• The Arsenal

  • Man U vs Arsenal | Sunday 09 March | 16.30 UK Time.

@DKGooner and @Clrnc -- I didn't watch the whole game and just caught a highlight package. It seemed from highlights that we tore them apart for the first 30 minutes, but then stagnated.

Did you feel we were poor throughout? or just in the latter half?

    MistaT I sat at the end where Arsenal attacked towards in the first half and had a superb view. United were very organised in their back 5 and Dalot playing inverted Nulified Nwaneri completely who was playing with a little hand brake on.

    Not sure how it looked like on TV but we "dominated" in the first half like how we did against Nottm and West Ham. Domination in possession without really threatening. Onana had nothing to do. United was very comfortable letting us have the ball and hitting us on the breaks. Our players were happy to recycle the ball horizontally without taking vertical risks.

      MistaT I was at the other end so had the better view of us attacking in the second half. Agree with Clrnc that it was domination of possession without creating anything of note. The same was largely true of the second half with only Martinelli creating any fear. Declan was good but his energy was wasted by our conservatism.

      The United fans I spoke to over the weekend were all expecting us to beat them comfortably. They started off really quiet when we dominated possession but once they understood we were going nowhere with it, they became confident and started really getting behind their team. While still wary, they were believed they had enough to beat us but the Rice goal took the wind out of their sails. However, despite upping the pressure, United had the better chances to win the game.

      Anmorim was also more visible on the touch line from what I saw, with Arteta barely patrolling the box.

          DKGooner what was interesting is Arteta took every single break in play to summon the players and give them instructions. Amorim didnt do that at all and kept squatting down.

          In the 2nd half Jover keep summoning Raya to give him instructions to pass to the rest of the team.

          I did the City and United Tours before the match (old toilet is really dated and run down, while Etihad stadium is pretty untouchable from our level currently) and the United fans were hoping not to lose by too big a margin. Any marginal loss is a win for them they said. Like you said, they grew in confidence once they realised we ain't going to threaten their goal and the stadium was really loud in the 2nd half.

              Clrnc I did notice that as well re the Arteta instructions. I guess the frustration was that all of that talking barely led to any tangible improvement in our play.

              I do wish we had another Sagna like FB. I find Timber far too passive in that role when it is so important to our attacking patterns under Arteta. After the game, I did also wonder whether switching Timber to DM (replacing Partey) would help us as well. Would also like to see Tierney given a few starts to see how a traditional overlapping LB works rather than the inverted system used so far. Might help bring Trossard (if we persist with him on the left) closer to the middle giving him more time on the ball and an outlet for someone to run beyond him. It was painful watching Trossard toil against United.

                The domination without impact thing is an issue that affects a lot of teams. It's evolution. Defenses have caught up to the Klopp / Pep offenses. That way of football might become less pronounced with teams ceding possession to create more opportunities to attack in transition. Interesting to see what the top teams look like in 3-4 years

                QuincyAbeyie The funniest criticism is for not scoring the FK.

                hey don't deprive people of another chance to diss the captain!

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