Arteta cut a frustrated figure in the post-match conference after watching Arsenal hold on for a point at Brighton, and he wasn’t very happy with the teams ability to take control from the Seagulls and try and get into scoring positions.
But the fact is that our defence managed their third clean sheet in the last four games, so they deserved some praise for keeping out a very persistent Brighton forward line. He was asked if our improvement defensively was due to Aaron Ramsdale taking over between the sticks. “I don’t know.” he told Arsenal.com. “The way we decided to recruit Aaron was [after] going through a big process where we wanted to know a lot about his personality, his character, the way he can handle playing under pressure at a big club.
“He is showing he is ready to do that and I’m really happy with his performances and what he is bringing. That’s one of the reasons I think defensively we have been really difficult to concede goals.
That same run of clean sheets came about with the partnership of Ben White and Gabriel in front of Ramsdale as well, and Arteta could only praise the new partnership. “Yeah [I’m impressed] because they’ve never played together and because they have struggled a little bit with the language and they didn’t have any time to work together in pre-season either. They’re getting a really good connection, good chemistry, and I think their qualities match and complement each other really, really well. I think both of them today were terrific.”
I know that Arsenal fans will be severely disappointed by yesterday’s performance by the team as a whole, but it looks like Arteta has found the correct pieces for his defensive iogsaw, and as a favourite football saying goes “If you don’t concede, you have more chance of winning”.
That seems to be Arsenal’s mantra at the moment…
Nope not disappointed not in the slightest..
I am in fact rejoicing after a hard earned point at a Brighton who started the day second on the log and were outright favourite to win.
The Gulls were also at home in a game played in awful conditions disadvantaging Arsenal.
I am confident we will achieve our targets.
1. Evolve this young squad.
2. Purge the deadwood.
3. Get 7th by Xmas.
4. Get 5th/6th by May.
COYG
PS.
Re the terrible conditions.
Every PL ground should be roofed.
When our team was announced prior to kick off, very few fans disagreed with the selection.I did not respond as I would not have played either Odegaard nor Auba because of the very heavy pitch and the system deployed by Brighton.Apart from Man City and Liverpool the best way to combat Brighton and others who use a defensive back three system, is to match up that set up.I would do the same when we face Chelsea.I would have played AMN at RWB and Laca at CF.The conditions did not suit a ball player like Odegaard who lacks strength and pace, and basically I much prefer Laca to Auba on a heavy pitch where the latter’s pace is nullified.Against Brighton, every attempt should be made to isolate Duffy who was useless in the Scottish Premier League last season..He cannot cope with any forward who runs at him, but ,sadly , yesterday he was never exposed.Rather than bemoan the loss of two points and berate Arteta, I would hope he and his team analyses where it went wrong and how to go about rectifying matters in future matches against sides which adopt the Brighton system.