EPL – Norwich vs Arsenal – 5:30pm – 20/10/12 - ESPN

[SomGooner]

This defeat has completely sucked the energy out of me and I'm still struggling to come to terms with it.

 

[outlaw_member]

I don't think "letting them have the ball" is really a solution. The fact is, they don't want the ball, so they're just going to lump it up regardless of what we do. Trying to give away dominance will just put us under more aerial threat, whether we're more prepared for it or not.

The key is always going to be the speed of our play and our ability to beat a man. I think the latter is the most important, because I don't think we started that slowly against Norwich, we just couldn't get anywhere because they were pressing us hard and no one was willing to take a man on. No matter how fast we pass, we need to be able to take risks and make something happen, not just keep moving the ball around. Whether we need to try more killer passes, or dribble at players more, I'm not sure, but all we're doing now is going for the "safe" option 99.9% of the time. Arteta looks great because of his ability to keep the ball, but at the moment he's just an upgrade on Denilson. Brilliant in some games, but completely pointless in others.

It's not about letting them have it in a literal sense, but rather creating a type of game where they see more of the ball than they would expect. If a game is too one sided in our favour, it will typically be an attack vs defence scenario, a match-up in which we don't always succeed. Sometimes, we need to help turn the game into a shoot-off, similar to our 5-3 win against Chelsea last season, where the opponent is taking more risks as it is experiencing sufficient possession to do so.

Sure, you can say that such a game will place our defence under greater pressure, but I don't think many realise the type of scenarios in which our defence is vulnerable. We are fine when we have men at the back, and are creating attacks quickly, directly, and the game is experiencing frequent turnover of possession. We saw plenty of this last season, and we were defending well during periods when we weren't hit by injuries. We have often been vulnerable when we have built attacks at a slow pace, pushed many players up the pitch, and then lost the ball in a dangerous position, allowing the opponent to counter into the vast unmarked spaces in our half.

Ideally, we'd have the ability to play our football at a fast tempo, thus making all the above redundant, but unfortunately, we are attempting to employ a style which many of our players are incapable of executing. It seemed like we were starting to become a little more direct over the past season, but we never seem to be set on any one way. The likes of Gervinho, Ramsey, and Giroud (remains to be seen) are not capable of playing fast, slick football, and they comprise 3 of our front 6. No wonder we can't play at a fast tempo.

 

[Giroud]

Why are you comparing our midfield to Barcelona's. We don't play the same way they do. We don't pressurise and they play in a league where physical contact doesn't exist. We need to sort our system out, because the arrogance we showed against Norwich is disgusting.

We play 4-2-3-1. We play the system the same way Chelsea does. A ball retaining holding midfielder, eg. Arteta and Mikel. A box to box midfielder capable of driving forward eg. Ramires and Diaby. An attacking creative midfielder eg. Oscar and Cazorla and two wide players. The current problem at the moment is our box to box midfielder is Ramsey, who has a problem because psychologically he cannot be physical. It throws the balance of the team off completely.

We have a selection of players that we are stuck with for the season and they do have potential. However, at the moment, we don't have a balance in midfield. We lack that drive, and people are saying we should play on the break, but without players to carry the ball that is useless.

Besides the team is good enough to pass the ball. Arsenal have shown they can do it, but Wenger really needs to get the balance in midfield, we can't have a midfield where our box to box midfielder can't tackle. In Spain you can get away with it, not in England.

I'm comparing ourselves to Barcalona because we are trying to play a similar patient passing game. The thing is we don't have the players to emulate that system so we have to show some variety to complement our passing game. At the moment we are failing to do so.

 

[GDeep™]

This defeat has completely sucked the energy out of me and I'm still struggling to come to terms with it.

Quite the opposite for me, no tension, stress, anger, frustration etc, just accept that such games are standard when you're team/squad is set up to compete for nothing more than 4th place.

 

[infineon]

Quite the opposite for me, no tension, stress, anger, frustration etc, just accept that such games are standard when you're team/squad is set up to compete for nothing more than 4th place.

On current form and those of other teams, not sure 4th place is guaranteed :S

 

[VAVAVOOM 14]

This defeat has completely sucked the energy out of me and I'm still struggling to come to terms with it.

HAHA, you make it sound as if someone has died.

I'm just frustrated/embarrassed that we're out of the title race with 7 months to go. Terribly pathetic when you think about it. I wonder what Arsène's thinking?

 

[Rain Dance]

Outie, Norwich would be happy with a point. why would they commit into attacking ?
only an amateur would fall into that kind of trap

If you could kindly give my opinion some sort of recognition (I don't know whether I am not worthy of your attention or you just don't see my posts), dribblers and ball hoggers are the way to unlock deep defenses. Gervinho could draw attention of 1-2 defenders to allow others to come in, but just 2 ball hoggers (Gerv and Ramsey) are a crowd and make the team becomes predictable, benching Ramsey and let Gerv have a free role could be the key

Whilst, a team can go into a game expecting to see little of the ball, gaining possession will naturally result in them wanting to generate an attack. It would be foolish to assume that they wouldn't commit forward, though you can argue that they may not be totally committed to the cause.

Thinking as a Norwich manager, I would have slowed the tempo down, time waste and generally will only use 3 players to surge forward while the rest should keep bursting forward at a minimum.
The only moment possible for a counter would be during corner kicks

Why did you say the bolded part?

Cause that probably is my 5th post about how to use Gervinho as an SS to unlock defense in reply to your theory Gervinho as a CF, while this was your first reply.

