Arsenal vs. Aston Villa: Thoughts on Gunners' Shaky Victory

Arsenal won 2-1 at Aston Villa.

Three points taken. That's what matters...most.

The victory gives the team a two-point cushion over Liverpool, who are hot on Arsenal's heels; it also leaves Arsenal within hailing distance of Chelsea. 

The battle for the top four spots continues. A slip is costly; mistakes can wipe away confidence, re-cultivated with sweat and grit.

Here are my thoughts on the match.

1. This was a terribly shaky match for the Gunners.

You are not likely to see a more frustrating or disjointed start from the Gunners anywhere, exaggeration and all. In the first 10 minutes, the Gunners could barely complete intentional passes. The midfield went AWOL.

That the team didn't concede in the first few minutes can be put down to luck and Villa's ineptitude in front of goal. Luck could be the other word for Wojciech Szczęsny, of course. This was another match in which the imposing Pole stood tall between the posts.

You could refer to the shaky start at Wigan, but that was more because of Wigan's enterprise than of Arsenal's disjointedness. There—as I have said elsewhere—it was case in which Wigan tried to out-Arsenal Arsenal, and they looked like they could in the first 10 minutes, but this wasn't because Arsenal were playing badly.

In this match, they played terribly.

2. The shaky start underscored the importance of Alex Song.

Alex Song is a Gunner who is underrated and under-appreciated. It is not uncommon still to hear criticism of Song even for matches where his performance, by and large, is above reproach—the Dortmund match at the Emirates and the last City match are just two examples.

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Alex Song is an important piece of the Arsenal machine

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Even now the loudest refrain is, "Wilshere, Wilshere, Wilshere!"

Don't get me wrong, Wilshere is an excellent player and I'm looking forward to his return, but when have you heard Song appreciated in the same breadth as Wilshere? There are reasons for this naturally, but all I'm saying is, let credit be given where it's due. 

Off the soapbox!

Song's absence made Mikel Arteta and Aaron Ramsey look bad, in the sense that in the first 30 minutes of the first half and the larger part of the second, they completely lost control of the midfield.

This should indicate clearly the importance of Song as a piece in the Arsenal machine.

3. Disjointed performance sounded a word of caution.

Two of the new bloods got a start in the match—Francis Coquelin and Emmanuel Frimpong.  But since they didn't exactly fly, there's no need to talk of colors.

Conquelin's rather painful and anonymous performance can be put down largely to the fact that he was played in a position in which—by Wenger's own admission—he is uncomfortable. 

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N'Zogbia was a tough nut to crack for Coquelin

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Stephen Warnock and Charles N'Zogbia took turns running circles around him. In fact, you could see that the latter was delighted in "taunting" the poor lad. A card was inevitable.

Again, it didn't take long to see that Villa strategically targeted Arsenal's right rear flank. They knew there was weakness there, and they exploited it. A better team than Villa could have reaped the expected reward from this exploitation. (Pardon the political vocabulary.)

Frimpong proved redundant and lumbering in the holding midfield role. The drive and ability to break up the opponent's play, two elements that have endeared him quickly to Arsenal's fans, were missing. He had apparently left them at home, most probably with his Dench T-shirts.

He squandered possession both in persisting with ill-advised passes and in being careless with it.

Here then is the word of caution.

While it's natural for fans—including yours truly—to want to see our exciting youngsters, their inclusion is no guarantee that they will perform where the veterans fail. For example, the fashionable call these days is for the benching of Theo Walcott in preference of Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain.

I want to see Chamberlain more frequently myself, but to think that he's ready to replace Walcott altogether is a thought a tad premature.

What I'd like to see is a little more experimentation with the formation to allow for the integration of not just the youngsters or the fringe players, such as Tomas Rosicky and Yossi Benayoun, but of the starting players in different positions.

A big reason why Robin Van Persie couldn't be more effective in the City match was because, too many times, he had to hold up the ball to allow other players to overlap for a pass. This is something Marouane Chamakh—however much you dislike him—is good at.

