Arsenal 2-1 Everton: Everton cope with Arsenal’s plan A, but not their plan B
The starting line-ups
A very interesting game that Arsene Wenger managed to turn around with a second half change in formation.
Arsene Wenger was without Samir Nasri, and chose Tomas Rosicky rather than Andrei Arshavin on the left. The rest of the side was as expected.
David Moyes made no changes from the side that drew with Chelsea at the weekend.
The opening to the game was as expected – Arsenal dominated possession and territory, but their passing was sloppy when they got into the final third of the pitch, and they frequently gave the ball away before putting the Everton defence under any pressure.
In fact, they struggled to create chances throughout the first half, as Everton played compact (from back to front) and narrow (from left to right) and made it difficult for Arsenal to play through them. This, combined with the strong physical presence of Marouane Fellaini and Jack Rodwell in the centre, meant Arsenal’s passing game suffered. Mikel Arteta gave the best passing performance of the first half.
Everton cut off balls out wide
Everton’s strategy for nullifying Arsenal’s wingers was particularly interesting (see diagram below). The two Everton wide midfielders, Seamus Coleman and Diniyar Bilyaletdinov, dropped deep and let Arsenal’s full-backs have the ball, instead focusing upon cutting off the passing angle from Arsenal’s central midfielders (Alex Song and Jack Wilshere) to their wide men (Theo Walcott and Rosicky). This meant Arsenal frequently looked indecisive when they had the ball in the centre of the pitch, and often knocked passes out to the full-backs in non-threatening positions.
Everton's wingers cut off balls from Arsenal's central midfielders to their wingers, and left the Arsenal full-backs free
When this pattern became established after 20 minutes or so, Rosicky and Walcott found themselves having to adjust their position to try and pick up the ball. There were only two real options, either a run inside (a) – which played into Everton’s hands because it meant their narrow shape prevented purposeful attacks, or a move into a deeper position (b) – which obviously resulted in Walcott and Rosicky picking the ball up a long way from goal.
Everton were effectively using two players to marshal Arsenal’s wide players, and therefore the full-backs had an onus to become involved in attacking play as they saw so much of the ball – for example, down Arsenal’s right (where, as in the previous meeting between these two sides, they focused their passing) Bacary Sagna played twice as many passes as Walcott (see Chalkboards below).
Moyes switched Arteta and Rodwell midway through the first half, and this worked well as Rodwell outpaced Fabregas to a through ball. Everton played mainly on the counter-attack, and went ahead after a quick break, through Louis Saha’s controversial goal.
Second half
For the second period, Moyes asked Rodwell to man-mark Fabregas. Rodwell stuck to the Spaniard more tightly than you’ll see in any Premier League game this season, and the use of Arteta ahead meant that when Rodwell followed Fabregas into deep positions, Arteta could drop in to cover any forward runs from Wilshere or Abou Diaby, who had replaced Song at half time. Fabregas’ technical ability meant that Arsenal could still play him the ball in tight situations and he’d be able to find a sideways pass, but Rodwell’s presence meant he never had time to look up, nor space to play a forward pass. With Arsenal’s wingers nullified as outlined above, and Fabregas tightly man-marked, Arsenal lacked creativity and didn’t look like getting back in the game.
Wenger replaced Wilshere with Bendtner and moved Fabregas deeper
Wenger replaced Rosicky with Arshavin in a straight swap, but the key move came on 69 minutes, when Wilshere departed and Nicklas Bendtner came on to play upfront, with van Persie dropping slightly deeper. The key change here, however, was that Fabregas was forced to play alongside Diaby as one of the deeper midfielders.
Interestingly, as the change was made, Arteta, Fellaini and Rodwell had a conversation in the centre of the pitch about how they were going to adjust (presumably, who would be picking up Fabregas) – but whatever conclusion they came to, it didn’t work – within two minutes Fabregas had space for the first time in the second half, and chipped the ball over the defence for Arshavin to score.
