What has gone wrong in Arsenal’s pre-season fixtures?
What has gone wrong in Arsenal’s pre-season fixtures?
Despite the optimism of new signings and a relatively strong
finish to last season, pre-season hasn’t quite gone to plan so far.
Mikel Arteta will disappointed by two friendlies north of
the border, a 2-2 draw with Scottish champions Rangers at the weekend, which
followed on from a 2-1 defeat at Hibernian.
Whilst you should never read too much into non-competitive
fixtures, the performance levels in both games have left some fans concerned.
Clearly there is much work to do before the new campaign
gets underway properly, against.
But what has gone wrong so far in Arsenal‘s pre-season?
Defending set-pieces
It’s an obvious place to start, but an area that must be a
cause of concern to the manager.
From the four goals Arsenal have conceded across the two
matches so far, three have come from opposition corners.
That has to be a worry, particularly if Arteta’s men
continue to concede goals from set-pieces in their remaining pre-season
friendlies.
It is an area of defending that will be under greater
scrutiny at the start of this season, considering the club’s former set piece
coach Andreas Georgson has left to
join Swedish club Malmo.
Conceding goals from dead ball situations last season wasn’t
a huge issue for Arteta. Only 14 per cent of their goals conceded came via this
route.
If anything this makes it a bigger problem. The last thing a
side trying to progress to the next level needs, is for an apparent strength to
become a weakness.
Hopefully £50million new signing Ben White, will be able to
play his part to ensure set pieces don’t become Arsenal’s soft underbelly in
the season ahead.
Involving players who possibly won’t even play this season
This is difficult to avoid with some players still on an
extended break, post-Euro 2020.
But finding fluidity in the team will be difficult when
including so many players who won’t feature this season, with a few likely to
be sold or loaned out.
Pre-season games are all about finding rhythm, and Arsenal
look devoid of any so far.
In the draw with Rangers, Joe Willock was one of the Gunners
standout performers. Yet speculation still persists that he will be loaned out
again for the duration of the 2021-22 season.
Whilst Willock looked steely and composed in the midfield
battle, will playing him now actually be beneficial to the team, if he has left
before a ball is kicked in anger this season?
The same goes for Eddie Nketiah who has appeared in both
friendlies so far. He managed to get a goal and put in a much improved
performance in the second game against Rangers.
However, he is still heavily linked with a move to Crystal
Palace and is not expected to be part of the first-team squad after the
transfer window closes.
Individual errors
Perhaps this is the one issue that will worry Arteta the
least.
This is purely because major individual errors normally iron
themselves out before the season starts.
Naturally, even elite players are rusty after a summer
break, as a result individual errors are more likely to be spotted in
pre-season knockabouts.
For all Arsenal played poorly at Easter Road in the defeat
to Hibs, had it not been for a horrendous error from young goalkeeper Arthur
Okonkwo, they would have claimed a draw.
In the same game, forward Nketiah missed a one-on-one sitter
that you wouldn’t expect from a striker with solid game-time under his belt.
Such mistakes will cost you games.
But Arteta can at least take some comfort from the fact
pre-season is the perfect time to iron these errors out.
When the season gets underway for real, they should have
been eradicated. At least the manager will hope so.