Having direct dribblers in the side is an easy way to destabilize organised defences, but we don't really have anyone beyond Diaby and Gervinho, who are both questionable as it is. Gervinho has helped the attack when used as a CF, because he gives us variety and flexibility up front. His individual performance has been nothing worth writing home about, but the positions he assumes helps create a fluid attack, thus making us a little less predictable.

Gervinho as CF may add fluidity in our passing but this will only be a repeat of our past tactics during Cesc-Adebayor combo, and it would cause a classic problem of no-one inside the penalty box besides the midget CAM cause the CF drifted away from the center.
What if Podolski interchanges with Gervinho?
if Podolski is the one interchange with Gervinho this will create a hole behind Gibbs as in our system the Wingers and Fullbacks defense responsibilities interchanges.
Gervinho's goals mostly came because he was inside the penalty box making a ruckus.

Gervinho as SS could be analogized as cheap rip off of Robben. All he needs is to hog the ball, and shoot if the opportunity arise. This way, he doesn't need to think about passing (his main problem when he is playing) or decision making. His order would very simple "Dribble and shoot if possible".
Granted this will not work against top defenders but we all know Arsenal problems lies in games against small teams.

PS : Theo should also be given a similar role with a different set of command "run and shoot"

 

[The_Playmaker]

Norwich were so disciplined that even when they did go forward they didn't commit that many men. The back four would always be in place as would the holding midfielder and another central midfielder. Their shape was spot on, but it does help when you don't need to commit that many men forward against us. A long ball up to Holt, a knock back to the attacking midfielder and even with two players coming at us Norwich caused problems.

@Rain Dance, having one player with the licence to run with the ball only works if the team is geared to give the player the ball. Take Utd when they had Cristiano Ronaldo. He had hardly any defensive responsibilities, but they engineered opportunities for him to be one on one with the defender, they do the same now with Valencia.

What you are suggesting is a pattern of play, which I don't think we have at the moment. It is clear that when the ball goes wide our players have been told not to cross it, which is ironic as when we did cross it we caused problems. Wenger seems to have his philosophy that he wants to go through the middle. Thats good and well, but its proven that the more you get the ball in the box the more you will score. You can pass your way there or be more direct, however, the fact is that if the ball goes wide, there have to be crosses into the box. What is even more annoying is that we probably get the ball into more crossing positions than any other team, because teams actually force us wide. If we started to cross more it might give teams a little more to think about, but to do that you need players who can cross and I can't think of many other than Jenkinson and possibly the Ox.

We could also go direct a bit more, we did previously. A lot of long balls were directed towards Giroud, but against Norwich we were more concerned about possession, which I don't understand.

 

[pikey2000]

I'm not sure our players are directed not to cross, I think they choose not to as more often than not we only have 1 player to aim for which is always going to be a losing game.

As a team we just don't play the crossing game, if you look at UTD, if they are attacking down the right they have the wide left man in the box with the striker and a man breaking from midfield to get into the box - thats 3 people in the box

When was the last time we had 3 people in the box during open play?

It would take a major change of ethos for this to happen anyway so it may aswell join the wishlist along with people hoping we are going to sign Benzema of someone like that in the Jan transfer window.

Realistically I am hoping for the following:

1. Jack ease his way back into our midfield - a raise in quality
2. Frimpong returning and ousting Coquelin who doesn't seem up to it. More combative midfielder for some situations.
3. Gnarby gets more time in the wide area's as he looks like he can create, run at players and actually cross the ball.
4. Szcesney returns and we draft in better backup.

 

[Rain Dance]

@Rain Dance, having one player with the licence to run with the ball only works if the team is geared to give the player the ball. Take Utd when they had Cristiano Ronaldo. He had hardly any defensive responsibilities, but they engineered opportunities for him to be one on one with the defender, they do the same now with Valencia.

no, that's not what I had in mind. And what you wrote is what we did with Arshavin in 2009 and clearly Arsène won't try that again.

What I propose is give Gervinho a license to hog the ball and shoot, give him the ball when possible but his most important job is make as many defenders notice him as much as possible cause this opens space for others.
There no obligation to actually centralize passing toward Gervinho. He is more of decoy who can kill.

Cause I believe against compacted defense, what we need his to make defenders hesitate which one to mark more.

What I see whenever Gervinho plays with an ST, he is hesitant to shoot cause maybe he is instructed to make a pass toward the ST. Remember RvP glare when Gerv didn't pass to him and chose to shoot (that was during Gerv few earliest match here)? Afterward Gervinho always try to square it first.

What you are suggesting is a pattern of play, which I don't think we have at the moment. It is clear that when the ball goes wide our players have been told not to cross it, which is ironic as when we did cross it we caused problems.

Our wingers don't cross (well, I'll give Gervinho a point of initiative) but our fullbacks do, especially Gibbs. The problem is Gibb's crossing has been abysmal to say the least.

Wenger seems to have his philosophy that he wants to go through the middle. Thats good and well, but its proven that the more you get the ball in the box the more you will score. You can pass your way there or be more direct, however, the fact is that if the ball goes wide, there have to be crosses into the box. What is even more annoying is that we probably get the ball into more crossing positions than any other team, because teams actually force us wide. If we started to cross more it might give teams a little more to think about, but to do that you need players who can cross and I can't think of many other than Jenkinson and possibly the Ox.

True this, and the fact that we look like a team not trained to finish crosses either from open play or from corner kicks baffle me.

We could also go direct a bit more, we did previously. A lot of long balls were directed towards Giroud, but against Norwich we were more concerned about possession, which I don't understand.

Long balls without any runners to flick on to is just a waste of time.