There is no that Arsenal started the season at a blistering pace, and with just one game a week we were blowing teams away, scoring 13 goals in our first five games.
Then the fixture congestion started along with the Europa League, but we still had another fantastic week in which we beat Tottenham 3-1, Bodo/Glimt 3-0 and Liverpool 3-2 and all three were extremely draining for our first teamers, but the glut of games is not going to let up any time soon.
After the euphoria of beating Liverpool, the games started to get harder to win as fatigue started to set in. We had a tough trip to the cold, wet and windy northern part of Norway and came away with a lucky 1-0 thaanks to rebound off the chest of Bukayo Saka.
Then came Leeds and although we took the lead, we were thoroughly struggling to hang on in the face of an onslaught from the hosts in the second half. Again, against PSV Arteta didn’t make so many changes and again we scraped through 1-0.
But our luck finally run out at Southampton, and after going into a 1-0 lead again, we just couldn’t keep the Saints out and we dropped our first points in 9 games.
Gabriel Jesus was not happy after the game and says we need to return to our previous levels quickly. “It feels like we lost the game – because of the way we played, the way we created a lot, in the first half more than in the second,” Jesus told Arsenal.com. “In the second, we dropped a level again.
“It was a little bit similar to what happened against Leeds. We have to realise that, be smart and see what we are doing wrong, and then improve.
“We have to improve and try to come back at the same level at which we started the season, as a team and individuals. [We’ll] work hard and then come back stronger.
“There’s no excuses. We have some days to prepare, to work on what we have to do on the pitch. Obviously there are some players who need more time to recover, but like I said, it’s all about focusing on the pitch.
“We are creating chances, like in the last game. But the balls aren’t going in the net, and today that happened again. Now is the time to realise, breathe and try to come back.”
So, just like the last few seasons, our problems are again coming because of our strikers failing to hit the target, and this must be rectified quickly if we are going to sustain our title challenge. We should get a few more chances against Forest this coming weekend, but only if we rest our first team players on Thursday…..
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