Unfortunately the postponement of this fixture worked in City’s favour. When it should have been played we were on a 7 game winning streak and City had just lost to Liverpool. We had Partey and Jesus both fully fit as well.
Now we’re in a rotten run (thanks Lee Mason!) and they have their confidence back.
Shame

Barcelona have been found to have paid €1.4m to a company owned by a La Liga referee who was the vice president of Spain’s equivalent to our PGMOL. The money was never invoiced it just appeared as this ref gave exclusive ‘verbal advice’ to Barcelona on how to deal with individual referees.

All very, very dodgy

6 of our best 7 in the league are against bottom half teams, Fulham in 7th is the other one.

The problem when you’ve gone on a bad run is that no game looks easy now.

What Liam Brady told the team if they drop any more points.

I think one of the issues we have is that we don't currently possess the firepower to blow teams away so that increases the need for us to be rock solid defensively and we just aren't.

Saliba has not been at the same level since the World Cup, he has struggled noticeably against physical players.

Gabriel is well Gabriel, a player who enjoys the physical challenges and does a lot right but who always has an unforced error or two in him.

Zinchenko is technically brilliant but a bit chaotic defensively and his wanderings into midfield are perhaps part of the issues we now have at the back.

Ben White's levels have dropped and Tomiyasu doesn't look the same reliable player since his injuries.

I think its time to shake things up a bit. If Kiwior has been impressing in training maybe its time to give him a go at LCB and slot Tierney in at LB to give us a more conventional back four.

The amount City are able to rotate has them fresh for the run in. Not one of their defenders has started more than 14 out of 23 league games this season.
In attacking midfield, Grealish, Foden and Mahrez have only started 12/13 games each. De Bruyne ridiculously got restsed for both games v Spurs recently - Pep would never do that against us

3 of their outfield players have played 20+ league games. For us it is 7.

and yet despite all that we still have the 2nd best defensive record in the league. No doubt defensive mistakes cost us last night but our finishing has been really poor recently as well.

I haven’t seen any replays but my overwhelming feeling leaving the game was that we were beaten by a better team. Simple as. We competed well in the first half but they upped their game in the second and we had no real response.

We made lots of mistakes in the second half – but – they were forced by City’s ferocious pressing. Quite regularly, particularly in our LB / LM areas, there were 5 or 6 of them chasing 3 or 4 of us. Surprise, surprise, quite often they forced the mistake. They seemed particularly keen to embarrass Zinchenko - which they did, on a number of occasions.

The other feeling after the game was that I had watched one of the best strikers I’ve ever seen. Haaland is a true phenomenon. He’s like a cartoon character – a caricature with every feature you’d want in a striker wildly exaggerated. I’ve seen him on the box but live, he is just awesome. Biggest, quickest, strongest, fastest….the list goes on, but he also has bucket loads of skill. I thought Saliba had a decent game under the circumstances although he was lucky not to concede a pen. If he's on his game (and he was last night) no defender will fully dominate Haaland, nor even come close.

There aren't many neutrals!

I think you are right that City are kind of irrelevant. If City win, its 'oh well, we didn't have a chance'. If another side win something you feel its a missed opportunity and sour grapes sets in. The rest of the top six has conceded that City are better "don't mind" them winning the league nearly as much as they would one of the others.

Anyway, that is sort of how I feel even though it is illogical.

In retrospect, apart from the missed chances, I think the biggest problem is that City pressed brilliantly in the second half and we didn't adjust our game to that. The possession stat is a reflection of this. Too many risky passes in our own half and we paid for that. We needed to have the mindset that 1-1 wouldn't been a bad result. The lack of game management did feel a bit like the late Wenger era!

Also in retrospect, maybe a bit harsh to criticise Xhaka for some clumsy moments in attack because he was dynamic and part of a very good midfield, despite the absence of Partey.

In the last few games we haven't defended well or finished well.

When the pressure is on and the games are tight you have to be reliable at both ends of the pitch and in recent games we haven't been.