The second goal came soon after – Laurent Koscielny’s header from Robin van Persie’s inswinging corner (very similar to the goal Everton scored against Chelsea last weekend) – and then Arsenal had to sit back and defend. Having gone to an attack-minded system and used all three substitutes, they didn’t look entirely comfortable with Fabregas and Diaby screening the back four, but held out. Moyes replaced Coleman with Victor Anichebe and (slightly strangely) Phil Neville with Phil Jagielka, but only threatened from a lone set piece late on.
Conclusion
Change in formation on 69 minutes, first goal on 70 minutes, second goal on 75 minutes. The first goal certainly wouldn’t have happened had Wenger not made that substitution, the second goal was more a case of momentum (and bad defending), but credit must be given to Wenger for the brave substitution which resulted in Fabregas finding more room.
Until then, Moyes’ gameplan had worked very well. His plan to deal with Arsenal’s initial shape was spot on, but he didn’t adapt to Arsenal’s change quickly enough. The Arteta-Rodwell-Fellaini conversation suggests it was left to them to sort things out, but just two minutes without clear instructions ended up costing Everton.
Chalkboards
Everton’s narrow defending – all interceptions in the centre of the pitch
Sagna seeing much more of the ball than Walcott – 63 passes attempted compared to 31
Arsenal 2-1 Everton: Everton cope with Arsenal’s plan A, but not their plan B
In the first half, Everton were stronger in central midfield. Song couldn’t handle with Fellaini. In the second half, Arsenal players had much more space in the midfield which led to an improvement in offense. Arsenal players were more dangerous in the area between half-line and the box. Everton eliminated wing players almost excellently, Rosicky and Walcott were completely covered. But then Arshavin came on the pitch…
Interesting how well Everton’s original strategy worked according to your description (I didn’t see the match).
I would think that giving the full backs all the time and space they like would be suicidal against a lot of teams of Arsenal’s standard. Do you reckon this means that Moyes considers Arsenal’s full backs attacking abilities a relative weakness?
If he does think that, he’s probably right. Clichy and Sagna both tend to get into good positions, but often seem to deliver pretty bad balls. I think an opposition defence would be much happier letting this happen than allowing the likes of Rosicky, Walcott, Nasri, Arshavin the same kind of space.
Clichy does seem reluctant at times to really push on. Which does seem to hamper Arsenal’s width.
Probably because Clichy’s final ball is absolutely terrible. But his reluctance to attack does actually bring a bit of balance to the side; Sagna (or Eboue) is much more attack-minded on the right. If Clichy did the same, it would leave the defence more exposed. Particularly because he normally has Arshavin on the left wing, who is not renowned for his tracking back.
I beg to differ – if you’ve watched Arsenal play a lot this season you’ll know that Sagna’s delivery is vastly improved, as is his shooting (with two very well taken goals). Even Clichy has improved his delivey though not to the same degree.
Clichy just needs to work on his shooting — or lack of it.
Yes, it has improved (particularly Sagna) but I still think opposing teams are happier to give them a bit of space and concentrate on stopping Nasri etc. If the full backs make the most of this then they can catch teams out, like you say Sagna has already popped up with a couple of goals, rare before this season.
Clichy’s one on one with Howard near the end of the game supports that conclusion from Moyes (if he made it)
Perhaps. I was surprised they didn’t get forward more, to be honest.
While he didn’t get forward much, Clichy was given the space to run through for a brilliant one on one situation with Howard (which he muffed), as well as having acres of space for his shot from the center of the pitch.
A lot of Arsenal blogs were suggesting this may have been Clichy’s best performance of the season.
Could you point us Gooners to those blogs please?
it’s a matter of relativity – in a 2 v 1 you’d rather cover Nasri and let Sagna beat you. This season Sagna has been doing well, and for Arsenal to succeed he will need to continue, while Clichy needs to step it up.
Great write up. Spot on about that sub changing the game and Wenger deserves credit for it, he is sometimes seen as a bit naive when it comes to tactics and using subs but this was an example of him doing it well. The ability to change things round like that also comes from the fact that Arsenal now have a pretty good set of options when it comes to attacking players, including a bit of variation in types of player.
