Who is on the bus?: Page 20 - The Arsenal discussion forum and community: One More in the Tolly

Who is on the bus?

Claudius

We are trending in the right direction. So far, pieces for next season

[striker]

Aubameyang - ESR - Saka

Partey - [CM]

Tierney - Gabriel - Holding - [RB]

Leno

Main subs: Martinelli, Mari, Saliba, Mari

In the balance: Pepe - if he maintains form, think we should keep him at LW and try Aubameyang at striker

Basically, there is still a lot of panelbeating to be done to this squad to make it fit for purpose. Xhaka, Bellerin, Laca etc have contributed admirably but where we can find solutions, we should turn them over.

goon

I'd move Auba up top personally, look at how much threat Pepe and Saka offered down the wings today. You also have the option of playing an Odegaard type wide too for added combination play. We played some of our best football this season in the first 45 mins and Laca was barely involved bar a couple of simple layoffs.

If nothing else, I don't think there's anything particularly exciting out there in terms of strikers.

Claudius

I’m for that.

I’m hoping Arteta achieves with Pépé what he did with Sterling. In the last few games, we have seen a couple of changes from Pépé

he is in more open space and playing more freely, a benefit of being freed from the deeper positions he had before. This is just the basics of letting him play like he did in Lille
Pépé himself is playing with more confidence and willingness to do take ons. He attempted 5
he’s also busy defensively. His goal yesterday was from a recovery. Over the weekend, he was constantly tracking back and defending. He attempted 4 tackles

He just seems a much more dangerous, more integrated animal than what we saw last year. If Arteta succeeds with this transformation, we are in for a treat.

Anzac

IMO it is significant that Pepe's recent 2 goals and MOTM games have both come on the left and not the right.

Anzac

Claudius wrote:
We are trending in the right direction. So far, pieces for next season

[striker]

Aubameyang - ESR - Saka

Partey - [CM]

Tierney - Gabriel - Holding - [RB]

Leno

Main subs: Martinelli, Mari, Saliba, Mari

In the balance: Pepe - if he maintains form, think we should keep him at LW and try Aubameyang at striker

Basically, there is still a lot of panelbeating to be done to this squad to make it fit for purpose. Xhaka, Bellerin, Laca etc have contributed admirably but where we can find solutions, we should turn them over.

Mari 2x or were you thinking of someone else?

Anzac

goon wrote:
I'd move Auba up top personally, look at how much threat Pepe and Saka offered down the wings today. You also have the option of playing an Odegaard type wide too for added combination play. We played some of our best football this season in the first 45 mins and Laca was barely involved bar a couple of simple layoffs.

If nothing else, I don't think there's anything particularly exciting out there in terms of strikers.

Let alone that PEA offers very little capability in build-up other than his movement off the ball (which he can do at CF drifting out wide), and he is a better target inside that area rather than being the player making those crosses from wide..

Anzac

Claudius wrote:
We are trending in the right direction. So far, pieces for next season

[striker]

Aubameyang - ESR - Saka

Partey - [CM]

Tierney - Gabriel - Holding - [RB]

Leno

Main subs: Martinelli, Mari, Saliba, Mari

In the balance: Pepe - if he maintains form, think we should keep him at LW and try Aubameyang at striker

Basically, there is still a lot of panelbeating to be done to this squad to make it fit for purpose. Xhaka, Bellerin, Laca etc have contributed admirably but where we can find solutions, we should turn them over.

In terms of shape and team additions I'm firmly in the 433 camp as I posted recently.

tazmania

Anzac wrote:
IMO it is significant that Pepe's recent 2 goals and MOTM games have both come on the left and not the right.

I think he was great on the right side too. He's just playing much better like claudius laid out

TambourineMan

We are seeing glimpses of the Pepe who showed up in the FA Cup final. It was criminal killing that momentum at the start of the season.