I would have liked to see Ramsdale going long a lot more to keep them honest. His long passing has been excellent lately and it's when City are pressing like that that our wingers might have a bit of space. If City do come back at you, at least you have time to reset the defense.

Calvert Lewin, Toney, and Haaland have all made our CB look very wobbly. A worrying trend.

On a more positive note, our improvement is such that it no longer look like a complete mismatch. I quite fancy us to get at least a point in the return fixture, provided we aren't missing too many key players. The losing streak is getting a bit embarrassing!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gnl9xeOl_yo

Thanks Rog - I think!

Reminds me it was Gab who fouled Haaland for the ruled-out pen. Those highlights don't show the intensity and effort of the City press. Most of those mistakes were forced.

After a nights sleep-

Yeah they were better. Just. Not much in it though.

Football is a ruthless ruthless game and if we had Haaland instead of Eddie we would have won without question. Every title winning side I’ve seen has a player in it who looks like scoring in every game, Alan Smith scored a third of our goals in 89, Henry don’t get me started. We don’t really have that if we are honest even when Jesus comes back. You need a ruthless bully.

It’s far from over but I can’t see us winning the league to be honest.

It’s not a massive gap to bridge and I do wonder if some ruthless business decisions are required to get there. Maybe selling some popular players for the overall benefit of the side.

That is exactly how I feel with them. If we get beaten by City you just point to the millions of cheated money. If you get beaten by Liverpool with their smart recruitment etc then that could have been you if you were better.

being in this race with City has allowed me to see how those Liverpool fans felt for 3/4 seasons. Liverpool played at a level above virtually anything the prem has seen, they were borderline perfect through the season and they only got the better of City once, and even that needed City to have quite an off season with only 81 points

True but we shouldnt bash the team too much, they far exceeding any expectations even the most bias Gooner had let alone the media. In high pressure games we've seen us perform brilliantly beating Liverpool and Man U at home in two quite wild games, we eased past spurs and chelsea away in what were dull(ish) but quite superb performances of control and ruthlessness. We've also put a lot of tricky away games to the sword.

We played really badly at Everton who raised their game beyond anything else this season.
We were cheated out of 2 points against Brentford which would have been a hard fought 1-0 win breaking down 10 man defences (champions get lauded for doing this)
And we came up short against the best team in the league in a very tight game

I think we lack some confidence right now, we need to find it because the way we played earlier in the season has us right up there for a 85+ points season

Jesus was a big miss last night, not necessarily for the chances Nketiah missed as Jesus is quite capable of missing those as well but it is the way he links up the attack and makes everyone else play better. Joringho was good but Partey has been superb this year. Jorignho's passing was good but it was Partey's defensive nous and physicality we missed.

Rodri controlled the came 2nd half. If only City had lost Rodri to a late injury and had to deal with a 3 month injury to Haaland......

I thought we gave them a proper chasing in the first half, and they were rattled, all that without Partey. Other teams have had better results against them but I don’t think anyone has taken them on at their own game quite like us. We’re definitely heading in the right direction.

Exactly, they were wasting time from the first minute, they were fouling and trying to break the game up and take the sting out of the crowd etc. The problem for us is we didn't get ourselves in to the lead that the play deserved in that first half. They knew we had them in that first half and they were hanging on with every trick in the dark arts book they could do. People may say Arsenal need to learn to do that but I remain convinced we simply wouldn't be allowed to get away with it. 4 fouls from a full back on a tricky winger before a booking? no chance. Any time we've stepped anywhere near the dark arts we're treated by the letter of the law - you only have to look at the FA charges when we try to influence the ref (as every team does).

Considering the protection someone like Grealish gets I find it incredible how players are regularly allowed to kick Saka without proper punishment, and then he himself only needs to breathe near someone and its a foul and a card.

Would Partey and Jesus made a difference? You'd hope so. Ask City if they'd had to have played Alvarez and Phillips instead of Rodri and Haaland what that would have meant.

I read that last night they had 36% possession. That's the lowest since Pep took over.

There were plenty of positives from last night:


1. We dominated possession.

We had 63.5% of the possession and virtually nobody does that to City.


