Arsenal vs Man City Player Ratings

[Lukazan]

Wha? RVP hasn't looked dangerous on a set-piece since 06.... he's bloody shocking.

 

[Iloveyouarsenewenger]

RVP's delivery is usually of very high quality. He was actually a bit disappointing on that front yesterday. But, we did seem to create a few ripples with the RVP and Nasri short corner routine. When you don't have too many good header of the ball, it is better to get the cross in from a different angle.

 

[outlaw_member]

I like the corner routine. We rarely score the conventional way, so why not try something new?

Wilshere pisses me off with his one-footedness. He causes himself so much undue pressure by always trying to shift the ball on to his left.

 

[Klaus Daimler]

I like the corner routine. We rarely score the conventional way, so why not try something new?

It's frustrating to see Robin and Cesc take a short corner at a time when we've moved both our centrebacks into the box, though. It's not like we're taking it short to try and catch them off guard either. We just play it out to Song or Wilshere at the edge of the box and then usually onto the other flank. When was the last time we even got a goal out of a short corner? Does anyone know?

 

[outlaw_member]

We should keep our CB's back, in my opinion. None of them bar Vermaelen have indicated that they're actually worth sending forward. It's like an unwritten law to send your CB's up for a corner, but what's the point if it rarely ever proves worthwhile?

I'm not too worried about it going back to Song, as it means that we've kept control of the ball. All too often, the opposition keeper catches it and then promptly launches a counter, or we just end up ceding possession of the ball. Ideally, they would look to carve out a chance, like when Fabregas chipped it to van Persie who shot just wide.

 

[otfgoon]

When was the last time we even got a goal out of a short corner? Does anyone know?

When was the last time we scored from a normal corner? I'm guessing we score 1 every 100+

I'm with outlaw, the short corner routine has lead to far more dangerous situations than a traditional corner against Brum and City.

 

[ricky1985]

The short corner routines have actually been quite refreshing to see. A bit of inventiveness, you realise how rare it is when you see it. We're not a big team, or particularly blessed with great headers of the ball - so it make sense to try something different. And we constantly look dangerous when we do it.

I also really liked the way Cesc, Samir and Robin worked an indirect freekick up at Birmingham - Samir with a really simple but clever dummy that meant Robin got his shot off. Clever players doing clever things.

 

[Bossa]

Wha? RVP hasn't looked dangerous on a set-piece since 06.... he's bloody shocking.

He scored from a set piece last week.

 

[Bossa]

I like the corner routine. We rarely score the conventional way, so why not try something new?

It's frustrating to see Robin and Cesc take a short corner at a time when we've moved both our centrebacks into the box, though. It's not like we're taking it short to try and catch them off guard either. We just play it out to Song or Wilshere at the edge of the box and then usually onto the other flank. When was the last time we even got a goal out of a short corner? Does anyone know?

I agree with this, we have to score more out of free kicks and corners. I cant remember the last one we scored that way.

 

[Bossa]

We should keep our CB's back, in my opinion. None of them bar Vermaelen have indicated that they're actually worth sending forward. It's like an unwritten law to send your CB's up for a corner, but what's the point if it rarely ever proves worthwhile?

I'm not too worried about it going back to Song, as it means that we've kept control of the ball. All too often, the opposition keeper catches it and then promptly launches a counter, or we just end up ceding possession of the ball. Ideally, they would look to carve out a chance, like when Fabregas chipped it to van Persie who shot just wide.

Djourou is a dangerous guy in set pieces. There are a lot of times where he almost scored from a header.

 

[Bossa]

We should keep our CB's back, in my opinion. None of them bar Vermaelen have indicated that they're actually worth sending forward. It's like an unwritten law to send your CB's up for a corner, but what's the point if it rarely ever proves worthwhile?

I'm not too worried about it going back to Song, as it means that we've kept control of the ball. All too often, the opposition keeper catches it and then promptly launches a counter, or we just end up ceding possession of the ball. Ideally, they would look to carve out a chance, like when Fabregas chipped it to van Persie who shot just wide.

No, having Clichy and Sagna back is enough because most of the time the opponents have 0 or 1 max up front when we take a corner. Its not like we have midgets up front. We shouldn let Cesc or Nasri take the corners and let Song, RVP, DJ and Kos attack the box. Those are enough fairly big man who can score from a header.

 

[yuvken]

The short corner routines have actually been quite refreshing to see. A bit of inventiveness, you realise how rare it is when you see it. We're not a big team, or particularly blessed with great headers of the ball - so it make sense to try something different. And we constantly look dangerous when we do it.

I also really liked the way Cesc, Samir and Robin worked an indirect freekick up at Birmingham - Samir with a really simple but clever dummy that meant Robin got his shot off. Clever players doing clever things.

