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Match Report: Huddersfield Town 1 – 2 Arsenal

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Huddersfield Town (0) 1 Arsenal (2) 2
Premier League
John Smith’s Stadium, Stadium Way, Huddersfield HD1 6PG
Saturday, 9th February 2019. Kick-off time: 3.00pm
(4-2-3-1) Leno; Mustafi, Koscielny, Monreal, Maitland-Niles; Torreira, Guendouzi; Kolašinac, Mkhitaryan, Lacazette, Iwobi.
Substitutes: Čech, Elneny, Lichtsteiner, Suárez, Mavropanos, Nketiah, Willock
Scorers: Iwobi, Lacazette
Yellow Cards: Maitland-Niles, Kolašinac
Referee: Jonathan Moss
Attendance: 24,182
The mixture of joy and relief on the Arsenal players’ faces at the end of the match was clearly there for all to see; at last, an away win in the Premiership, the first since the victory at Bournemouth on 25th November. But let’s not get too carried away with this win in West Yorkshire today – it was hard work, dogged and at times, downright frustrating for everyone associated with Arsenal Football Club.
The good thing about these three points chalked up on the board is that a top four place is still in our sights, although it has to be said, there are some difficult matches ahead, namely Wolverhampton Wanderers, Manchester United and Tottenham Hotspur, all of whom are now in the ascendancy. The messy business that became the first goal after just fifteen minutes, scored by young Alex Iwobi via a deflection that ended up in the bottom corner of the Huddersfield goal, merely reflected the fact that at that point in the match, albeit early in the fray, we were in control. After that, the first period became a push-me-pull-you affair of transitional football. Hats off to The Terriers, though, they didn’t just lay back and accept their fate, they did create some chances that made our defenders work for their wages, and at times we were looking frail in our own penalty area.
But, above all of this, it has to be said that every time we went on the offensive, Huddersfield appeared to fold in at the back and did have problems containing our strikers. The excellent Ainsley Maitland-Niles, who had a superb game overall today, was causing real damage on the flanks, and when he expertly slotted the ball across to Alexandre Lacazette to score our second and final goal just before the break, it was with the skill of a golfer with ice-cool nerves who had to make a final putt to win the Ryder Cup for Europe. This player has a superb future in the game, as his overall vision and intuition belies his tender years. The second half beckoned, and with it as we have seen so many times this season, a different Arsenal appeared from behind the curtain.
By rights, being 2-0 up, we should have built on this score and gone back to North London in the knowledge that we scored a hat-full of goals on our march to the top four of the Premiership, but hey, this is Arsenal, remember. There were times, it has to be said, when Huddersfield could have, would have and defintely should have scored, but somehow lacked the final certain something needed to give us cause for concern. Despite Mr. Emery bringing on Mohamed Elneny for the lacklustre Lucas Torreira and Denis Suárez for Henrikh Mkhitaryan (who looked impressive earlier in the match), we were unable to add to the two goals that we scored in the first half. Just when we thought we were going to walk away with our first match of the season with a clean sheet, Sead Kolašinac ham-fistedly directed the ball into his own net deep into injury time.
Look, three points is nothing to sneeze at, but it should be noted that Huddersfield’s statistics were somehow better than ours; fifteen goal attempts to our nine, five corners to our none (unbelievable) and their overall possession was 54% to Arsenal’s 46%. No disrespect at all to our old friends, but it was a good job we weren’t facing a top four club today, as we may well have been punished badly for our efforts. It has been widely reported that Mr. Emery may have an increased budget of £45-60,000,000 available for transfer deals this summer; if that is the case, then let’s hope we get in a 2 or 3 quailty players to push for starting places. Remember everyone, keep the faith, get behind the team and the manager, as these early days are going to be crucial for our future success in all competitions. Stick with the winners. 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.

https://twitter.com/shewore/status/1092861498597261312?s=21

4312 for The Arsenal is not “too defensive”

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Arsenal’s best performance this season came against Chelsea. A 2-0 victory in a game that The Gunners dominated.