2. Our pass completion rate was 83% compared to City's 72.3%


3. We made 523 passes v City's 301.

I've never seen City resort to so many long balls.


The negatives:


1. We had 10 shots on goal and only 1 on target.

By contrast City had 9 shots on goal and 6 on target.

That is not good enough at home in a game of this magnitude and Nketiah's misses look worse every time you see them.


2. We only won 38.5% of our tackles compared to City's 70.6%

Again, not good enough at this level.


So, plenty to be pleased with but still lots to improve on.

Think I read last night that it’s the lowest of any side he’s managed.

City had their lowest possession under Pep - 36%
Lowest passing accuracy - 72%
Lowest number of successful passes - 219
Most long balls - 52

We did all of that to them.....but still lost.

It is the biggest area we need to improve on. I said before that If we play well then we win 8 or 9/10 times. If we don't play well then we maybe win 3/10 times.

The very best teams always win when they play well and they find a way to win a lot more regularly that we do when they're not playing well.

It is probably a mixture of experience and individual ability. Your experience tells you the game is tight and tough and so you don't attack, or you play longer, or your midfield just gets more compact to whether the storm - and then you build energy for the right moments when you can be a killer. Then the individual brilliance which can win a game on its own from nothing. I don't think we have either yet. But it can come

Saka has 17 goals+assists against the big 5 clubs in England.

I think that is in 38 appearances against them over 4 seasons. Considering how good we were for the first 2 of his 4 seasons and that he wasn't established as aright winger fully until his 3rd season, playing lots of games at left-back that is a very good return - big game player

Whilst I have real sympathy with the current waves of strikes, the Post Office dispute is really testing my sodding patience. One day to go and still no sign of my Villa tickets. Utter pain in the arse!!

Means waiting for an hour or so tomorrow in a phone queue to get the Arse to order re-prints of the tickets for collection up there. Means getting up there early to find the Villa Ticket Office, queuing for another age* before entering into what you know will be a long and tedious discussion about proof of identity. All because of the ridiculous time it takes for anything to get anywhere by post.

This will be the fourth time away tickets haven't turned up. Brentford, Leeds, Brighton and now Villa. In these digital times, you'd think there would be a better way!

ps - queueing* is a pain but there's buggerall else to do before a morning game at Villa.

https://twitter.com/gunnerblog/status/1 ... 08419?s=20

This was a good performance from Jorginho

I’ve just seen in the 3 seasons Partey has been with us he’s missed 12 games v the top 5 sides. In 3 seasons we’d play then 30 times I think. This includes 4 out of 6 times we’ve played Man City.

Declan rice is a must in the summer!

I hear it can sometimes take as long as 100 years, but have no fear it will get there.

I decided to come back a few days early from a family trip to Wales to see last night's match. I figured that it was the biggest league match in years and the chance of being present at a victory was too big to pass up. Plus I dont go to as many games as before as I let my kids go instead. Anyway, in hindsight I dont regret it. I thought in the first half we played well despite frustratingly gifting them the early goal. The noise after we equalised was really something. At half time the question going around was would we take a draw, but nobody did as we had every reason to think we could go on to win the game. Unfortunately City had other ideas and seemed to wear us down and harry us with their pressing and we started to lose some of our composure. Gunnerblog made an interesting observation which was that it wasnt that we made rare errors, but that unlike other opponents City have the quality and ruthlessness to punish errors. Once the third goal went in the atmosphere collapsed like a deflating baloon even with 10 mins to go. I think in the 2nd half City showed why they are champions by moving up another gear to which we couldnt quite match. I thought the 21 year old Saliba handled the world's best striker really well, and even Jorghinio, while obviously lacking Partey's speed and strength was assured with his passing and positioning. All in all, it feels like the momentum has now swung towards City particulary with our dip in form. But lets see where we are with 10 games to go, and if we are still close to the top of the table, with a returning Jesus and Emile Smith Rowe ya never know. However, In terms of Arsenal's overall development we've come a long way in a short space of time and there is a lot to be confident about the future of this team.