It did seem like Fabregas was having a quiet game, especially in second half but I hadn’t really put it down to Rodwell’s man marking job before reading this. Interesting tactic from Moyes and one we don’t see very often in the premier league. Do you think there might be a bit of a trend coming? (I’m sure there are a few other recent examples e.g. Essien on Messi in champs league)
The problem is I’m not sure if the change was a deliberate tactic or just Wenger introducing another striker and adapting the shape to it.
haha! It worked though, that’s the imporant thing. I say let’s give him the benefit of the doubt…
Taking off one of two holding midfielders to bring on a centre-forward when you’re 1-0 down against inferior opposition is not exactly ground-breaking. Wenger should get credit for doing what any coach worth his salt would’ve done. As for Wenger being “a bit naive when it comes to tactics and using subs”, I don’t think a home win over Everton is the bar by which he is to be measured, especially if Barca skip pass them in the Champions League again.
Sunderland have also used this the tactic of man-marking Fabregas previous matches
I can’t see it being a trend myself, but it worked well here for 20 mins or so
Fabregas did very much the same thing in the FA Cup game at the weekend when he couldn’t get time on the ball from his normal position. Picking up the ball from deep and firing long passes. I put it down to his problem solving ability but it may well be a deliberate tactic by Wenger. Not a bad solution when facing a deep narrow defence. I had no idea Fabregas could play a Regista role so well.
I definately see Fabre3gas as a future regista, he’s got an extraordinary sense for space and timing and has vastly improved his long range passing. Look at the goals against Wigan, and you’ll see some really slick passes. A regista position seems to suit him very well, sinces he’s not very fast and seems to disappear when man marked.
As Song gets better in the attack and Wilshere gets better in defense, I think we could see a triple pivot coming together very nicely for Arsenal. Fabregas can float around the midfield and find space while Wilshere and Song fill up the other space.
Also, what has happened to Chamakh? He was brilliant in the first part of the season but now seems to be the third choice forward? Will he get back on form? I hope so, he was tremendously effective.
He needed a break as he was tired after all the games he was put through, and then RvP took his place. Bentner’s talking may have got him the second spot in our strikers line up.
Borja Valero, a similar type of player to Cesc, plays alongside the holding midfielder for Villarreal; they don’t look quite as defensively solid as when they have Senna sitting alongside the defensive mid, but it does make the side wonderfully fluid.
Cesc in a deeper role can work, especially since he seems to have toughened up a bit in the last couple of years. But also because for a player playing as an advanced midfielder, his shooting is quite woeful. He scores goals only because he gets so many chances. Compare to Lampard or Gerrard for example; while Cesc is still a better player, he finishing is considerably worse.
What was your interpretation of Saha’s goal, ZM? Even after re-reading the Laws I’m still uncertain whether the referee and linesman got it right or wrong!
The offside laws make no mention of a ball touching a defender (pass or deflection) leading to any reset of the offside situation. Technically, the defenders can pass the ball around their defence for 10mins but when if an attacking player was offside when played by a teammate interferes with play then it’s offside.
Law 11 – Offside
It is not an offence in itself to be in an offside position.
A player is in an offside position if:
• he is nearer to his opponents’ goal line than both the ball and the
second-last opponent
A player is not in an offside position if:
• he is in his own half of the fi eld of play or
• he is level with the second-last opponent or
• he is level with the last two opponents
No mention of a defender touching the ball.
When the ball is last played by the ATTACKER (only).
Interesting how reverting to a modified 4-4-2 worked so well.
It wasn’t a 4-4-2: More like a 4-2-4, or maybe a 4-2-3-1, since Walcott and Arshavin (both forwards) were playing high up the pitch as outside-forwards.
Arsenal created some reasonable chances in the first half and it was a lack of sharpness in front of goal that meant they went in 1-0 down at half-time. Everton’s robust approach (aided by some dubious refereeing) nullified Arsenal for about the first 20 minutes in the first half but after that Arsenal’s movement was creating space for the team to play.
