Arsenal have faced plenty of scrutiny this season as their title charge has somewhat faltered despite the previous two chases of Manchester City promising so much. The Gunners remain clinging on to the coattails of Liverpool by six points although Arne Slot’s side have a game in hand.
However, had the Gunners turned their back-to-back draws with Fulham and Everton into wins, they would have been a very surmountable distance away. Instead, Chelsea has taken the encouragement of Liverpool’s own slips and closed the gap themselves.
In that downturn in form, the draw with Fulham saw the Reds come away licking their wounds and a man down after Andrew Robertson was sent off for denying Harry Wilson a clear goalscoring opportunity with the visitors already a goal to the good. Despite the offence receiving a straight read, because it was not due to serious foul play, Robertson will miss just one game.
This one game happens to be the League Cup quarter-final with Southampton. This means the full-back will be available when Liverpool travel to Tottenham for a tricky forthcoming weekend match.
Now, this for Arsenal supporters might bring up some frustration. Earlier in the season there was much made of Leandro Trossard’s red card at Manchester City seeing him miss the Gunners’ own League Cup match with Bolton.
He was then able to start in their next league game with Leicester where he scored the second goal of the match in a 4-2 win. The Gunners required two very late goals to claim victory on the day with Trossard involved in the winner too, deflecting a shot off Wilfried Ndidi.
So far very little has been said about Robertson’s own fortuitous timing of his suspension besides some Gunners supporters keen to remind people of the discussions when Trossard benefitted from this ruling. It is certainly more lucky that Liverpool not only have the, on paper, easiest draw of the quarter-finals but also a tough following league game that Robertson will not miss.
It follows what has been a continually divergent season for Arsenal and Arne Slot’s side. While the Gunners have had such a challenging start to the season with injuries and controversial decisions going against them, Liverpool’s fixture schedule allowed them to build momentum into their tougher games while the likes of Mohamed Salah and Virgil van Dijk have remained available whereas Martin Odegaard and Bukayo Saka have suffered fitness problems among a plethora of others.
There will be no sympathy though in any case and Arsenal need to respond and start taking destiny into their own hands as much as they can. Focus on themselves instead of being distracted by what’s going on elsewhere.