And it has worked yesterday with at least one of the corners, with Nas feeding VP who shot from a tight angle (but not "impossible", like someone said) to the near corner (which Hart didn't have a prayer to block - that power and distance). The CB's there are an option, and make it very hard for the defense: our creators can still find them, and with a D that has to track much movement, but also some defenders must stick with them, thus leaving some gaps for whatever the quick movers/thinkers spot.
It is essentially our game, and exploiting our advantage: when we get to the forward position, our big advantage is the ability to move it at bigger speed than the defenders can track.

Other point for corners: having either of Nik, Chamakh or Diaby on, adds to direct ball side.
And we actually have scored recently from a corner - Shava to Nas. But that ball really looked like a ball typically played after a short corner (Nas was on the edge of the box, far side).

 

[outlaw_member]

You are disregarding them your saying you want a striker who is more adapt at finishing who finds the back of the net regularly and offers more penetration around the opposition area, despite DaG’s stat list that Ricky posted if accurate blowing the goal view clear out of the water it doesn’t get much better than 1 in 2 at top flight Premier League level and that we have players already in the squad namely Nasri and Theo who have been consistently penetrating the opposition defences time and again all season but unless RVP does so it’s a stick to beat him with?

Forlan, Aguero & Tevez have one major factor over RVP it’s not their finishing, not their goal record simply the fact that they are able to stay injury free. RVP has a horrible injury record, he is injury prone but that’s ultimately not where the criticism is stemming from you like in the above paragraph. Nobody can argue that having to go for such long periods without our best striker doesn’t have a negative impact on our club just like it would for any of the clubs if these other 30+ goals a season strikers were to suffer similar injury dilemmas, yet to mark him down for being lacking compared to other top strikers in ability is dead wrong and I couldn’t disagree more.

Cliche formula? What's wrong with having Wilshere-Cesc-Nasri as the creative hub of the side, with Walcott and the CF being the primary goalscorers. It's hardly the same setup as Liverpool's.

What’s wrong with the system as it is if we are consistently one of the highest scoring teams around in top flight football?

You want the striker to score more goals despite our team’s ability to already get goals prolifically from wide areas, make them turn their game on their heads to support the striker instead i.e. glorified water carriers with Cesc as the creative hub and the prolific striker as the main man. What do we have to gain from nullifying our wide areas that way it’s deconstructive to say the least.

Missing a glut of chances is hardly a new problem. It's something that has plagued us for years. It's not just pace, it's also top goalscoring ability that we lack. In a game where we missed chance after chance, incidentally we were also wasteful against Birmingham, how could a great finisher NOT have helped our cause? Theo had alot of joy last night, in the sense that he was in many dangerous areas. The problem as always is Theo is still quite unreliable.

I agree, that it is the best the attacking lineup in the league. It doesn't change the fact that in my opinion we'd be even better with a proper goalscorer on the end of our infinite chances.

We don’t lack goal scoring ability, how can we possibly score as many goals as we do and lack goal scoring ability we’re 1 goal behind Utd in the league this season top scorers in the CL group stages. Out of 30 games we’ve played this season we’ve failed to score in just 5 games. We’ve racked up 70 goals in them fixtures that’s over 2 goals a game despite having one of the more difficult league starts in terms of fixtures of all the teams we’ll be competing with, again just how is that struggling for goals?

How do we lack pace whenever a team actually stops playing a 10-0-0 formation Nasri has been devastating, whenever he gets running at the opposition goal some of the Arshavin to Nasri cross field combo breaks have been superb, Theo’s been blistering, that goal in the CL he ran half the pitch and shot from 25 yards away bamboozling the keeper, that’s pace, why do we need more from some external striker?

We have great finishers here at Arsenal now, In Chelsea-Brum-City we arguably played three of the toughest defensive teams the Premier League has to offer including two of our bogey teams in a matter of days, yet walked away with 7 points and scored 6 goals.

I don't think he's as good a finisher. van Persie has always been relatively wasteful in front of goal.

We don't score as many goal as we should, considering how offensively setup we are. United and Chelsea outscore us almost every season, even though we take far more risks and create more chances.

Why would the wide players game have to change with a more goals orientated CF? Cesc creates more for Walcott and Nasri than van Persie ever does. Furthermore, most of Nasri's goals have come without him in the team. Admittedly, van Persie has a good understanding with Walcott, but Fabregas is the man who makes it all gel. Despite, a much needed improvement from our wide players, I still believe that we have so much more goalscoring potential. Considering that we are a possession side with some of the most creative players in the world, strikers who thrive on goals would add a more ruthless edge to our incessant passing.