The formation we played in that match was 4312. It is a formation we have played numerous times since; and one which Unai Emery has come in for some stick for.

Fans wrongly claim that we are playing 3 defensive midfielders. Lucas Torreira Granit Xhaka and Matteo Guendouzi. They are not all defensive midfielders.

Gunners Town recently spoke to a Lorient fan about Arsenal target Alexis Claude Maurice. During the discussion they talked about Guendouzi, who signed from Lorient last summer.

They expressed surprise at Arsenal fans labelling Guendouzi as a defensive or holding midfielder, as he has only ever been box-to-box growing up and was utilised in an attacking free role last season in French Ligue 2.

And that is the truth, Guendouzi does not play as a defensive midfielder. He is more box to box. A proper central midfielder. Like what Patrick Vieira was.

It seems in many fans mind, you are either an attacking midfielder (Mesut Ozil) or a defensive midfielder (Claude Makelele). There is nothing in between. But there is, and that is where Guendouzi sits.

Xhaka has also never really been an out and out defensive midfielder. In fact he struggled at Arsenal when he was the primary defensive midfielder.

For Borussia Mönchengladbach and Switzerland, he always played with someone behind him doing the bulk of the defensive work.

A hulk of a man, Xhaka did contribute to his sides defensively, but his man job was transitioning the ball from defence to attack with his excellent passing. He is not as box to box as Guendouzi, more a deep lying play maker. He certainly is not a defensive midfielder.

Lucas Torreira is the closest we have to a defensive midfielder, but even he is not a Makelele or Gilberto Silva.

The Uruguayan gets forward a lot more than someone who is simply a shied in front of a defence. And he is a much better passer and creator then people like Makelele, Gilberto or Fernandinho.

Whilst for Arsenal he is the deepest of the midfield 3, he is more than capable playing further forward. He is a talented guy.

The reality is, Emery is building a high energy midfield trio who can provide solid cover for the defence, but also push forward and press high.

Playing all 3 ensures that they can push forward backing up the front 3 when they press, knowing that one will still sit so that they are not all cut out with one ball through the midfield.

They also allow Hector Bellerin and Saed Kolasinac to bomb forward and provide extra cover for them.

I like the 12 upfront as well.

Pierre Emerick Aubameyang and Alexandre Lacazette both love dropping out wide. This then creates space in the middle for an attacking midfielder to bomb into. Aaron Ramsey would have been ideal for this role with his goal scoring record.

Back to the midfield, I can see us continuing to play 3 in the middle next season. It is why Emery is looking at the likes of Adrien Rabiot and Christopher Nkunku. If we play 3, we need 6.

If we secure both Frenchmen, it will enable us to cash in on Mohamed Elneny and, alongside Ainsley Maitland-Niles, we will have the midfielders we need to play the way Emery wants.

As for those who are still moaning about it being too defensive, let me ask you a question:

Is Liverpool’s midfield too defensive?

Liverpool also play a midfield 3. A trio combination of Jordan Henderson, Naby Keita, Georginio Wijnaldum and Fabinho.

Let’s compare their Premier League statistics to the lads at Arsenal:

Xhaka – 1885 minutes played – 3 Goals; 1 Aassist

Guendouzi – 1466 – 0G 0A

Torreira – 1790 – 2G 2A

 

Fabinho – 1096 – 1G 2A

Wijnaldum – 1774 – 1G 0A

Henderson – 1234 – 0G 0A

Keita – 970 – 0G 1A

Totals:

 

Arsenal midfield:

5140 minutes played

5 goals; 3 assists

Liverpool midfield:

5074 minutes played

2 goals; 3 assists

Yet no one is saying Liverpool’s midfield is “too defensive.”

The truth is, playing Xhaka, Torreira and Guendouzi is not too defensive. It is probably the only part of the Arsenal side that is solid and actually working at the moment.

Keenos

Arsenal need to rebuild momentum for top 4 battle

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All is quiet this morning in the world of Arsenal. Friday’s often are if we have not played on the Thursday.

