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MOTD: Arsenal 2-0 Manchester City

By on January 18, 2015

Arsenal; aren’t they the team that usually seem to value possession and creative midfielders over anything else? Aren’t they the team that always lose in the big matches? These two characteristics are correlated. Arsenal has never before shown a reliable plan B, or at least played with it, to revert to when playing against better clubs which can easily pick them apart on the counter-attack. In the end, they would always lose big matches; not in their past sixteen matches against Manchester United, Manchester City, or Chelsea had they won.

Arsene Wenger told of their gameplan speaking after the match, to play “high up in their half and very deep in our half.” While Arsenal kept their high pressing and high intensity attacking style when on the break and in possession, they were disciplined to get back and often stay in their half during the periods when City were dominant. For once, Arsenal deployed that plan B counter-attacking football which pundits left and right have been telling them to for ages, and lo and behold it worked. The Gunners only had 35% of possession and fewer shots than Manchester City, but were no less exhilarating on attack than usual, and nicked the win away from home at the Etihad.

Coming home with three points that bring them to one point off the top four, it seems that finally Arsenal have learned how to combine pretty football with winning. Santi Cazorla’s performance was textbook, the midfielder scored the crucial opening goal, Francis Coquelin was a brick wall in front of Arsenal’s back four, making ten ball recoveries and eleven clearances, and Aaron Ramsey was a bridge between the two. The nine men Arsenal kept in their defensive third when City was on the ball frustrated their hosts – City had twelve shots throughout the ninety minutes but few from dangerous areas and even fewer clear cut chances. It was both a tactical triumph and one won with grit and steel of Arsenal’s squad.

Manuel Pellegrini’s City was dominant from the opening kick of the match yet ended the first half with only one shot, a goal down. Arsenal had been an organized unit in defense but threatening on the counter; eighteen minutes in with the first shot of the match Olivier Giroud sent Alex Oxlade-Chamberlains’s near post cross wide of the near post on a counter-attack. Neither carved many clear cut chances, however, Arsenal’s silky play was what ended up giving them the lead, as Vincent Kompany clipped Nacho Monreal inside the penalty area after the Spanish full-back got the better of him on the end of a one-two with Giroud. And Arsenal was clinical, as well, with Santi Cazorla’s penalty just curling past Joe Hart’s fingertips.

Not until the second period did the stalemate flow of the match disappear, and even then Arsenal limited City’s chances. Forty-six minutes in Sergio Aguero’s effort from the edge of the box was deflected wide, and Jesus Navas, who found some freedom down the right wing, drilled a shot right at David Ospina on the right side of the box. Fernaninho would then volley over after a chaotic ping-pong match in Arsenal’s penalty area before Laurent Koscielny just managed to tip Navas’ low cross past the lurking feet of Aguero and Stevan Jovetic.

On the opposite end of the pitch, City’s pressure allowed Arsenal more freedom on the break and after Ramsey sliced a fifteen yard effort high and wide the winning goal came. Cazorla delivered a delicious free-kick right into the mixer, where Giroud was left criminally open to flick a header into the bottom left corner. All in all, it was the type of performance from Arsenal which makes one wonder how their 6-0, 5-1, and 5-0 embarrassment at the very same ground not too long ago and inconsistencies always seem to arise. At the end of the season we may well be looking back on this as the result that changed Arsenal’s outlook, or just another one of those mystifying performances that leaves one scratching their head at why Wenger doesn’t use these seemingly obvious tactical choices more often.
Man of the Match: Santi Cazorla

Homepage photo credit: Wikipedia Commons and Ronnie Macdonald

About Alex Morgan

Alex Morgan, founder of Football Every Day, lives and breaths football from the West Coast of the United States in California. Aside from founding Football Every Day in January of 2013, Alex has also launched his own journalism career and hopes to help others do the same with FBED. He covers the San Jose Earthquakes as a beat reporter for QuakesTalk.com and his work has also been featured in the BBC's Match of the Day Magazine.