That's what I mean, being a goal behind United is hardly impressive. We should be scoring more than them, and by quite a margin. We take more offensive risks, yet reap fewer rewards. We should expect to concede more, but we should also expect to score more. Chelsea's double winning side last season scored over 100 goals which included 37 from Drogba. That's an illustration of the level of goal scoring prowess we need to attain.

 

[ricky1985]

Yet we've also been without Cesc and Robin for most of the season and it has been the same story with our best attackers/players in every season for over 5 years now.

If Jack, Cesc, Samir and Robin play the majority of our games between now and the end of the season, then we will finish as top scorers by the end of it.

 

[mo50]

We should keep our CB's back, in my opinion. None of them bar Vermaelen have indicated that they're actually worth sending forward. It's like an unwritten law to send your CB's up for a corner, but what's the point if it rarely ever proves worthwhile?

I'm not too worried about it going back to Song, as it means that we've kept control of the ball. All too often, the opposition keeper catches it and then promptly launches a counter, or we just end up ceding possession of the ball. Ideally, they would look to carve out a chance, like when Fabregas chipped it to van Persie who shot just wide.

Djourou is a dangerous guy in set pieces. There are a lot of times where he almost scored from a header.

He's never scored for us. I don't see how he's dangerous at corners. There are times where the CB's should come up, and against City, who were parking the bus and didn't have much pace in their counter attacks, they should have, and they did.

The problem is when we're leading there is no need for them to come up. Koscielny and Djourou aren't really much of a threat either.

 

[-Shaun-]

Does it sound strange to say I kind of admire the way City played?

They got just what they wanted. Boring as f**k to watch (and incredibly frustrating for us), but if I was a Man City fan I definitely wouldn't complain.

 

[mo50]

After spending a few hundred million on a dozen strikers, I'd be well pissed off if I was a City fan.

Who cares, let them play like that. 9 times out of 10 we'd win.

 

[celestis]

I do wonder what has happened to RVP's direct free kicks , he doesn't seem to be able to directly over the wall to the near post anymore . Actually they are downright precictable these days .

 

[Anzac]

Yet we've also been without Cesc and Robin for most of the season and it has been the same story with our best attackers/players in every season for over 5 years now.

If Jack, Cesc, Samir and Robin play the majority of our games between now and the end of the season, then we will finish as top scorers by the end of it.

IMO we have a potentially prolific attack 'IF' our main players remain fit AND on form, AND we are able to continue to create plenty of clear cut scoring opportunities. This current team is built upon the strategy of looking to have a regular scoring contribution from the midfield as much as from the front 3 = the bulk of goals being scored by a front 4. These past seasons indicate that we struggle in games when any of the above is not the case, primarily because we do not have a reliably fit and/or prolific goal scorer.

We create an abundance of scoring opportunities but we spurn at least half because we don't shoot at goal in general unless 1v1 and right infront. We continually look to attack the front of the area & pass our way into the area before looking to shoot, and continued to do so v City despite their jamming the centre of defence. Ironically as a consequence our actual rate of conversion of shots at goal v shots on target & goals scored is better than most, and we are usually amongst the top4 for goals scored each season.

Perhaps the 'real' indication would be in regards to how many times we are in possession around the opposition area, including crosses?

 

[yuvken]

That last criterion seems too vague (what exactly is "around the area?) to make something of it.

As for shooting, and particularly as this debate highlights Robin's contribution and style, would be good to look at what he really did in the last game (and it's a trend that started earlier, he obviously feels better every game, thus knows it's worth a try): he was shooting long range (despite your last claims), and only the post and a superb save kept one of his efforts out, he was shooting from inside and not just in a certain-to-score type (the one from tight angle to near post after short corner), and he was making room for these shots himself.
I don't know how on earth anyone can claim he was not being "a proper CF". At least in this game, against a very good and tight defense, he did extremely well, trying to open the D up from a different side or range each time, and he was very close to making it too.

people seem to want Robin to be Robin, Henry and Adebayor together. Well he's never gonna be that. He doesn't have TH's speed (and thus outlaw's wishes for a striker of great skill and speed will not be answered here), and he will probably never have the great headers to do Adebayor/Chamakh or even Nik. Wow - a seriously flawed striker.

It's a good thing to look at his game with a bit more than the tiresome "good link up play". Though he's surely great in that, and helps the team tick, he has some personal qualities which make him top quality: his ball control, first touch, ability to operate from wherever, brilliant reading and anticipating (yeah, he should have actually done better with Jack's pass, but oh well), fantastic shot from all ranges, and a great ability to make situations for himself.

I said it before (and I saw Ricky was at pains to demonstrate this) - he is a great, great player for us, and all that is really wrong with him is his injury record. Which is why I said and will repeat: if he stays fit, I will not need to argue for it, it will be self-evident.