Category: Arsenal game review

Was our goalie at fault for Arsenal Womens loss on Thursday?

Manuela Zinsberger hadn’t conceded a goal as yet in the FA Cup this season, that was until we came up against Manchester City, where she conceded two goals, adding to the two she has already conceded in the WSL so far.

Now it makes it one against Reading and one against West Ham in the WSL and two against City in the FA Cup!

Despite her conceding in the WSL Joe Montemurro still picked her to go in between the sticks against a City side that looked like they could score each time they went forward.

Is she to blame for our loss? Was she at fault for the goals? Could she have stopped either of the two goals that went in! The answers are all yes and no. Sloppy defending should never have been apparent, and she should have been able to keep the goals out. But quality over shone on the night and really, we lost as a team. This shouldn’t be a real shock, as from the off it was clear to see that she was going to be the busiest of keepers.

I have never really been too confident with Zinsberger in goal from what I have seen of her so far. Although she rarely got tested in previous games up until Thursday night, it could be said the City game was the biggest test she faced so far, and she failed along with her teammates.

As injuries seemed to be hitting us on Thursday, something else was clearly lacking in the team midweek. I think it would be a good time to give Fran Stenson a run around in the side to see if she could give Zinsberger some healthy competition and maybe it would be time for Fran to take her chance in the team and even overtake Zinsberger because it will only be a matter of time before Montemurro also decides a change needs to be made in between the sticks if his team is to compete and do better against top opposition.

As the Arsenal Women failed to beat Manchester City, losing 2-1 in the semi-finals of the FA Cup, in contrast to them, our men’s team pulled out a satisfying penalty shootout after finishing the game 0-0 after 90 minutes, beating Liverpool on penalties 5-4 helped them to advance to the next round of the Carabao Cup.

 

Of course, it would have been nice for both of our teams to progress and get positive results on the same day. But as that was not to be, at least one of our teams had done well, rather than both doing poorly!

 

The two games couldn’t be any different really. The Arsenal women hardly got out of the blocks and despite a wondergoal equaliser by Jordan Nobbs, they quickly fell back behind and lost 2-1 to a dominant Manchester City side, who seemed to work for it and want it more on the night. They got their reward and now they move on to the final of the FA Cup that will take place at Wembley.

 

Whereas on the other hand, the men came out with a determined performance against a strong Liverpool side and with some key saves at 0-0 in the game by Leno, the game was forced into penalties where he then saved two penalties and helped our men to a 5-4 win.

For the Arsenal women, they will now dust themselves off and move on and look to pick themselves up for their next round of games and for the men, they will now carry this positivity and add it to their already great mentality and try to achieve even more greatness under a manager that will accept nothing less. Here’s hoping hey Gooners?

Leno redeems himself in penalty shootout but there’s still a long way to go!

Bernd Leno shows that he is on the right track to becoming Arsenal’s number one.

He produced some key saves to keep us in the game throughout the 90 minutes on Thursday night against a strong Liverpool side, and it was clear to see as he won the man of the match performance that he is serious abiout becoming that number one.

Coming under fire by myself for previous games so far this season, I have to say I was impressed with the way he came out to try and prove people like me wrong but there is a long way to go and even Leno will know that!

Although the teams were slightly different to the one that was sent out on Monday, both teams still had a strong line-up. We could see as much, as Arteta decided to pick Leno rather than give new signing Runarsson a run out.

And Leno did not disappoint, making some key saves to keep out a number of Liverpool shots during the game, he was again in the spot light, in a penalty shootout where he would be called upon to try and save at least one, and that he did, saving twice in another shootout v Liverpool, making the saves from Divock Origi and Harry Wilson helping to put us through to the next round of the Carabao Cup!

The penalty results were as below:

Arsenal Scorers
Lacazette
Cedric
Maitland-Niles
Pepe
Willock

Arsenal Misses
Elneny

Liverpool Scorers
Milner
Wijnaldum
Minamino
Jones

Liverpool Misses / Leno Saves ?
Origi
Wilson

Leno was impressive throughout the game pulling off saves to keep us at 0-0. He then pulled off two saves in the shootout to help us win 5-4 and match the result that we had against the same opponents in the Community Shield final. Now all Leno needs to do is to keep that form up and keep it consistent and he will soon become a number one in my eyes.