The arrival of Bendtner added a physical presence to the Arsenal front-line. By pressing high up the pitch, Everton were forcing Arsenal to kick long from the keeper most of which ended on Fellaini’s head as he moved laterally in front of his own defence.
Everton knows Arsenal so well.
side midfield sit back and let arsenal’s wing back have the ball.
This really works coz of Clichy is so poor on crossing.
Sagna is a bit better but apparently V.persie is not gd enough to win header under 2 big CB….
Of course, that rather backfired in the game at Goodison, when they let Sagna have the ball in the penalty area and he smashed it into the top corner.
Still, no-one expected that!
I thought it a fabulous game last night, and I think both sides deserve much credit. Everton for stifling Arsenal so effectively and Arsenal for persevering and managing to win the match (without opening themselves up to the counter attack).
In fact I was quite shocked that the Guardian’s match report seemed quite so dismissive of the match!
I’m not sure to what degree Arsenal changed formation, rather than mere personnel. Pretty difficult to tell bearing in mind how quickly the equaliser followed the change. But RVP looked to me to have dropped extremely deep. Either way, as you say, Fabregas was freed up for the first time in the half, and thereafter it was a different game.
ZM, isn’t Arsene’s tactic reminiscent to last’s years Guardiola’s tactic? The use of two deep midfielders (one creator, one defender) and using 4 guys at front?
I’m not saying that Arsene copied the same tactic but it’s interesting the similarities. But i guess it’s an effective one against a tight defense.
Yes, very interesting comparison. Imagine if they both play that way in two weeks’ time!
playing two exposed holders against Barcelona is suicidal (see Barca 5, Real Madrid 0). Xavi would simply push forward, create a triangle with Messi and Iniesta, and Barca would park themselves in Arsenal’s third, all the while threatening a Messi/Iniesta/Xavi through ball between the full backs and center backs.
In the absence of Alves however, the strategy of cutting off Barca’s wide attackers might have some merit (doing what Everton did to Arsenal). Hypothetically, a deep and narrow 4-4-1-1 would contain and isolate Messi in the center, and Barca would struggle to break down the opposition. The 1st Law of Playing Barca is, Messi + passing options = game over.
“Hypothetically, a deep and narrow 4-4-1-1 would…..”. Hypothetically? Did you not see Inter, Hercules, Athletic Bilbao at home, Athletic Bilbao away..? Is it still up for debate that Barca struggle against a deep and narrow team no matter how inferior? In addition, I think creating “Laws of Playing Barca” based on their procession through the Primera is a bit of a waste of your time. Real Madrid are twice as good as any team below them and have not progressed passed the fourth round of the Champions League since Messi was in short trousers.
I don’t think there is a team in the universe that doesn’t struggle against a deep and narrow team.
Matt hmm. decent idea but you forgot one thing. Every team tries this and 90 percent fail. The reason why most teams fail is because of 3 things.
1. You need luck(when you defend for 90 mins straight theres a good chance even if you denie barca space they could score of some fluke goal. Then you need to attack and by attking you leave for space to murder you and put 3 past you. Before you know it its 4 nill)
2. You need enormous amounts of stamina and determination. (very few teams on the planet have the amount needed to subdue barca. There are only 2 teams who have had enough to trouble barca. chelsea and inter)
3. You could have 12 men against barca all defending but at the end of the day. Barcelona’s passing patterns have build built and developed for years now. The players know where they are at any moment and time. and Barcalona have the most creative players of our generation. it doesn’t matter how many men you have behind the ball they will 9 times out of ten pass their way through you.
Will you do a preview of the tie? Obviously Barca will be favorites but I’m sure it will be one of the great ties of the year.
Are you referring to what ZM has deemed Barca’s alternative shape?
Great game I just loved when Bendtner game on and signaled to the team with his hands 442
I thought yes this was the direct style he would add to tough home games
ZM, this is all just so fascinating… so Everton’s first half defensive strategy was a good one but also gambled on leaving Arsenal’s wing backs free. In general, what’s a good attacking strategy to exploit that? When you’re already behind by a goal, do you think Arsenal’s approach to the comeback is a good solution for future cases? And what if they’re not down by a goal… is the prospect of conceding a goal from a counterattack too risky in that case?
