Morning all.
So yesterday’s big game between Man City and Liverpool turned out to be a pretty one-sided affair, with Pep Guardiola’s 1000th game as manager ending in a 3-0 win for his side. Liverpool were a bit of mess defensively, which isn’t entirely a surprise after their recent run, but as much as Mo Salah was key for them last season, so too was the central defensive partnership of Virgil van Dijk and Ibrahima Konate. Salah’s not scoring at the same rate this time around, but this partnership looks really vulnerable of late.
The latter, in particular, looked a long way from his best. It’s as if he got a visit from the big lad from The Green Mile who, instead of sucking all the bad stuff out of him, blew him full of some kind of low-level poison. I was also quite interested in the fact that Liverpool had a £130m striker on the bench and there was barely a mention of that during the game from the commentator or co-commentator. Maybe they addressed it in the post-game stuff which I didn’t watch, but I found it quite strange that this wasn’t a major talking point in a game Liverpool lost badly.
It’s likely that Alexander Isak wasn’t fully fit, but if he’s on the bench, surely it’s for a scenario where you need a goal/goals in the last 20-30 minutes? It stood out to me a bit because when Arsenal had the two goalkeepers situation, you couldn’t get through two minutes of a match without the cameras panning to Aaron Ramsdale every time David Raya did anything. I’d have thought Liverpool not using the most expensive substitute in English football history might have been more of a talking point, but there you go.
Anyway, City took full advantage, and it means that our lead at the top going into this Interlull is now 4 points. As I said yesterday, I do think that’s a place you’d happily have taken after the last break, so I can’t really have any complaints. It could have been a bit better, but that’s football.
Maybe it’s worth taking a look at how this last little period, from October 18th has gone for Arsenal. Not quite a by the numbers thing, I don’t want the stats guys after me with their spreadsheets and briefcases and stuff, but in that kinda ballpark.
Games played: 7
Goals scored: 15
Goal scorers: Bukayo Saka (4); Viktor Gyokeres (3); Leandro Trossard (2); Mikel Merino (2); Gabriel (1); Gabriel Martinelli (1); Declan Rice (1); Ethan Nwaneri (1); Eberechi Eze (1)
Shots on target: 44
Shots on target against: 11 – this is heavily skewed by the 6 shots on target Brighton had in the EFL Cup tie, and also includes Eddie Nketiah’s ‘shot on target’ which only exists as a stat because someone, somewhere decided it was a shot on target when it absolutely wasn’t. We need the Dubious Stats Panel to adjudicate this and have it stricken from the records.
Goals conceded: 2
Clean sheets: 6
Minutes played by Martin Odegaard: 0
Minutes played by Kai Havertz: 0
Minutes played by Noni Madueke: 0
Minutes played by Gabriel Jesus: 0
Injuries sustained to forward players: 2 – Viktor Gyokeres, Gabriel Martinelli
I’ve kinda run out of stats now, but I do think it’s worth reflecting on what we did, and who we didn’t have, at the same time. Maybe the result against Sunderland could have been different with different subs from Mikel Arteta. We’ll never know for sure, but there’s also a very good chance that we might have won the game if we’d had some of those absent players at our disposal. The lads who have played a lot have really pushed hard to contribute in the final third, but imagine putting on some of those players in the final stages of a game we were leading. That would certainly have had an impact on where the game was played, and I don’t think the ball would have been in our half as much.
Anyway, key now is to have a few of them back post-Interlull, because we have some very challenging fixtures straight away, and we need those options in the forward line – particularly in that first week with a North London derby, Bayern Munich in the Champions League, and then a trip to Stamford Bridge to face Chelsea. Fingers crossed.
Right, I’ll leave it there this morning. We’ll have an Arsecast Extra for you later on, we’re recording around 10.30am. We’ve already put out the call for questions on BlueSky @gunnerblog.bsky.social and @arseblog.com with the hashtag #arsecastextra – or if you’re an Arseblog Member on Patreon, leave your question in the #arsecast-extra-questions channel on our Discord server. The pod should be out around noon.
And, later on again, we’ll have an episode of The 30 over on Patreon, recapping all the weekend’s Premier League action, so please join us for that.
For now, have a good one.