UCL: Arsenal vs Porto | Tue 9th March | 19.45 | SS2

[ricky1985]

Nice write-up ricky, how did the atmosphere compare with other games at the Emirates that have had good atmosphere?

And where do you think it comes from? Is it because it was a European night, is it part of the general positive united attitude among Gooners since Stoke or something else? Reading around the web, from various Arsenal forums and blogs, there just seems to be this huge shift in belief and attitude. Even the most negative Gooners seem to be uniting with the rest. Less bickering and more feeling of togetherness really, however corny that sounds.

When I got to the stadium it immediately dawned on me that there seemed to be a buzz around the stadium, everyone seemed really up for it, and I thought what's all this about then? It's been a good atmosphere over there for every game I've gone to this season, but last night there was a little extra. Anyway, I suddenly realised that this was the knock-outs of the Champions League, so of course there was going to be a buzz of excitement, but I definitely think the emotional experience of Stoke has galvanised the fans, and restored a sense of pride and belief that was kicked out of us post United and Chelsea.

When the fans believe it can do amazing things to the team, you can't even begin to quantify the difference it makes. The next European night at the Emirates, whoever we face, will be a night to remember, that's for sure.

 

[famous no 10]

Yeah, it's taken a while but The Grove is starting to feel like "home".

 

[ricky1985]

Hey Ricky,

Interesting observations about Song's pressure and the defensive game around him. I hate using them as an example, but at the half of the Milan-United game, Bobby McMahon did a segment on Fox Soccer Channel about United's defensive scheme. He showed a couple plays to illustrate his point. Basically, they force the ball into an area they control. Then, someone goes in hard to challenge, the rest of the players for United are already closing down the available players so they very often beat the intended target to the pass or force that person into a rushed pass and so on until the other team gives the ball away. It was very effective. Does anyone notice this on the part of Arsenal? Do we use those kind of defensive tactics? Maybe I watch too much Arsenal (as if there were such a thing as too much) but those aren't the kind of movements I've been watching for at all. I'll keep an eye out for it next game.

Interesting, and the answer is "no", we definitely don't do anything a clever as that, but that's because we're a completely different team to them. When United play open, expansive football they are as vulnerable as we are, the difference is they don't play open, expansive football against teams who are at, or even close to, their level - we do.

We could stay narrow and compact and we would defend much, much better, not as well as Chelsea or United do, because they have years of experience of doing just that, but we'd still defend a lot better than we currently do, but then we wouldn't be Arsenal, and we wouldn't score the goals or play the football we do. It just means if we are going to win the whole thing we're going to have to play very, very good in every game from here on out. Tactics and formations won't get us over the line like it might for other teams, we literally have to go out and play our opponents off the park.

 

[caldeltatrojan]

Hey Ricky,

Interesting observations about Song's pressure and the defensive game around him. I hate using them as an example, but at the half of the Milan-United game, Bobby McMahon did a segment on Fox Soccer Channel about United's defensive scheme. He showed a couple plays to illustrate his point. Basically, they force the ball into an area they control. Then, someone goes in hard to challenge, the rest of the players for United are already closing down the available players so they very often beat the intended target to the pass or force that person into a rushed pass and so on until the other team gives the ball away. It was very effective. Does anyone notice this on the part of Arsenal? Do we use those kind of defensive tactics? Maybe I watch too much Arsenal (as if there were such a thing as too much) but those aren't the kind of movements I've been watching for at all. I'll keep an eye out for it next game.

Interesting, and the answer is "no", we definitely don't do anything a clever as that, but that's because we're a completely different team to them. When United play open, expansive football they are as vulnerable as we are, the difference is they don't play open, expansive football against teams who are at, or even close to, their level - we do.

We could stay narrow and compact and we would defend much, much better, not as well as Chelsea or United do, because they have years of experience of doing just that, but we'd still defend a lot better than we currently do, but then we wouldn't be Arsenal, and we wouldn't score the goals or play the football we do. It just means if we are going to win the whole thing we're going to have to play very, very good in every game from here on out. Tactics and formations won't get us over the line like it might for other teams, we literally have to go out and play our opponents off the park.