Claudius

In al fairness Pépé himself wasn’t lighting it up earlier this year. This is a different player in both directions. His sprints to help on defense are a revelation

Rohit

Yeah. His movement is better too. He was always dropping back looking for the ball. Now he is trying to run in behind, asking for the ball to be played in space - the Southampton goal and the through ball by Xhaka yesterday. He is becoming more unpredictable and we are better for it. If we can keep this up we will become so dangerous. The way Saka started yesterday, Wolves had to adjust and focus on him. If we can pose that threat from the left too, the opposition will have a problem.

Qwiss

Claudius wrote:
In al fairness Pépé himself wasn’t lighting it up earlier this year. This is a different player in both directions. His sprints to help on defense are a revelation

He wasn't getting chances earlier in the season. That he's had 3-4 starts in a row is clearly helping. I think he's more or less doubled his PL starts over the last few weeks. Its pretty obvious now that he deserved more PL minutes ahead of Willian in the first half of the season and that it only hurt us to play the Brazillian, fortunately Artetas finally recognised that too.

KingslandBarge

Exactly. The 'turn it around' sentiment is mainly about Arteta. Arteta turned it around after stifling the progress of the player from FA cup final, to his pre season to the club's first 1/3 of the season. Pépé's industry in both directions has been evident in most non league starts he was getting.

Claudius

Pepe wasn't this good on defense. Nor was he this good on offense before. Tactical switch and more application is evident. He just feels less chaotic and prone to running into cul-de-sacs.

Good to feel like there is a bus finally. For so long, we've wandered around aimlessly.

Clrnc

Nope. Pepe industry has been widely praised whenever he played. In fact he was probably better for our defence than in attack in those sporadic minutes he played.

A run of games and his confidence is up now. He is a confidence player you can see after scoring the goal he was dribbling and taking on players with real drive and belief. He is someone that needs to feel the manager trust and he's getting it I feel

Qwiss

I'll give Arteta credit in recent weeks for sticking with Pepe and most importantly encouraging him to play to his strengths. You can see him cheering him on and clapping when he takes players on even if it doesn't work out. I think generally Arteta has a adjusted how willing to take risks with the ball he is and its working out much better.

Claudius

[Twitter]

This highlights what I was saying about this being a bit of Arteta and a bit of Pépé. Arteta has him taking more central positions. Versus before when he was getting crowded on the right flank. Pépé is not a winger. He’s a forward. He needs to be able to be close to goal and Arteta has come to this realisation. That’s why he has Saka taking over Pépé’s role out right and linking up with ESR/Laca, and has let Pépé loose on the less crowded side of the field.

So for now he best looks like our Aubemayang alternative. But can we move Auba/Martinelli central to accommodate Pépé?

goon

It was really noticeable how central Pepe was a times yesterday, it wasn't remotely subtle.

I think moving Auba up top is the best solution. I think I said this in another game, can't remember which, but I don't think Auba and Laca should play in the same XI. By playing both you deprive the team of someone who is better in the build-up phase.

Klaus

goon wrote:
It was really noticeable how central Pepe was a times yesterday, it wasn't remotely subtle.

One of the big tactical changes lately has been that we have stopped overloading the left flank with three players and put an extra bloke - Smith-Rowe - centrally. I definitely think it suits Pepe who finds it easier to come into the field and play, with Smith-Rowe moving to occupying the wide areas when that happens and create space for him to run into. There was a noticeable difference in Auba's performances too which I thought were generally of a high quality over the last month.

It's hard to say if the improvement is down to getting more minutes or if he just improved and therefore got more minutes, but we know he is a confidence player and we haven't had a confident attacking game in a while. He has scored in three straight away games now apparently. It's been a little underhyped because Smith-Rowe and Saka have done such an outstanding job.

goon

The irony is by vacating the left flank to an extent it's probably made it a bigger threat by giving the overlapping fullback more space as well as more central passing options.

By the way, the most genius thing Pepe did last night was defend by standing right in front of Adama Traore, who without his one trick of beating his man on the outside, got confused and ended up having to turn around and pass back 😆

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