ZM, thanks for another top-notch game review. I especially like how you diagrammed the defensive strategy of the Everton wide midfielders.
I am wondering what you think about Arsenal pressing. I am a big fan of the pressing strategy, and feel like whenever I see Arsenal actually press they look fantastic, but they too often go about it a bit lethargically, and in that case it’d be better not to do it at all. However, I don’t get to watch many of their games to I can’t really generalize. What’s your perspective?
Pressing is wonderfully effective tactic, if you can pull it of. To do it you need a) stamina b) great teamwork. Arsenal is a top team and England and have the stamina, but the teamwork is missing. Keep in mind that pressing is very difficult against good sides like Everton and highly dangerous if you fail. Arsenal’s recent defensive improve stems from better teamwork in pressing. If you look at Nasri, Walcott and (when he’s on form) Arshavin you will see that they work tirelessly in the defence. Nasri is a very good example, he makes a lot of interception.
This was Arsenal’s second kick-off in about 48 hours, so I think a lack of pressing can be excused. January was a tough month: hopefully we’ll see a return of pressing during February when the fixture congestion eases.
Also keep in mind that the pace of Premier League games is much higher than other European leagues, you’ve got to last the distance of a season without a winter break so you can’t be quite as relentless with pressing strategies.
In fact one could possibly argue that the lack of a winter break (and general fixture congestion) has made pressing strategies harder to pull off over a season and that’s why English football has historically not employed such strategies and stuck to defending deep when out of possession and direct attacks.
This was certainly the case in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s and you only need to watch a handful of Arsenal games to see how teams played high defensive lines but put no pressure on the ball, so upon losing it were faced with a counter-attack involving Anelka, Overmars, Bergkamp, Henry, Pires, Ljungberg and Wiltord giving them no time to drop deep and defend effectively.
The eventual solution to that problem was to defend deep the entire game, a tactic that was certainly influenced with the tweak to the offside law in 2004.
I actually wasn’t talking about this game since I didn’t see it, but Arsenal are pretty deep – what’s the point of having all those players on the bench if they don’t play?
On the other hand, for that kind of rotation to work they’d have to keep guys like Ramsey, Traore, and Vela rather than loan them out.
Thanks as well, ZM. Missed the last 30 minutes of the game for class, so particularly helpful to have your description.
Everton left Saha too isolated in the second half. Every time he got the ball he lost it, as he didn’t have Arteta/Rodwell near him to play off to. Just another example of Moyes’ negativity – especially against the top sides.
Managers have their own style of dealing with things. Some managers choose to have a more
defensive approach(largely influenced by the players they have at their disposal.)
If moyes had arsenal and wengar had everton. Moyes would most likely adapt a more attacking
attitude and wengar would surely take a more defensive approach.
Surprised you didn’t say anything about Arshavin’s positioning–more central, less on the touch line. To me, the decline in his production this season is directly related to him being placed too wide, and hence having to do too much with the ball to get into decent positions. He’s best when he receives the ball slightly wide of the posts (or the side lines of the box).
Great column though–real interesting observations on Wenger’s subs.
Cheers for the analysis ZM – gutted about the result but enjoyed reading that. I thought Everton played a lot deeper 2nd half and our passing was poor in comparison to the first half. Our average pass completion was 70-80% throughout but dropped alarmingly to the 50% marker in the 60-75 minute period when Arsenal got both goals.
Sorry but this review doesn’t make much sense.
Firstly, in the first half RvP got in behind just like Arshavin did in the second. Van Persie was a bit unlucky whereas Arshavin got a bit of luck that the deflection from the defender fell kindly for him. To put the goal down to tactical change and claiming that Arsenal wouldn’t have done it otherwise seems rather silly.
Secondly, Sagna almost always makes twice the passes of Walcott. Theo is not a tippy-tappy player. I don’t see how that is unique to this game. Seems like a lame attempt to make a non-existent point.