I think you're right Ricky. We rarely ever talk defensive strategy on AM and when we talk about defense it's more in terms of breaking up attacks and closing down, etc. More basic stuff. I guess it's probably similar with the club itself. As you say, that's what makes us The Arsenal (post-Graham era, I'm told).

If that's their strategy though, wouldn't switching the emphasis of attack be the way to counter it? That's not really our game, but if we are to solve them through our attack, we at least need to figure out the best way to break them down.

 

[True Gooner]

Song is getting quite a lot of criticism based on last night's game, but I think, when you're there in the stadium it's so clear to see, the vast majority of the time he vacates "his" space he does so because one of Diaby, Nasri, Rosicky or Arshavin haven't respected their own personal responsibility. Too often opponents are allowed too much time to decide on a pass, or afforded space to move into because no one is closing them down, Song moves forward to pressurise, but if he doesn't get the ball it's passed around him to players that haven't been tracked, and it puts our defence under tremendous pressure. It's a real problem and there's no quick fix, our players aren't going to suddenly figure it out, it's something that will improve with experience and time playing together - so basically I'm saying it's going to cost us when we meet a better side later in the tournament.

That's not what most people have taken issue with ricky. What annoyed me the most was seeing Song run up the pitch with the ball trying to get a shot away or making a pass. There was absolutely no need for him to do that when he could have passed the ball to more attacking players.

There was one particular moment in the second half when it was 2-0 and we were under pressure and Song ran up with the ball, Sagna pushed forward leaving only 3 defenders back and called for a pass, Song ignored him and tried to shoot. The gap between the defence and midfield was massive and any decent team would have made much better use of that space.

 

[Nela]

Song has a tendency to start fancying himself a playmaker. He starts to dribble a bit too much, pushes to far forward, and tries to jink past too many opposotion players and gets caught. If he could just be a bit more disciplined.

 

[Meatwad]

if he had diaby's pace then i could understand him "losing it" a little and wanting to show off his skills up the pitch, but recovering quickly from advance positions when it breaks down isn't a strength of his.

 

[Anzac]

Thought this was a good read.

<a class="postlink" href="http://www.football365.com/story/0,17033,8689_6012734,00.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.football365.com/story/0,1703 ... 34,00.html</a>

 

[hesham]

Good article.
The 1st 20min of the game was some of the best football I have seen us play all season

 

[Armor for Sleep]

Song is getting quite a lot of criticism based on last night's game, but I think, when you're there in the stadium it's so clear to see, the vast majority of the time he vacates "his" space he does so because one of Diaby, Nasri, Rosicky or Arshavin haven't respected their own personal responsibility. Too often opponents are allowed too much time to decide on a pass, or afforded space to move into because no one is closing them down, Song moves forward to pressurise, but if he doesn't get the ball it's passed around him to players that haven't been tracked, and it puts our defence under tremendous pressure. It's a real problem and there's no quick fix, our players aren't going to suddenly figure it out, it's something that will improve with experience and time playing together - so basically I'm saying it's going to cost us when we meet a better side later in the tournament.

Do you think the signing of a midfielder this summer could go a long way to solving the problem ricky? We just seem to be too gung ho at the minute so if we face Chelsea, Barca or whoever they will inevitably hurt us on the counter. Obviously most of us would like to see a defensive player come in who can cover Song so if we were to sign someone it could tighten things up defensively big time in midfield. I'm thinking an athletic ball winner - a la Flamini - or even an experienced midfielder (someone like Gilberto) who could make sure nobody loses the run of themselves and leaves too big a gap in midfield.

Against top teams I think having the option of playing a compact midfield unit would be brilliant for us. The current starters - Diaby and Cesc/Nasri as you say will need time before they excel at the defensive side of things and I can see the same weaknesses costing us big games and ultimately trophies. So I feel against top sides, being able to play a trio such as Song Cesc and for argument's sake Flamini would help fix one major flaw in this side.

I just hate the thought of watching repeats of our 2-0 loss at Stamford Bridge for the next few seasons. Where we outplay teams, compete with them physically but then see it all pissed away because of tactical naivety on our midfield's part.

 

[Klaus Daimler]

We could have played Gilberto at his best instead of Song to very little or no defensive improvement this season. Sure, Song's still developing but the biggest fault has always been the lack of defensive discipline from the other two midfielders.

