injury time), but to no avail.

Our two visits in four days to the West Midlands have left us with six valuable points dropped. We went in like lions and came out like lambs at Wolverhampton on Tuesday, but today we were lambs all the way, barring one or two interesting flashpoints. We are undoubtedly becoming the team you cannot trust. How can a team that gain sixty-six per cent possession in a match at this level end up with absolutely nothing? We are now exactly halfway up (or down, depending on your view) the Premiership table, at tenth place, and with Leeds United being our next opponents at home on Valentine’s Day, we need a positive result, and fast.

Remember everyone, keep the faith, get behind the team and the manager, as this season is going to be crucial for our future success in all competitions. Stick with the winners. Our next match: Leeds United at the Emirates on Sunday, 14th February at 4.30pm (Premier League). Victoria Concordia Crescit.

Steve

Too Dearly Loved To Be Forgotten: Arsenal v Racing Club de Paris 1930-1962 by Steve Ingless (Rangemore Publications, ISBN 978-1-5272-0135-4) is now available on Amazon.

Facebook announced over the weekend that they will be assisting football in an attempt to “stamp out racism in the game”.

This makes it appear that racism on social media is footballs problem. It is not.

Racism on social media – whether it be Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or YouTube – is social media’s problem.

The abuse online is not only aimed at footballers – it is aimed at cricket players, boxers, musicians, actors and “ordinary folk”.

For too long, social media companies have not done enough to tackle online abuse.

They realise that a lot of their Daily Active Users (DAU) only log on to abuse others.

If they took a tough stance against abusers, their DAUs would drop, which in turn would see advertising revenue and therefore profits drop.

These companies Rey on advertising revenue to survive. Without that revenue they would not have the income to operate. They literally need abusers logging on each day with multiple accounts to boost their DAU statistics.

Facebook, Twitter et al literally turn a blind eye to online abuse in favour of profits.

The recent abuse of Marcus Rashford, Reece James, Axel Tuanzebe and Anthony Martial is disgusting, but not new.

Online racist abuse hidden under a cape of anonymity has existed for as long as the internet.

It predates currently social media and goes back to internet forums, IRC chat rooms and MySpace.

All social media has done is bought us closer together and made it easier for someone to sit online and directly abuse someone they do not know.

For a long time, the stance taken by social media companies stance has been “if you are a victim of online abuse, report it to your local authorities”.

This is literally them washing their hands with the situation. Saying it has nothing to do with them.

Yet they provide the platform that the abusers use. And they could work a lot harder to stamp out the abusers.

By Facebook saying they will “work with football” shows once more they are trying to shift the blame.

They are saying the issue is for football and they will help. The issue is actually the social media companies.

Solutions are easy.

Take Twitter, for example.

Instead of leaving “verification ticks” for celebrities, journalists, etc; they could have them for everyone.

You upload a valid ID and that then allows your account to be verified.

Stage two is then allow you to mute unverified accounts and restrict them from sending you a DM.

Overnight that will clean up your timeline – as most of the abusers are “burner accounts” set up by teenagers across the globe to only send abuse.

It is unlikely people would tweet abuse knowing that Twitter knows exactly who they are.

“But I don’t want social media to have a copy of my ID” will be a response by many.

You don’t have to give it. It would be optional. It would then be a users choice whether they want to mute unverified accounts or not.

You chose not to verify, then your abuse falls on deaf ears. You are basically shouting at a post on your wall.

So simple. So effective.

Much of the racism that footballers face online does not come from the UK – which makes it even harder for local authorities to act.

We have seen an actress in India racially abuse Alex Iwobi, and much of the racist abuse comes from African’s. Literally black people racially abusing other black people.

“We need better education” is good in theory. But when much of abuse is coming from children that think “it’s a joke” or people outside of your jurisdiction, authorities can do little.

The kids will eventually grow out of it and probably be ashamed of a tweet that they sent at 14. Your 25 year old who is still messaging abuse is beyond education.

Arsenal can not do anything about someone in India abusing Alex Iwobi. Great Manchester Police can do nothing about someone in Nigeria racially abusing Marcus Rashford.

Even when the abuse happens within the UK, clubs and authorities can do little when it is a 14 year old doing the abuse.

Whilst Twitter, Facebook, etc allows people to set up anonymous accounts, abuse will continue.

Instead of “working with football to stamp out racism in the game”, social media needs to look at itself and stamp out racism on its own platforms.

Keenos

Against Southampton, with Kieran Tierney out injured, Mikel Arteta had 2 choices to play at left back. Cedric Soares or Ainsley Maitland-Niles.

Arteta opted to go for the Portuguese international, leaving the Hale End product on the bench.

Last summer Maitland-Niles was on the verge of signing for Wolves in a deal worth around £20million before Arsenal pulled the plug at the last minute.

At the time there were rumours that Hector Bellerin could be off to PSG, so it made sense for Arsenal to keep hold of Maitland-Niles; who would then compete with Cedric at right back.

There was also the conundrum at left back.

With Tierney’s injury and Sead Kolasinac looking for a move away, Edu and Arteta clearly made the decision to keep Maitland-Niles so that they would not be short of numbers.

Up until the victory against Newcastle in the Premier League, it had been Maitland-Niles coming in for Bellerin and Tierney when injured.

Against Newcastle, Cedric replaced Bellerin at right back, with Maitland-Niles not in the squad. Cedric making his first Premier League start of the season.

And against Southampton, Cedric replaced Tierney at left back with Maitland-Niles left on the bench.

The key factor for Arteta when deciding between Maitland-Niles or Cedric seems to be formation.

Of Ainsley Maitland-Niles 5 Premier League starts, only two have come as part of a back 4; with 3 of 5 coming when Arteta opted for 3 at the back.

Against Southampton and Newcastle, Arteta went for 4 at the back and Cedric started.

Moving forward, the feeling is that Arteta will stick with a back 4, which pushes Cedric ahead of Maitland-Niles in the pecking order.

With the club looking at a left footed left back as cover for Kieran Tierney (Ryan Bertrand would be a good option – a blog for another day), that would leave Maitland-Niles struggling for any game time.

His good form at the back end of last season resulted him in making the England squad and winning 3 caps. But he is at risk of missing out on a place at the upcoming Euro’s due to lack of playing time.

If an offer of £20million comes in for him over the next couple of days, it would be a deal that would interest both player and club.

Arsenal would bank some money, using a portion of it to buy a left back who is better in a back 4. Whilst Maitland-Niles would get the playing time he needs to keep his place in the England squad.

Keep an eye on this one over the next few days.

Keenos