There haven’t been many positives from the Arsenal versus Brighton draw. The Seagulls, with the “assistance of the referees”, have now denied us wins both home and away.
A controversial Declan Rice red card at the Emirates Stadium last August saw Brighton take advantage of their numbers to force a 1-1 draw.
On Saturday night, without Bukayo Saka, Martin Odegaard, Jurrien Timber, Ben White, and Kai Havertz in the starting lineup against Brighton, we just needed a 1-0 win to call it a day. Unfortunately, Anthony Taylor had other plans. He awarded the Fabian Hurzeler-led side a controversial penalty, penalising William Saliba for his head collision with Joao Pedro. Pedro went on to convert the penalty, forcing the game to end in a 1-1 draw.
Poor refereeing and dropping 2 points made for a frustrating weekend. Were there any positives from that Brighton game? Personally, I felt Riccardo Calafiori’s performance was a positive.
Starting his second consecutive game after returning from injury, the Italian recruit showed his class.
There was much to complain about, but Calafiori’s performance is something to appreciate.
Against Brighton, he had:
– 100% aerial duels won
– 100% dribbles completed
– 100% long ball accuracy
– 95% pass accuracy
– 5 ground duels won
– 3 interceptions
– 2 tackles
– 0 times dribbled past
Only 22 years old, the Italian’s performances can only make us look forward to what he’ll offer once he fully settles in with so much promise.
Not long ago, some of us were worried that Myles Lewis Skelly was slowly making the left-back position his own, but with Calafiori rising to the occasion like he did yesterday, we can only sit back, relax, and enjoy the battle for the LB spot—a position that not long ago was a point of weakness.
Calafiori was my positive against Brighton. What was your positive from that match?
Daniel O
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Always forget how young he is tbf.
Same.
Calafiori was indeed one of our better players against Brighton and given that he is first and foremost a centre back, defensively he makes us more secure at the back.The trouble is most successful Clubs look for their full backs to be productive going forward, and, not surprisingly, it’s not easy for a strapping centre back to suddenly become effective in an attacking sense.
Arteta himself needed more information on the qualities of players that suit certain roles in his Artetaball system.
He has really suffered for using the wrong players in these 5 main roles
1 – wingers
2 – CDMs
3 – fullbacks
4 – CF
5 – CB
Arteta is holding on for too long using Trossard as a winger, worst still he brought in Sterling who has lost his solidity and concreteness to be effective on the wings??!! When he could have gotten archetypical Artetaball wingers like Adama Traore, Semenyo, Wissa, Bueno etc. Let’s hope that Ethan Nwaneri, Max Dowman, and Osman Kamara from our academy can really step up this time so that the winger development minutes in the first team are not wasted on the wrong youth players.
It has been difficult seeing Arteta anchoring Arsenal midfield base with Jorginho. Thank God he eventually got Rice as both cover and partner for Partey. There are enough proper central defenders in the academy who can step in at CDM as defensive occupiers with a high level of steeze. These include Heaven, Monlouis, Sweet, Kaccuri, Clarke, Salmon, Chapman, Shuaib, Ibrahim, Onyeka, Kuczynski, Ogunnaike and even trialist Lennon.
At fullbacks, we have seen Zinchenko’s defensive frailties a lot despite his outstanding ball playing qualities. Just like Skelly, Timbre and Tierney, he (Zinchenko) is clearly not tall enough as a typical Artetaball fullback. So, with prolonged injuries to the likes of White, Tomiyasu, and Calafiori, it is expected that Kiwior will get more game time at fullback and then Arteta would promote more defensive occupiers from the academy to provide the much needed cover. Tierney and Timbre are better as wide men than fullbacks in the Artetaball system, while Skelly is not a 3 nor 6, he is destined to be an 8 where he can regularly go deep and take the ball out into the final third.
The only CF in this team is Havertz, and the closest we’ve got to him is Merino. The team needs at least 1 more target man physical playmaker big CF. We can then give opportunities to the academy likes of Annous, Copley, Casey, and Khayon.
It’s a shame that for 3 seasons in a row, we do not have a proper like for like backup for Saliba and Magalhaes. Any injury to Saliba will turn this team into a bang average team! We do not have any cover who can dominate opposition lead attackers like Saliba and Magalhaes. As a matter of urgency, we need at least one more CB cover in the mould of Saliba. The guy shouldn’t be less than 190cm, must be very fast and technical.
Arteta has a lot of Wenger syndromes in him including packing the squad unnecessarily with lots of playmakers causing the team to be desperately short in other departments. Odegaard, Trossard, Ethan, Jorginho, Sterling, Lewis-Skelly, and Zinchenko are too much! Esp that only one of them or max of 2, can start per time! We need to decongest this department and use the space to bring in proper Artetaball wingers like Adama Traore, Semenyo Wissa Bueno. If not, we can call Nelson and Marquinhos back from loan. Also, Tierney and Timbre can be trusted to play as wingers in slightly different ways because of their more defensive capabilities, asking them different questions.
So, there’s no panic buying, all we need are covers for CF Havertz, RW Saka, DM Partey, CB Saliba.
CBs – Saliba, Magalhaes (“cover needed”, “cover needed”)
RB – White (Tomiyasu; Kacurri, Clarke, Salmon)
LB – Calafiori (Kiwior; Chapman, Ogunnaike, Lennon)
DMs – Partey, Rice (Merino*, “cover needed”; Monlouis, Sweet, Onyeka, Kuczynski, Ibrahim, Shuaib, Heaven)
AM – Odegaard (Jorginho; Ethan and Skelly, Trossard, Zinchenko, Sterling)
WF – Saka, Martinelli (Jesus, “cover needed”, Timbre, Tierney, Marquinhos*, Nelson*)
CF – Havertz (Merino*; “cover needed”, Annous, Copley, Casey, Khayon)
Certainly, Calafiori played well, but overall Arsenal need to improve and improvise in their games to stand any chance of winning the PL title. Also, we need to sign 1/2 key players this winter window to strengthen the squad.
Hope Pedro’s ok after the gun shot incident in the Arsenal box..lol
Although I see the need for versatility in player’s at times during a long season, I still maintain that we would get more consistent performances with players playing in their preferred positions.
I don’t care how good some of these versatile player’s are, even most of them if you asked them would admit to having a preferred position.
Calafiori may well offer us something defensively, but when playing left back he offers very little going forward, adding to the lack of success down our left wing all season.
Although he’s going by the looks of thing’s, its so frustrating to see Tierney being constantly ignored. I f nothing else, we would have better balance down the left side. That coupled with his overlapping runs, would surely benefit our attacking play down the left also. (But sadly, this is wishful thinking on my part🤦♂️🙄).
Calafiori even did a couple of overlaps, which wasn’t so difficult due to Trossards positioning, but I think he might be a success.