Football news - Opinion: After tough start Mikel Arteta needs time to try and save Arsenal
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Updated 28/08/2021 at 15:16 GMT
After watching Arsenal get torn apart by Manchester City on Saturday afternoon Mike Gibbons reflects on what has been a disastrous opening few weeks for the Gunners. Yet still perhaps Arteta deserves to be given some more time to try and turn things around with a tough set of opening fixtures and young players still adjusting.
Arteta: 'It's time to reflect and look in the mirror' as Arsenal lose 5-0 to Manchester City
Whether they sign a new striker or not, Manchester City are going to do this to a lot of teams this season; hell, they did it to Norwich City last weekend.
Arsenal were buried today with a nap hand of goals by one of the best teams in Europe, passed into paralysis at the Etihad after being reduced to ten men following Granit Xhaka’s red card after 35 minutes.
With City able to interject Riyad Mahrez and Raheem Sterling into proceedings from the bench in the second half, the only governing factor on the result thereafter was how sadistic a mood the home team were in.
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MANCHESTER, ENGLAND - AUGUST 28: Ferran Torres of Manchester City celebrates after scoring their sides second goal during the Premier League match between Manchester City and Arsenal at Etihad Stadium on August 28, 2021 in Manchester, England.
Image credit: Getty Images
So far, so explicable; yet there were deeply concerning aspects to this afternoon for Arsenal fans beyond the emphatic nature of the result. It was 11 versus 11 for a third of the game, but City effectively swatted Arsenal aside in the first 12 minutes.
The ease with which Ilkay Gundogan and then Ferran Torres walked in unopposed at the back post to apply the first two goals is evidence of something seriously wrong at Arsenal. Although Xhaka’s latest entry to his rap sheet rendered them spectators to a City training session for the best part of an hour, they were already a beaten docket.
Such basic defensive errors and no pressure on the ball in midfield will leave Arsenal open to punishment against opponents with far less resources than City.
In the fledgling 2021-22 season, it already has. A similarly limp defeat to European champions Chelsea last week was preceded by a battering at Brentford on the opening night of the Premier League, as Arteta’s team were outmuscled and outmanoeuvred by Thomas Frank’s side. Arsenal have lost their first three games in a league campaign for the first time since 1954-55, and when Ferran Torres glanced in the fifth in the final minutes at the Etihad they dropped to the very bottom of the Premier League table.
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MANCHESTER, ENGLAND - AUGUST 28: Ferran Torres of Manchester City celebrates after scoring their sides fifth goal during the Premier League match between Manchester City and Arsenal at Etihad Stadium on August 28, 2021 in Manchester, England.
Image credit: Getty Images
It is early in the season of course, but a team that always tops the table at the start of each season due to alphabetical priority has sunk to 20th place with alarming speed.
All of this has been despite an enormous investment in the summer. Arsenal spent a reported £132 million on Ben White, Nuno Tavares, Martin Odegaard, Albert Sambi Lokonga and Aaron Ramsdale, young players intended to bolster a club looking to return to the perch they occupied in the noughties.
With no European football to contest this season and in a world still struggling through the impact of the pandemic, it’s an eye-watering outlay. Like all major football clubs, Arsenal bandy around the middle-management terminology; this is a project, a strategy needs to be executed, they have a long-term vision. Arteta is evangelical about delivering this, but so far it has yet to yield even one Premier League goal this season.
There is some mitigation; issues with positive coronavirus tests in his existing squad and with new signings, plus late registrations of players, have affected Arteta’s ability to get his strongest team on the pitch from the off. In terms of recruitment, the lack of European football and the accent of difficulty on finishing in the top four have left Arsenal shopping in aisles that they’re unfamiliar with.
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MANCHESTER, ENGLAND - AUGUST 28: Referee Martin Atkinson awards Granit Xhaka of Arsenal a red card during the Premier League match between Manchester City and Arsenal at Etihad Stadium on August 28, 2021 in Manchester, England.
Image credit: Getty Images
The fixtures in this chaotic period haven’t fallen kindly either, with an away match against a team buoyed by playing its first match in the top flight for 74 years and the two Champions League finalists back-to-back. All that said, there is a familiarity in all three of these Arsenal performances, which have displayed the hallmarks of some of their worst collapses in the last decade and change.
Only one thing can sort that out, and that's time. Chelsea and now Manchester City have shown just how big the chasm is between Arsenal and the upper echelon of the Premier League. Arteta needs to completely rebuild the club, and that is a far from instantaneous process.
Even though they’re bottom of the league right now, Arsenal won’t go down; the real fear around the Emirates is that they won’t do anything. There’s an international break now before they face Norwich, Burnley and Tottenham in September. Arsenal’s season needs to start soon or, relevant to the lofty ambition of the club, it will be over.
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