And there goes the dream fading away by Lagos Gooner

Hello Gooners all over! I am still in a great shock: I can’t possibly think of any reason why we lost to a spirited Olympiacos team. A match I felt we were going to win effortlessly became the match that broke my heart, once again! Who is going to console me right now? Who is going to console the billions of Arsenal fans all over the world, who felt winning the Europa would catapult them into the UEFA Champions league? What is going to happen next to my darling Arsenal? Wow! How are the mighty fallen! The great Arsenal is finding it difficult winning the 2nd tier UEFA competition.

Earlier this month, I did a piece on two things I want from Arsenal this season. I said I wanted us to qualify for the Champions league and I wanted my uncle to fulfill his promise of sponsoring me on a trip to see the Emirates stadium live! Arsenal by failing to qualify for the round of 16 games in the Europa, have limited their chances of qualifying for the UEFA Champions league, next season. Let me say this here; in as much as I believe in miracles, I don’t believe Arsenal will end the season in the top four. To be honest with us all, Chelsea and Manchester United are doing better than us in the Premier league and I don’t see them not finishing higher than us in the league. Even if Manchester City is to miss the champions league next season, we still have teams who will finish above us, at the end of this current Premiership campaign. We have Leicester city, we have Chelsea, we have Man United and of course, we have Wolves! All these teams will surely finish higher than us unless a miracle happens. Arsenal sadly, just threw away the only real chance they had of qualifying for the UEFA Champions league. It can’t get worse, can it?

However, I still believe Arteta is doing a good job, despite his obvious lack of experience at the highest level. A coach like Mikel Arteta should not been thrown straight into the hot zone! He is not experienced enough to steer a big club like Arsenal with high expectations, out of trouble. Rather, he should have been hired at the start of a new season, where he can start a campaign and plan it his own way. What I am trying to say here is that, with Arteta, we won’t qualify for the champions league this season, but next season will be better. I still feel bad about the loss but I will be fine. We are Arsenal and we are proud.

Sylvester Kwentua

A win is a win and so that is good, right? Well, yes, but also a resounding no, why? because we were rank poor again and my player ratings will reflect that, I will not gloss over the failings just because we won, a win that came about because of a goalkeeping howler and because our opponents went down to ten men, not that we took full advantage.

As the game went on, I honestly thought we would concede, the Hornets looked far more likely to find the back of the net than what we did and I tell you now, we play like that against Napoli and a two-goal lead will not be enough.

Anyway, here are my ratings

Leno – 8

He made some crucial saves, without him we may well have conceded and to a large extent, he saved us from embarrassing ourselves.

Mustafi – 7

Actually thought he had a good game, he stood strong under pressure and thankfully made no gross errors.

Mavropanos – 5

Bloody useless, he made me nervous and if Andre Gray was a better play we would have been in trouble.

Koscielny – 7

Solid performance when you consider how much defending he had to do, showed toughness against a very physical team.

Monreal – 6

Was reliable, never made any big mistakes but was not inspiring with his passes either, an average performance really.

Torreira – 5

I expected more and the truth is he never delivered in midfield, we should have completely controlled the game when Deeney got sent off but we did not and for large parts of the game got overrun in the centre and a part of that was down to a poor game from Torreira.

Xhaka – 5

A poor game and just like Torreira I expected more, with his talent and vision he should have taken the midfield by the scruff of its neck, he never did.

Mkhitaryan – 4

Woeful, his finishing and passing were terrible, he never looked like he wanted to tackle and just looked damn lazy throughout.

Ramsey – 5

Not a vintage performance, in fact, he was poor, he had a great chance in this game to tear into Watford and he just went missing.

Iwobi – 6

At least he tried but what did he actually do with the ball, nothing, he looked like a busy bee with no end product.

Aubameyang – 7

He made the goal with his persistence, he did his job and for large parts of the game was provided with appalling service, cannot criticise him too much.

Ozil – 6

Became anonymous when he was brought on, he did show some of his usual sublime touches and on a couple of times released the pressure on us but other than that did nothing outstanding in a game perfectly set up for him.

Guendouzi – 6

Was busy and involved when he came on, did nothing wrong really, no mad tackles, no real bad passes and fought for the ball, his usual average game.

Maitland-Niles – 7

Made a very crucial tackle and when he came on he did make a difference, he brought a far better shape to the team and it is a shame he was not on from the start.

So, as you can see, the ratings are not great and I am critical and I will not apologise for that, not when you are playing a team down to ten men for almost 80 minutes and their most influential player at that was the one red carded, we should have done far better than scrape through and goal difference could be a factor come to the end of the season, we had a chance here to really lay down a marker and we failed.

