Arsenal are finally at home, but it’s against Everton. Always a rough outing for us, though the problems tend to come from games we play in Merseyside.
The fear with Everton is much harsher than the reality. We’re unbeaten in 7 against them. I think the pain was from the two draws we had against them the season prior to winning the league. We also just don’t like playing Moyes teams, they’re very industrial, they clog up passing lanes, and it’s generally just an ugly spectacle.
Arsenal have been on a scintillating run of games, the football has been far better, but it’s hard not to look at our attack and worry that we’re getting away with it a touch so far this season. Most of our goals have come from open play goals this season, but we’re ranked 12th in the league for open play xG. We’re on 18 points, but our xPts is 5 lower. It’s not just Arsenal, Man City are in the same boat, outperforming xG by an even bigger margin than Arsenal.
It’s not hard to decode why our attacking numbers are so dismal… we low-volume everything.
Low shot volume. 83 shots, 12th in the league. Everton (97) have taken more.
Not dominating shot count. 83 taken vs 75 faced, a 53/47 split. City, Liverpool and Brighton are all far more one-sided.
Mid-table attacking output. 13.3 xG, 9th in the league.
Finishing below expectation. 11 goals from 13.3 xG, about 2.3 short.
Conversion just average. 13% of shots scored, joint 6th, when the quality of those shots suggests closer to 16%.
Well behind the top scorers. 11 goals vs City’s 19 and Brighton’s 23, level with Ipswich.
The only positive is we’re creating a lot of good xG when we do create chances… high-quality chances, limited volume, probably speaks a little bit to a strategy of low risk-taking. Arteta doesn’t like to give the oppo chances to break like Bayern did the other night, so precision could be a thing… though that does butt up against some of the things he’s said in the media about wanting goals, goals, goals.
I know Brighton won’t last the season, but it is striking to see that they’ve had 39 shots more than Arsenal and we’re only 7 games in. They’re averaging 17 shots a game to our 12… a team of minnows delivering those sorts of numbers, with a better defence, and an Arsenal scalp. They are massively outperforming attacking xG, everything they hit is going in, but I do like the volume business, and Arsenal just aren’t in that area.
A manager who was also not in the volume business was Conte at Spurs… but he had Harry Kane to support a low chance creation machine. Arteta thought he was getting that with Gyokeres, but he can’t get him into good positions in the Premier League. Kai has been really disappointing since a good start, no doubt there’s an injury for him brewing very soon. It beggars belief we’re Premier League Champions with a manager who has never had a truly world class striker.
So we do have to wonder… are we just going to be a low-volume team all season and rely on a defence doing mega numbers?
Best defence by the underlying numbers. 7.9 xGA is the lowest in the league (Liverpool next on 8.5).
Joint-fewest goals conceded. 5, level with Brighton.
4 clean sheets in 7, second only to Brighton.
Strong overall control. xG difference of +5.4, joint 3rd with Bournemouth behind City (+6.8) and Liverpool (+6.2).
Discipline. 9 bookings, among the lowest in the league (only Coventry have fewer).
Or will life catch up to us at some point?
It’s also worth noting that this crying I’m doing always needs to be contextualised by the reality that Arsenal are dealing with a number of problems Hürzeler is not…
Arsenal ranked third for the most players at the World Cup
16 of our players went to the World Cup and a lot of our important players went DEEP. Man City and Bayern were ahead of us with 19 and 17 respectively. Arsenal are getting lucky in attack, but City are getting away with it in defence, conceding 3.2 less than they should have.
Larger point here, when you’ve got big players going to the end of tournaments, you’re going to struggle to recover… we even lost the best centre back in the world to the World Cup.
Emotional fatigue of greatness
Arsenal have been climbing Everest for 4 years, at the last section, they’ve slipped, 3 times in a row… it’s incredible we even mustered a 4th attempt. But we did, and the mountain was conquered.
That emotional drain is real. It impacts players. The levels can dip a little bit. You regather yourself as you try to figure out what you want from life. It is very, very hard to reorient yourself after the death of a goal. It actually has a term, it’s called arrival fallacy, coined by Tal Ben-Shahar, a Harvard lecturer famous for a course on positive psychology. Was I at Harvard? I prefer not to speak...
Anyway, the gist is that an aggressive goal gives you structure, purpose, meaning… and when you reach it, you can feel flat. It never feels as good as you imagined. Your whole worldview changes, you’re not an underdog anymore, you’re the top dog, being the top dog requires a rewiring of your brain.
That can take time… but I promise you, it’s a thing. You’re reading this website, that means you’re handsome and highly successful, you know that feeling when you get a pay rise, a promotion, or you win darts against a foe you absolutely DESPISE at a bar. The outcome is never as you dreamt it. I wrote about José Mourinho yesterday; he had the third-season issue, you had world-class ballers talking about how hard it is to listen to a really intense, slightly psychopathic leader, at the third try. Arteta has been with this group a long time, he pushed them to the limits last season… worth keeping in mind.
The smaller teams are fresher
Teams like Brighton and Leeds have less of the above problems… and they’re not playing three games a week until December. Do not underestimate the benefits of having one game a week after summer that has had a big World Cup. Their players are fitter, they’re getting more time with the coach on the pitch, and the standards in the Premier League are so high now that makes a huge difference.
Things will level out when December hits and all the teams are playing at least twice a week, but until then, you just have to gut things out… and we’re gutting things out, no doubt.
Everton’s 8th-place league position is really good, but they are exactly where they deserve to be. They don’t press very well, they have the 7th most passive PPDA number in the league. They have the 8th best defence based on xG. Their attack is also underperforming based on their xG output. They’ve also racked up points against teams that aren’t doing very well.
This should be a more comfortable game than we’ve had of late, but a big emotional game against Bayern can have the habit of creating a Saturday slow start. So who knows. They also have Thierno Barry, a guy so infatuated with Thierry Henry, his Instagram bio is his own head AI’d onto Thierry’s statue. He’s a monster athlete and he scored goals. Lots of them. 23 years old, French, very fast, and very fun to watch… very rough round the edges, but he does prove out, it’s better to be an elite athlete with rough technique, than a good technician with limited physical prowess… Thierno very much in the world of Darwin and Nico Jackson… one to watch for sure.
I have no idea how this game will go, my prediction was 3-0… so we’ll see how that goes. If you want to get the On The Whistle right after the game, jump in and get signed up below! x
Podcast## EVERTON (H) | ON THE WHISTLE | MEMBERS LIVE SHOW ⚡
EVERTON (H) | ON THE WHISTLE | MEMBERS LIVE SHOW ⚡
Matt Kandela and Johnny Cochrane are going LIVE right after the game to bring you the BIG swings on a HUGE day for Arsenal.