Finally, Arsenal won plenty of first headers from corners on both ends of the pitch all through the game. Was it really a surprise that one went in?
The real difference was that in the first half Everton pressed higher up the pitch and Arsenal didn’t move the ball fast enough. In the second half Arsenal’s tempo was much higher and pushed the visitors back a lot more.
The second difference was that Rosicky didn’t move well enough. Arshavin scored after leaving his wing and moving to the middle. Based on your write-up the wide player moving in would be playing right into the opponents’ hands but that’s not the case.
Very disappointing article.
Gooner the dynamic of a winger in a 4-2-3-1 is different from that in a 4-2-4(obviously)
In a 4-2-3-1 the winger would naturally play deeper and than run inside. When they are
running from deep to inside they are playing into the hands of everton. because they are basically running into traffic. Also because the winger is located deeper in the 4-2-3-1
it makes it harder to play them in because the wingers are located in bewteen 2 wide players.
In a 4-2-4 the winger will play right on the defensive line instead of being located deeper. So the winger isnt running from deep into trafic. Hes already on the defensive line. Since wingers in a 4-2-4 are located higher up it makes it easier for your midfielders to thread them in with a nice through ball. Because the 4-2-4 winger is right on the defensive line. he isn’t being occupied by 2 opposition wide players.
I didnt wacth the game but it seems like fabergas threaded arshavin through on goal which is much easier to do when the player is right on the defensive line. than when hes deep. and in bewteen 2 wide players
John,
Thank you for your reply. I appreciate the effort but yours seems like a theoretical response rather than a discussion of what actually happened in this case/game.
Arshavin was not on the defensive line. He made a run from a deepish position. Moreover if it had been a 4-2-4 Arshavin would normally have been on the left but he was in an inside right kind of position. And no, Walcott was not on the left at that time, nor was Van Persie if memory serves me right.
My point is that general statements like “Wide player moving in plays into the oppositions hands” are rather lame. Then to go on and say that Arsenal would never have scored without changes is downright ridiculous. Nasri has scored plenty of goals while making diagonal runs. Arshavin has created a lot of goals and chances by drifting inside. Both of these have come largely in a 4-2-3-1 system.
In this particular game that wasn’t working well because Rosicky wasn’t able to get his movement right and consequently he wasn’t involved as often as possible. The introduction of Arshavin changed a lot of that and was the key to the goal, not the introduction of Bendtner.
Last night, when I saw Bendtner about to come on, and then the board go up with ‘19′ in red, I was sure we were doomed. With three forwards already on the pitch and the match being won and lost in midfield, I thought it was wholly uninspired and desperate on Wenger’s part, and began mentally preparing to start the long, slow, despairing, alcohol-aided descent into another “what could I have been” typical-Arsenal run-in.
Of course, moments later, I was yelling at the top of my lungs (with little regard for the fact that it was 1:00am, as I watched on DVR-delay), and moments after that I was nearly in tears. I knew we had shifted our formation but didn’t fully understand how or why it was so successful until reading this report.
I put our first-half stagnation in midfield down less to a disparity in strength and more to simply being outnumbered. It was essentially 5-on-3 for most of the half, and really more like 5-on-2.5 with Song sticking to his holding role and rarely venturing past the center circle. As a result, Arteta and Fellaini were able to roam about with near-impunity, and quickly shut down Cesc, Jack, or either of the wingers whenever they got a touch. It was incredibly frustrating to watch how on every bit of possession in the first half-hour, three blue shirts would collapse on a red shirt, hurrying its owner into a poor forward pass or a surrendering back pass (the amount of time Djourou and Koscielny spent kicking the ball back and forth was dreadful). And, of course, when Everton picked up the ball, they were able to flood forward, easily blowing past Cesc and Jack to pressure our center-backs, usually again with a numerical advantage as Saha would suddenly pop up (sometimes in front of, sometimes behind the back line…harrumph). To me, shutting down the central midfield and Cesc was a bigger factor in Everton’s dominance than shutting off the wingers, although with even fewer outlets available, we certainly suffered even further.
