ARTETA SIGNALS END OF ARSENAL’S PASSING PHASE
Those days when possession was ninetenths of the Arsenal way are no more and Mikel Arteta makes no apologies.
There have been too many times when they stood by the principles forged under Arsene Wenger only for stronger teams to tear them apart. It has happened regularly at Liverpool, where Arsenal have conceded 30 goals in eight games and not won for eight years.
Arteta witnessed it at close quarters when he was captain, suffering in the heart of midfield, and he has been determined to address it since he returned as the manager.
‘I am here to win,’ he said, ahead of tonight’s trip to Anfield. ‘We have to prepare for the game by finding scenarios to win. If I am proposing something difficult, that is going to expose our team, I don’t think I am acting in the best favour of our players.’
he learned at clubs where principles of play are important, where style matters and yet perhaps the most important change he has made since returning has been to strip away the pretence and serve up some realism.
Under Arteta, they have played 32 games in all competitions. The games when they made the fewest passes, and took the fewest touches, were in the FA Cup semifinal against Manchester City and against champions Liverpool in the Premier League in July.
They won both, just as they did when they faced Chelsea in the FA Cup final and Liverpool in the Community shield.
‘one way now in football doesn’t work,’ said Arteta. ‘Unless you are very, very superior to the opponent all the time. The players we have available can change our game plan. We have to be able to adapt.’
For years, Arsenal have not been good enough to take on the best teams at their own game and still refused to abandon the purism of their approach.
‘sport has to encourage initiative,’ said Wenger, in the later phase of his Arsenal career, while discussing the counter-attacking prowess of Leicester in 2015/16 and Antonio Conte’s Chelsea, the following season. ‘If it rewards too much teams who don’t take the initiative, we have to rethink the whole process because people will not come to watch teams who do not want to take the initiative.’
even when deployed to effect, as he did at Manchester City in 2015, the last time Arsenal won at the home of any of their ‘Big six’ rivals, Wenger could not bring himself to persist with it.
Instead, he believed a counterattacking style could not be successful in the Champions
League, and could not be adopted and portrayed as the dominant culture in a club with serious intentions to develop footballers through their own academy. he was also certain it could never be imposed on big players.
Another key success for Arteta has been to persuade Pierreemerick Aubameyang to stay.
There were post-pandemic factors at play because transfer options disappeared but the Arsenal captain would not have signed a new contract if he was worried about the direction of travel under the new boss.
‘Results always drive belief,’ said Arteta. ‘The players have to be comfortable with the plan. They have to realise we can achieve what we want when we jump on to the pitch. Then they will feel more secure. They will know or expect what is going to happen so it does not surprise or shock them.’
Aubameyang is Arsenal’s greatest threat and with 11 goals in his last 12 games, flourishing in a 3-4-3 system which releases him to attack the penalty area from the left, a potent weapon against the fashion who push the full-backs on as auxiliary wingers.
Together with a determination to tighten up at the back and inject more aggression and industry through the team, casting out those who cannot or will not commit, Arteta has generated a positive vibe at the club.
With the early glimmers of success came the change in title from head coach to manager, a show of trust and a little extra power which helped when it came to recruitment. The latest addition is Andreas Georgson, a set-pieces coach from Brentford.
‘It’s where a high percentage of goals are scored and conceded,’ said Arteta. ‘It has a great impact on results and points, so it’s another aspect of the game you have to dominate.’
Arteta’s Arsenal remains very much a work in progress. Last season’s eighth place marked their worst for a quarter of a century.
There will be another stern test at Liverpool and, in the weeks ahead, armies of analysts will focus their software technology on finding ways to combat the threat of Aubameyang on the break.
Until then, spirits are high because there will be more than one dimension to the Arsenal way.