Earlier in the season Cesc went out of his way to cover every blade of grass and put in very impressive defensive performances. The games against Celtic in particular springs to mind. When Robin got injured he started playing a more attacking game, and consequently we suffered defensively, especially when Denilson - who was the only one in central midfield offering proper defensive support at the time - also got injured. Diaby's defensive improvement lately has meant that we're less porous through the middle, but we're still struggling to field the same midfield for two games in a row. We lack continuity above anything else right now. Give Diaby and Song some time and it'll work wonders.

 

[flobaba]

We could have played Gilberto at his best instead of Song to very little or no defensive improvement this season. Sure, Song's still developing but the biggest fault has always been the lack of defensive discipline from the other two midfielders..

I quite agree with what you said bar the bolded bit- methinks the defensive issues are with the team as a whole and not just the responsibility of the midfielders.

 

[Klaus Daimler]

Yeah, in some aspects. The lack of a centreforward has meant that we've found it harder to hold up the ball in the attacking third, for example, which increases the pressure on the midfield. Having so many naturalised wide players out injured has meant that we've challenged defenders less and been dispossessed more than we should have been. And when Clichy and Gibbs both got injured we were down to our third choice leftback for a couple of months. All those small things weaken the team in several areas.

Players out of their depth or out of position tend to increase the workload on others, and too often this season it has made Song, Gallas and Vermaelen to look worse than they are. In saying that the attacking midfielders have still left too much space behind them at many times. It's not easy being Song when you're forced to deal with that all by yourself. A lot of the chances Denilson was getting early on, prior to his back injury, was because he didn't went astray as much as the other two.

 

[mistaT]

I'd have to agree 100% with the bolded bit from the part above and want to emphasis the biggest advantage Diaby has added to our midfield is his speed.

That was what killed me about Denilson, he'd be in the right places when we lost the ball but if he wasn't intercepting a pass then teams were blowing right past him.

This and the fact that Song isn't too pacy and we were constantly watching as teams attacked our back line with pace and no one to hassle them. Now I know dribbling past defenders is one of the hardest elements in football, but when you have speed and no one on your shoulder its not too hard to blow past a flat footed defender.

Look at how Clichy was getting torched for a while....I think his saving grace has been Diaby coming to form and that the opposition knows he'll be on them soon so they have to make plays and get rid of the ball.

Point being, as others have said I like Song and think he's doing a great job in defending tight areas but he's not too good in recovery or tracking players from distance. Diaby, and defenders who have pace, do much better.

So next year its got to be Diaby-Song-Cesc and a back up midfielder who can cover for Diaby as well as Song. The way I see it Diaby can do Song's job, but Song and truth be told no one else on our team can do Diaby's job.

And no Melo isn't the answer, he's a glorified version of Song.

 

[Nela]

Diaby's abilbity to cover a lot of space very quickly is hugely important to the team, especially with two rather slow players in Cesc and Song next to him.

I've also been really impressed by his increased discipline and tactical awareness.

 

[Meatwad]

uefa keeps stats regarding distance covered each CL match and i thought i saw something about diaby covering 11km. that's marathon running.

he also attempted (53) and completed (46) the most passes and was most accurate at 87%.

 

[Zinc]

but we're still struggling to field the same midfield for two games in a row. We lack continuity above anything else right now. Give Diaby and Song some time and it'll work wonders.

I feel exactly the same. Hopefully they get the rest of the season together then a good pre season and bam we'll be looking so good. Diaby's injury proness is alittle worrying, he does seem to pick up alot of lil 1's.

 

[Kain]

uefa keeps stats regarding distance covered each CL match and i thought i saw something about diaby covering 11km. that's marathon running.

he also attempted (53) and completed (46) the most passes and was most accurate at 87%.

He did, I saw some stats on SSN the day after the game posted it on the Song ACN thread, Diaby covered an unreal amount of ground, I think it's fair to say that it is a part of the game I never really thought Abou had it in him to achieve, yet recent months has seen him go from strength to strength.

 

[alboots101]

so we`re all on the Diaby train at last?

 

[Kain]

Well... he's one of the only players with a chant, even if it's just repeating his name, so hell yea.

DIABY, DIABY......... DIABY!