Arsenal rescue a point against Man City thanks to late Martinelli strike
After falling behind early, Arsenal bounced back in the dying stages to rescue what could prove to be one of their most crucial points of the season. A 1-1 draw with Manchester City at a pulsating Emirates Stadium was sealed by a late goal from Gabriel Martinelli.
William Saliba returned to the side after going off injured against Liverpool before the international break. The first half was, as some would say, a display of “same old Arsenal” – dominating possession and creating chances but still finding themselves a goal down at the break.
Arsenal’s summer signing Noni Madueke, fresh from scoring his first England goal during the break, was one of Arsenal’s brightest sparks throughout the opening 45 minutes.
The second half saw Arsenal finally find their rhythm. Martinelli rescued a draw after relentless pressure late on, but not before a string of half-chances for the Gunners. Eberechi Eze forced Donnarumma into a save and assisted Martinelli’s goal and he looked much more at home in the centre of the pitch.
Arsenal 1-1 Man City: Match Report
Round-up and verdict
Arsenal ended with more than double City’s shots (12 to 6), although both sides registered three on target. Madueke was lively once again, following on from strong showings against Nottingham Forest and Liverpool. His direct running and willingness to take on defenders caused problems, even if the end product was not always there.
Gyökeres, however, endured a frustrating afternoon. He worked tirelessly off the ball but struggled to make his presence count in the box. As Mikel Arteta has admitted, Arsenal must provide him with better service, while the striker himself needs to sharpen his hold-up play.
Even though it is only five games into the Premier League season, Arsenal will be relieved to have avoided a second defeat after already losing 1-0 to Liverpool. That setback had prompted criticism that the Gunners were “sitting back,” but here they were far more proactive, caught only by Haaland’s early strike.
This was another proud display against City, though not as emphatic as last season’s memorable 5-1 win at the Emirates. Ultimately, Martinelli’s late equaliser made sure Arsenal came away with a point, and as the saying goes: “a point is better than no point.”
Your thoughts welcome in the comments.
Liam Harding
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Imagine what Iraola or some other talented young manager could do with this excellent squad of players.
Not play like we did yesterday…
In the cool light of the day after,i have to say that i thought we were superior to Man City a view that was shared by Pep in a post match interview on TV.That said there is room for improvement in terms of speeding up our build up play and our running off the ball particularly in the final third where we simply must interchange more often to create spaces.Apart from Gabriel being sucked into a no go area as far as a CB is concerned which led to the City goal, our back four was rock solid and in front of them Zubimendi and Rice were more than a match with their opposite numbers with Foden and Silva being largely annonymous.Much has been said about the absence of a recognised AM until Eze was introduced, yet the much vaunted Newcastle midfield trio consists of 3 box to box operators?I suspect Arteta will not repeat his tactical error in future as we now have 3 players who are natural attacking midfielder s in Odegaard, Eze abd Nwaneri not forgetting Havertz who played as a number 10 in Germany.There may be times when it might be appropriate to manage out a win in the latter stages of a match , but by and large one AM is a must.Despite dropping 2 points i am not despondent with our performance nor our ability to run Liverpool very close this season, a Liver pool which has been far from convincing in the matches i have seen, but a Liverpool which has enjoyed the rub of the green thus far.The Port Vale match will be an opportunity to give our “bench” players an outing and i look forward to seeing Hincapie in particular.
Gabriel shouldn’t have been sucked in I agree but watch the 10 seconds prior to that, our midfield completely failed to deal with the situation which resulted in him trying to get tighter.
Our severe lack of pace in the midfield meant they couldn’t assist with the recovery
👍 Fine comment Grandad. Thanks for the knowledgeable and intelligent analysis and what I consider to be a reasonable perspective. MA must do better and imo stop thinking so much like the defensive midfielder he once was.
Sorry, but this is a lot of MMQB analysis. Could you guarantee that if those players that have been highlighted had started MC couldn’t have countered in the way they did?
Even with a lot of attacking players in the second half Arsenal struggled to break down the low block until that late brilliant move.
Of course they struggled.
When you have ten outfield players behind the ball, intent on defending a lead, every team will struggle.
This is Pep’s city we’re talking about and we forced them to defend, something Pep swore he would never do!!
Even Haaland was sacrificed to defend the lead!
You ask if we could say things would have been different if certain named players were changed… well, once again, Arteta’s subs proved decisive and, in particular, Martinelli, who Grandad didn’t mention.
So maybe you play creative players to break them down ?
Oops, I said MA must do better, sorry for triggering you. It is quite good MMQB analysis and imo you should learn from it in this case. Let’s see, we won the second half 1-0 with players who were not on the pitch in the first half combining for the brilliant move. There are no guarantees on anything but that’s not a good excuse for turning a blind eye to any analysis of what actually ended up happening. Everything isn’t all one sided with respect to management or anything else.
My point is that the claim that it was an initial tactical error is based on hindsight bias. We have no idea how the game would have played out if those players highlighted by Grandad had started.
What is evident is how both managers adjusted their personnel and tactics as the game evolved. Making tactical adjustments and personnel changes is normally considered a sign of good in-game management.
For the game at Port Vale we have to utilize the whole bench, as I think we have good squad to compete at the Cups.
Kepa
White-Mosquera-Hincapie-L.Skelly
Nwaneri-Norgaard-Merino
Dowman-Giokeris-Trossard
And will have a fresh team for Newcastle.
Only change mate maybe Martinelli instead of Gyokeres?
Him or Trossard in the middle and Eze instead of Dowman