Archive for January 25th, 2010

Stoke 3 – 1 Arsenal: Sol’s back but the problems are the same

Add comment January 25th, 2010



Stoke City 3 – 1 Arsenal (Fuller 2, 78, Denilson 41, Whitehead 86)
Highlights | Arsene’s reaction

Arsenal are out of the FA Cup.  For some reason, it doesn’t hurt as much as you might expect.  Perhaps it’s because we still have a fighting chance in the league and in Europe.  Perhaps it’s because from the moment this draw was made it looked a difficult tie.  Perhaps it’s because we picked a line-up which, Fabregas apart, was a collection of players either too old or too young to cope with an athletic Stoke side.  Or perhaps it’s because we simply didn’t play very well.  There was no injustice: no refereeing mistake or unforeseeable injury.  We didn’t play well, and we got beat.  Football is wonderfully simple sometimes.

The line-up was an attempt at rotation, but our squad is so struck by injuries that when it rotates all that you see on other side is a gaping hole.  Lukasz Fabianski played in goal in front of a makeshift back-four of Traore, Silvestre, Campbell and Francis Coquelin – by trade a holding midfielder.  The midfield trio looked stronger, with Fabregas and Denilson supported by Craig Eastmond, who has emerged from nowhere to become a fairly regular member of the first-team squad.  Upfront our lack of options was clear – with Rosicky, Eduardo and Arshavin all on the bench, Walcott and Vela were joined by debutant Jay Emmanuel-Thomas – like Coquelin, a midfielder playing out of position.

Our start to the game was almost comic in its predictability.  Rory Delap’s first opportunity to hurl the ball in to the area came after just sixty seconds.  When he did so, Fabianski was static and Ricardo Fuller nipped in ahead of him to nod the ball in to the net.  One minute in, and we were one down.  Stoke’s confidence was sky-high, and ours was rattled.  That set the pattern for the rest of the game.

We never really got in to our stride. Even our equaliser, five minutes before the break, was not the result of a clear-cut opportunity but a deflection, with Denilson’s strike wrong-footing former Arsenal target Thomas Sorenson.  In the second half Arsene gambled by throwing Ramsey, Eduardo and Arshavin in to the fray, but just as we seemed to be taking control of the game Stoke scored what would prove to be their crucial second goal.  Mamady Sidibe got past a tired-looking Denilson on the right to loft in a perfect cross towards Fuller, who calmly nodded home his second.  Arsenal conspired to concede a calamitous third, with Armand Traore leaving Dean Whitehead completely free to tap-in.  It could have been worse: we were only spared a humiliating fourth by an offside flag.

As stated above, it was a poor performance.  Lukasz Fabianski’s inability to deal with crosses was so reminiscent of Manuel Almunia that I found myself wondering about the quality of goalkeeping coaching at the club – didn’t Gerry Peyton go on some sort of leave, hence the arrival of Mart Poom?  The signing on a long-term deal of Vito Mannone hasn’t made me feel any more secure about this area of our squad.

The defence was all over the place at times, but what can you expect from four players just thrown together for a one-off game?  What’s most worrying is that the mistakes we make seem to be the same whoever plays – they’re not due to personnel, but lack of organisation.  One bonus was Sol Campbell, who came through his first 90 minutes in nine months rather well.  He was powerful in the air and solid on the ground, and looks like a viable (perhaps even preferable) alternative to Silvestre or the departing Philippe Senderos.

Midfield did OK, with Cesc doing his best to win the game single-handedly and Denilson netting his third goal in five games, but we really struggled upfront.  Emmanuel-Thomas showed strength and awareness but is no striker, whilst Walcott and Vela continued their poor form.  It was a point made by the commentators yesterday, but the former really does look miles away from the World Cup.

I like the FA Cup an awful lot.  It’s a great competition.  But the fact that three of the ‘Big Four’ are already out says more about the priorities of those clubs than it does about the “magic of the cup”.  If we can get through the next four games in the league and still be strongly in contention, yesterday’s defeat will be forgotten.


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