Arsenal must be weary of Bournemouth’s high intensity pressing today.
After a two week international break, club football returns to the excitement of fans around the world, Arsenal resume their football with a deceptively trickish journey to the south coast this evening to take on Bournemouth at the Vitality stadium. The Cherries are ten places below the Gunners, however they will still pose a threat and we must be at our very best without any complacency to get a win.
With the top 2 of Manchester City and Liverpool not playing till tomorrow then a win will see us climb to the summit at least for 24 hours, which I’m confident we can absolutely do. One of the reasons why we have been this good recently is that we’ve been a team that can adapt and vary it’s approach to certain games, maximizing our chances of winning in the process. On the south coast today we must do exactly that against one of the most tireless working teams in the Premier League.
They’re certainly no push overs however their high risk, high reward approach to games has seen them drop unnecessary points this season however we should not be mistaken, they’ll absolutely put us to the test today. Their running stats are among the best in the league with Iraola’s persistence on attacking at high speed leading to an often chaotic, end to end matchup between their opponents, which has certainly become an asset to them after initially starting off horrendously.
Just to get an idea of how good their running stats are, they rank:
1st for distance covered(782km)
3rd for sprints(1185)
2nd for high turnovers(75)
&
1st for shots from high turnovers(18)
Looking at that we should be wary of conceding a freak goal from a high turnover and our fitness levels must be in peak condition if we’re going get over them, but at the same time we can easily take advantage of their high pressing by drawing them in and absolutely ripping them to shreds by exploiting large spaces they often leave behind.
We struggled against a similarly high intensity pressing side recently in our very first UCL game of the season against Atalanta but this is a completely different game to a Champions League tie under the lights.
Like I said above, this encounter will be a tricky one today, but I have confidence in our ability to win pretty comfortably. How confident are you all today?
KENNETH BENJAMIN.
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I think this is likely to be a much tougher test for us than the game against their costal neighbours Southampton recently (although even that wasn’t won until extra time). I’ve got Arsenal down to win but in probably a close game.
This game is going to be played like a Thrash Metal song in the opening half hour. We need a two goal cushion early so we can control the tempo when we have the ball. Fancy Rice scoring early or a cheeky goal for Gabriel from a corner to settle us down. Come on Arsenal! 💪 ❤️🤍