Wenger made the obvious tactical change at halftime, pulling Rosicky back into a more central location, dropping Robin into a deeper false nine (in fact, Robin basically shared box-to-box duties with Cesc for much of the second half, dropping close to the back line on many occasions in defense), and granting Diaby more freedom to roam up the pitch than Song had. After that, it was evenly matched in the middle, and we had enough added time on the ball to express our technical superiority and take control. Evening out the midfield also directly contributed to the deluge of Everton fouls and cards in the opening passages of the second half, as they started kicking out to try and shut us down. We always looked like we’d score eventually but simply hadn’t managed any penetration by the time Arshavin came on.
Rosicky was rusty and largely ineffective, even in midfield, so the change was welcome, but I was worried Arshavin would linger up top and Everton would regain the advantage in midfield. Thankfully he put in another good shift, playing deeply and actively enough to keep Everton’s midfielders spread out. When that change didn’t bear immediate fruit, though, bringing on Bendtner appeared to be a “throw everything at the wall and see what sticks” solution, and I expected us to start haphazardly flooding the box, leaving ourselves wide open to counterattacks. Of course, as ZM points out, we actually changed our formation (I’m not entirely sure it was to a 4-4-2, as Robin still played fairly deep and definitely behind Bendtner – 4-4-1-1 perhaps), dropping Cesc back far enough that he could start lobbing passes up to our target men and Arshavin and Walcott back into essentially permanent midfield positions.
Of course, when the breakthrough came, to me it looked like half dumb luck and half Cesc-wizardry. That the tactical element behind the switch was indeed so masterful is but icing on the cake. Now, as always, in Arsene we trust.
Klavg, definitely not a 4-4-2 (or 4-4-1-1); no way were Walcott and Arshavin part of a midfield unit… at most they were a 4-2-3-1 (if you include RVP dropping off)but more likely a version of 4-2-4
Do I understand that Liverpool played a three man defence against Stoke?
yeah they did play a very fluid 3-4-2-1 or 5-3-1-1. kenny has shown that he is a good tactician. when he was appointed i thought of him as an old fashioned manager who does not work on formations and tactics much but he seems to have proven me wrong.
Absolutely spot-on as always ZM, your tactical nous amazes me!
Also, a lot of people are saying that Wenger is tactically naive. I don’t think he is, he is, or rather WAS very STUBBORN for the past couple of years. He knows how to change games, he just didn’t want to change HIS style of play. He knows now that a plan B is essential and he showed that he is now willing to use it (an obvious Plan B that everyone knows existed, just wasn’t used)
Excellent write up again ZM, and a good match to watch!
I find it a bit strange though, that you didn’t analyse the Everton substitutions more, since they were quite awfull to be honest. To be fair, Moyes had very limited options on the bench, but bringing on Osman when trying to hold on to a lead, is truly a stange one. Despite his obvious talent, he isn’t exactly hard working, nor accomplished in defending. Also Dinyar was having a decent match in the role he was given. He couldn’t be that tired already at 65mins? Hard to tell.
Neville and Coleman were probably tired when they got subbed, but Everton lost their widht with Moyes subs. Osman drifted into the middle everytime Everton had the ball (Baines was doing a decent job getting forward, though), Anichebe was playing that strange role where he is a nominal striker when in possession, but tracks back the right wing and Jagielka doesn’t really offer any kind of attacking option at the back. This was a very strange move, since Everton’s most threatening attacks came from the wings, or at least started there.
Also Everton were terrible in set-pieces at both ends, which is a strange one, since they have decent aerieal players.
To be fair, I think Bily was absolutely shattered. He looked exhausted when walking off the pitch, so that sub was probably because of that.
I agree on Jagielka though – did mention that at the end – could have brought on Beckford instead.
I am surprised that you could say that Sagna’s delivery is pretty bad. He has had plenty of the crosses which have resulted in Arsenal scoring. As for Clichy may because once he beats his man he tends to run out of ideas and begins passing sideways instead of foraging into the box like when he had only the GK to beat he passed it to the striker in the box in this game.