Yes, we won, I am happy about that, but I saw nothing last night to alleviate my worries about our away form, absolutely nothing.

WEST BROM 3-1 ARSENAL; WHAT THE STATS SAYS AS REGARDS TO THE GUNNERS 3-1 LOSS TO WEST BROM.

The Gunners were hammered a big blow at the Hawthorns as Arsenal were beaten 3-1 under the view of 24065 spectators. The host started brightly as they took the lead through Craig Dawson who found some room in Arsenal’s defence to head home from a resultant corner-kick in the 12th minutes of the game.

The Gunners came back into the game through who else but Alexis Sanchez as Arsenal eventually lost 3-1 to the host.
This result makes it 4 loss out of the last five games for Arsenal s questions continues to get towards the Arsenal side and Arsene Wenger in particular for what a torrid season it is turning to be for the London side.
With the 3-1 loss we take a look at some match statistics as it happened at the Hawthorns.

FULL STATISTICS
SHOTS ON TARGET
6 (WEST BROM) (ARSENAL) 3
The Gunners were beaten on numbers of shots on target by the home side. West Brom had six strikes on goal which resulted in the corner-kick that produced both goals for the home side as they downed Arsenal 3-1 in the game.
Arsenal’s 3 shots on goal produced their equalizer as Alexis Sanchez showed composure and confidence to finish past the goalkeeper following a brilliant ball from his teammate Granit Xhaka who looped a decent ball over the West Brom defence to find Alexis Sanchez in the box.

SHOTS OFF TARGET
3 (WEST BROM) (ARSENAL) 3
Both sides produced a total of six shots off target in the game as both sides shared the spoils here on 3 shots apiece away from goal.
In the end it was Arsenal who paid the price in the match as they were dealt a huge blow with the 3-1 win in the game.

POSSESSION (%)
31 (WEST BROM) (ARSENAL) 69
It was no surprise as the Gunners produced quality and flair in transition. The likes of Aaron Ramsey and Granit Xhaka sat deep in midfield as the duo produced some good moment to dominate the host in the middle of the park.
The Gunners though were unlucky as they could not convert their dominance into the much needed three points as Craig Dawson got the job done for West Brom with 2 headed goals.

CORNERS
4 (WEST BROM) (ARSENAL) 5
The Gunners had 5 corner-kicks in the game as regards to West Brom’s 4 corner-kick in total.
The host made use of their corner-kick to effectiveness as two of their goals came from corner-kick set play from one player Craig Dawson who scored in each half to open and end the scoring in the match as Arsenal were given a soccer punch in the wake of what is turning out to be a bad and unfruitful season and a one to forget.

OFFSIDES
2 (WEST BROM) (ARSENAL) 1
The home side had 2 offside calls in the game while the visiting side Arsenal were caught offside on one occasion as the host threw every ball at the Gunners in the wake of a 3-1 win despite Alexis Sanchez equalizer in the game.

FOULS
5 (WEST BROM) (ARSENAL) 5
The host committed about 5 fouls in the entire game while the visitors were forced into 5 fouls themselves in the match. This is as a result of the flair exhibited by both side in midfield particularly from Granit Xhaka and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain as both sides attempted to get the ball off each other in the wake of the contested duel at the Hawthorns.

YELLOW CARDS
1 (WEST BROM) (ARSENAL) 0
The game produced only one yellow card in the entire 90minutes encounter. It was no surprise as the team with the less possession of the ball tends to hit the dominant side in the course of the game.
West Brom’s James McClean was booked in the 42nd minute as the only booking of the entire match.

GOAL-KICK
5 (WEST BROM) (ARSENAL) 7
The game produced a total of 12 goal-kicks in the game. Players like Sanchez and Salomon Rondon spearheaded their team’s attack (forward play) as this resulted in a stern attacking match for the opposing defence as Arsenal conceded 7 goal-kick behind their goal as compared to the 5 goal-kick at the end of West Brom goal area.

TREATMENTS
0 (WEST BROM) (ARSENAL) 2
The Gunners had 2 treatments in the game as compared to the host none in the game. It was no surprise as Arsenal players are prone to injury and might have fallen prey to any sort of knocks or some physical constraint during the game in line with Alexis Sanchez injury before the Chilean Superstar was replaced by Nigerian attacking talent Alex Iwobi later on in the game.