We had the pre-game conferences yesterday and the game against Huddersfield tomorrow. Friday is the very average meat in the sandwich.

Unai Emery spoke yesterday about a lose of confidence in recent weeks amongst the team.

“We started very well away, changing our mentality, but now we need to recover this confidence, to recover this performance and the next opportunity is Saturday against Huddersfield.”

Momentum is such an important factor in sport.

We saw that at Liverpool who looked to go 7 points clear of Manchester City in second before slipping up against Leicester City. This led to further dropped points against West Ham. 2 draws in a row, a drop in momentum and suddenly Manchester City are top.

It will be interesting to see if the confidence that was brimming at Liverpool, and driving them towards the title reverses and they continue to wobble.

You can also see the confidence ebb away in the England cricket team over in the West Indies.

Prior to the first test, most were expecting a 3-0 white wash. 77 all out in their first innings led to an 381 run defeat and then a 10 wicket defeat in the 2nd innings.

The 3rd best test team in the world are on the verge of being white washed against the 8th best team, this after they beat Sri Lanka 3-0 at the back end of last year.

The momentum has gone, and England players look completely bereft of confidence.

During the 22-game unbeaten run, the momentum was with Arsenal. We were winning games we perhaps should not have done. We had the confidence that even when not winning at half time, we would come back and win the game. As Emery states, we need to recover that confidence and put together a run to drive us into 4th for the end of the season.

A few people have got arrogant over tomorrows games, calling is an “easy 3 points”.

Huddersfield at bottom of the league with just 11 points. Arsenal should win the game, but a victory should never be taken for granted. Unai Emery is certainly not seeing it as an easy 3 points.

“These matches are difficult and they are playing for the possibility to continue in the Premier League.

“Their last results have not been good but with their new coach [Jan Siewert], I am sure that they are going to play with a big ambition and a big performance on Saturday.

“I think they have good players with a good organisation. They push a lot and I know it will be difficult. For us as well, away games have been a challenge and each match is a new challenge.”

Arsenal’s away form is much improved this season.

Last year we looked fearful when playing away. Zero confidence. Zero momentum. We just kept losing. Whilst it has improved this season, we are certainly not in a position to think that 3 points away from home will be easy.

4 wins away from is the same as we achieved in the whole of last season, and we currently have just 1 point less than we did from the 19 away games last season (16). However this is still not good enough.

We have the 9th best away form yet the 3rd best home form. It is clearly holding us back. Based on home form, we are just 4 points behind Manchester City, level with Liverpool. The poor away form puts us out of the title race – just like last season when we had the 2nd best home form.

“Maybe both,” Emery replied when asked if poor away form was due to tactical or mental reasons.

“It can be… at the end, the reason we didn’t take the same balance as we have shown at home.

“I spoke with the players [and told them] we need to think this match is very important for us and every player needs to be ready, be focused and be thinking we need to win this match.

“Imposing ourselves from the first minute, and throughout the 90 minutes, our capacity against them – but first is the mentality.

“For us, tactically, is the second issue. The first is to think we need to win and after it’s how we can win this match – (in terms of) preparing tactically and individually.”

If Arsenal are to make the top 4, I would imagine we need to win at least 4 of our last 7 away games starting with Huddersfield tomorrow.

Plenty of transfer speculation floating about today as well – usually the case on a slow news day.

A deal for Adrien Rabiot has been mentioned again.

He had supposedly agreed a deal to join Barcelona on a free transfer, but they have since spent big on Frankie De Jong. He would be a very good accusation for Arsenal, reinforcing the midfield and giving the club 4 fantastic options in the 3 man midfield (alongside Lucas Torriera, Granit Xhaka and Matteo Guendouzi).

Christopher Nkunku is another mentioned again. It would not be a surprise if that deal is done in the summer. He would then make it 5 options for 3 spots, and would probably be the end of Mohamed Elneny.

It has also been reported today that “Arsenal lead the race for Alex Grimaldo“, a left back at Benfica.

I know nothing about him, and I imagine he will be one of about 100 left backs we will be linked to over the next 6 months.

Keenos