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Vincent Kompany restricted Van Persie's influence in the City match

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Van Persie, for example could have been played as a false nine and Chamakh played as the main striker to do the dirty work Van Persie did in the match.

This would have forced Vincent Kompany to mark Chamakh instead of Van Persie, else be pulled out of position in persisting with marking Van Persie. So who would I have replaced with Chamakh? Aaron Ramsey, but more on this in a forthcoming article.

This, though, is just one example of how Wenger could reshuffle players strategically. I have also mentioned the lopsided formation somewhere in passing, which is another option that could be explored. I intend to expand on this in another article.

Here's the gist of this point: Coquelin's and Frimpong's performances showed that five-star performances are dependent on many factors. In other words, the inclusion of the younger players in the lineup is not an automatic guarantee that they'd do better than the current starting 11. 

Understand that I'm all for giving them more playing time, but this is different than saying Chamberlain should replace Walcott, for example.

4. Disjointed performance highlighted the importance of rhythm.

If you were very frustrated as you watched the match and wondered what on earth Frimpong was doing, why Ramsey kept misplacing passes, why Arteta seemed largely missing from the midfield, why Arsenal could not put together more than three passes without one going awry or why they huffed and puffed yet were dominated by a mediocre Villa, here's why. 

They lack rhyme and rhythm.

Rhyme is, of course, a fancy way of saying they weren't in sync. But rhythm is the important point here. (For those who read this article and wondered why I tarried on terminologies, this is the reason why. I wanted to be able to call on this vocabulary without resorting to definitions. If you missed that article, I advice you to read it later.)

Arsenal's inability to retain possession in this match was due to two factors.

First, players off the ball provided little option for the possessing players. In other words, they tended to be stationary instead of "moving towards"—see this article—the possessing player to receive the pass.

This lack of mobility off the ball made it easy for the same players to be marked by the opposition. This also meant that the possessing player became quickly agitated as he looked to get rid of the ball. The pass, then, was often made to players under duress who were then easily disposed.

In the last 10 minutes of the first half where Arsenal were more assured in possession, they were able to do this because non-possessing players began making intelligent moves. This provided the possessing player more than one good option for passing.

Second, there was no pacesetter for rhythm and tempo.

This is why Frimpong looked lost in the midfield and Arteta and Ramsey lacked their customary authority and efficiency in the midfield. This hacks back to the point on Alex Song.

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 Frimpong and Arsenal had a torrid time against Villa

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It shows you how important he is to Arsenal's movement, modulation and transition in the midfield. So if you've ever wondered who is the rhythm setter in Arsenal's midfield, you have your answer from this match.

Rhythm, as you'd recall from that earlier article, is the choreographed movement of the team while in possession (or out of possession).

It is the pace at which the team decides to play (That is, it controls tempo. Again see that article if you don't know what I mean by tempo), and it is what each player does to contribute to the retention of possession and to the advancement of a particular attacking movement towards climax. Think tiki-taka, only off the ball.

When a team plays with rhythm, pieces of its movement seem to naturally fall into place. This is what happened in the last 10 minutes of the Villa game, especially the last six.

The beauty of Barcelona (or of the Chilean national team in the 2010 Word Cup or of Brazil's 1982 World Cup squad) owes to their rhythm. People talk about their passing, but it is their rhythm that allows them their fluency in possession.

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Brazil's 1982 World Cup squad possessed fantastic rhythm

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When Barcelona struggle, they struggle because they're either unable to set the right rhythm for their play or because the opponent is breaking up their rhythm, which is often done by fouling them.

To summarize, complete lack of rhythm was the reason why Arsenal were so poor in this match; the reason why they were dominated by Villa.

All things being equal, Frimpong should have controlled the rhythm, but he was lost at sea unfortunately (my intention, though, is not to blame him). Thankfully, Song is available for the Monday match against Wolves. Watch for the return of fluent rhythm then.