...one other thing is that the old cliche of having to take your chances when you get them in tight games really rings true in hindsight. Nketiah missed the target with 3 really good chances, and Tommy blazed over when unmarked in the penalty area. Convert one of those and the momentum would have swung massively back to us.

Apparently we have won the lowest percentage of aerial duels this season of the 20 teams in the league. Set piece threat and goals have dried up a bit as well.

Certainly an area where we need to improve. Target man striker and some additional power in central midfield really needed.

https://twitter.com/eurofootcom/status/ ... R1J5pPWHNg

This ability is for me the single biggest weapon in football. A striker who has pace and power and can strike fear in a defence from 50 yards from goal. The pass is a hopeful one that Rashford marked by 2 defenders turns in to what could easily be a pen or red card or goal.

I can’t think of many footballers in better form in the world than Rashford right now

Lots to agree with you on there Bored. I felt before the match that the most likely result would be a battling defeat but hope raises expectations, especially after the first half. But like you, I think this season has been one of overachievement so far with a very young team and a squad that is still a work in progress. As you've rightly mentioned, Saliba is 21 which is kindergarten for a CB. He'll get stronger and smarter. Tomiyasu has always been a bit edgy in his first match back from long layoffs. But he's usually back on it after 2 games. Something has been up with White since he went home from the World Cup and he's not the same as he was in the early part of the season. Partey has been awesome and we know this is a gap that we need one more transfer window to fill (I'm not convinced that it is Declan Rice either).

It's going to be a rocky road to the end of the season and I expect a lot more draws or nail biting wins. The team is starting to lose it's swagger and it's inevitable that they're going to get more tired. It's not an indictment on them, just the reality when we don't have the options to rotate and keep people fresh. Not over yet by a long shot because City have also been flaky at times this season so let's see where we end up. If we finish 2nd to the Petrocheats and above a 'resurgent' Manure then I'd still consider it an extremely successful season.

My biggest worry right now is the poaching of Saka. He's got to be one of the best right forwards in the game right now and I can see Citeh in particular wanting to replace Mahrez.

I think it's sometimes overlooked a little bit how hard it can be to defend against someone like Haaland. The defender is always having to either anticipate or react within split seconds to what he or others around him might do next. And, like you said, it's even harder because he's stronger, faster and quite smart about where and when he times his movement.

I didn't think you would start vouching for anyone with Kiwi in their name to be near the squad.

What is ominous is looking at City’s fixtures, they’ve already played the big 6 + Newcastle away from home and have 4 home games left against them. They only have 3 away games against top half teams.

We’ve also got 4 top 6 + Newcastle games left but 3 of them are away.

Annoyingly ten Hag is doing a quite fantastic job at Man U. His squad was far better than anything Arteta inherited, his waste of space players were more peripheral in most cases - but he did have a lot of off field issues to sort and had to be single minded and strong enough to do it. His signings have on the whole been good and because it is Man U even when they make a complete error (Anthony £90m) they can ride it out.

He's phased out the likes of Maguire, McTominey, got rid of Ronaldo etc. They are where they are and nowhere near through the ten hag project. Of course he can go about it 10 times quicker than Arteta because he spent £200m in his first window and Arteta survived on a couple of loans. However, I can see a clear plan for what Man U need to do in the summer transfer window - a top level striker (Osimhen/Kane), a new GK who is more comfortable with the ball at his feet, and a box-to-box central mid to move Fred further down the order and allow Eriksen less game time. Beyond that you then are looking at players like Varane and Casemiro and Eriksen getting in to their early 30's and you succession plan for that.

Hi Rich,

I always felt that we needed to go into the last 10 games with the cushion of a 9 point gap because we do not yet possess either the experience or nous required to deal with the pressure a title run-in brings but also because we have some really tough away games still left to play.

Not getting at least 4 points from the Everton and Brentford games seems like a big opportunity lost.

I agree with you Socrates. Having that cushion would probably have got us to the last 10 games as league leaders, and by my completely unscientific and made up reasoning that means we genuinely would have had a shot at the title when it really counts.