5. Arsenal goals showed what a difference individual quality makes for a team.

Here's a thought.

A below-par Messi is better than an on-par _________...fill in the blank. For those who can't stop criticizing Walcott—he showed you what difference his mere presence can make in the team. A simple feint and a burst of pace bought us a goal. Prior to this, Arsenal were completely asleep. 

He was boxed in the City match? So what? It happens to the best of stars. Lionel Messi was just a shadow of himself at the 2010 World Cup, boxed, most of the time, by the opposing teams. Lothar Matthäus had Maradona's number at the 1986 World Cup final.

This only emphasizes the need to reshuffle formation in order to destabilize the opponent's game plan as per boxing particular players. This is what Guardiola did with Alexis Sánchez, Andrés Iniesta and Cesc Fabregas in the recent Clásico.

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Theo Walcott was marked out of the City game

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Is Theo Walcott boxed in the flank? Pull him to the middle; refuse to play the right winger for awhile, for example. This will confuse not only his marker but also the opposing coach, who will most certainly wonder how best to counter this new formation.

As soon as he seems to figure out what you're up to, change the formation again. (I acknowledge that this can only be done when a manager has versatile and gifted players at his disposal. So here's the question: Are Arsenal players gifted enough for this?)

The key is this:

Be strategically proactive in order to maintain the upper hand throughout a match. This point is what sets Barcelona apart from the rest of the pack. Here my question: Why can't Arsenal do the same?

"Arsenal striker Robin van Persie outshone by Yossi Benayoun on night of landmark goals," reads the headline from The Telegraph.

This sensationalizes the whole thing, of course; it's what the media does. If Van Persie hadn't supplied the well-weighted assist from the corner, there wouldn't have been a Benayoun header. But again, if Benayoun hadn't been in the right position to supply the header for the goal, we all now would be spewing venom rather than savoring the taste of another three points.

But what all this highlights is the difference individual quality makes. Arsenal didn't play well, but they rose to the demands of the occasion by letting their individual quality work for them.

More playing time for Benayoun, I say. Remember his fantastic goal against Olympiakos? Definitely, he needs more playing time. I'd like to see more competition between him, Ramsey and Rosicky.

6. Arsenal's labored performance means Wenger needs to be more creative at the back.

Wenger himself admits that creativity is needed with the full-back situation. The question is, what trumps what? Will Wenger persist with trying to fit an ill-suited player to a system, or will he tinker with the system to fit it to the strengths of the players he has available? I have said my bit on this issue on two occasions now—here and here—so I'm not going to rehash it.

You know where my opinion lies. I think the system should serve the players rather than the players the system. I believe this same reason is why the reserve players are not getting playing time.

7. Incoherent performance may indicate the reason why Wenger is reluctant to experiment with formation.

The fact that Frimpong and Coquelin didn't exactly bring fireworks to this match may be part of the reason why Wenger is reluctant to experiment. How much room is there for creativity in an atmosphere where anything less than victory is anathema? I strike this point to counterbalance the preceding. 

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Wenger may be reluctant to experiment because of the need to win every game

 

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8. The away jersey could be bad luck!

Tongue-in-cheek and superstition, but what's life without superstition? On a serious note though, I hate this away outfit. I can't wait to see it gone at the end of the season. What cold and drab colors! No wonder Arsenal get beaten in it more frequently than not!

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Drab and cold?

 

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Parting words

Thanks to those of you who have been following my articles. And welcome to those who are meeting me for the first time. Here's what you can do to encourage me to continue writing. Be sure to check my page any time you are logged on to B/R. (Better, bookmark it.)

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I'll like to continue writing analysis, but it doesn't help when the effort—by and large—is wasted in terms of appreciation and readership.

This article, for example, didn't even make it to the Arsenal stream, for a variety of reasons (I'm not trying to fault B/R, mind), so it didn't get sufficient exposure, and I wrote it specifically because you, the readers, encouraged me to.

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