Arsenal surrender proves Emery reign is work in progress
Defence weaknesses are shown up in a chastening defeat for visitors, reports Jim White at Anfield
At times this was almost painful to watch. Here was an old warhorse being schooled by the fizzing man of the moment. Here was the past being undone by the present. It all came to a head in the 58th minute. That was when Mo Salah chased after a ball in the middle of the Arsenal half and David Luiz attempted to dispossess him.
As the centre-back tried to move into position, the impulse was to shield the eyes. Luiz had already brought Salah down for a penalty with one of the most shameless pulls of the shirt you will ever see. And here he was, already booked, trying to corral a player whose pace across five metres is roughly three times his own.
The result was inevitable: Salah swished past the Brazilian as if he were a training ground cone, piled on the after burners to accelerate away and slam a gloriously emphatic left-foot shot into the corner of the goal to make it 3-0. And from the Anfield Road stand, the visiting Arsenal fans began preparing themselves for another miserable trip back down the motorway.
Here, on the ground where they had witnessed their most epic of victories three decades ago, it was happening again. And none of them could pretend they weren’t warned. For Arsenal, the 5-1 result at Anfield last season was as
chastening as any they had experienced, a horrible indication of how far they had fallen from relevance. Toyed with by the club they had once lorded over, it was demeaning.
But for Unai Emery that loss at least gave judicious measure of how his restructuring was going. And in the manner in which he set up his team for this encounter, this was clearly meant to be an altogether different Arsenal from the one that surrendered so meekly last December.
Only five players survived from the carnage. From back to front the changes were significant: in attack Emery gave a starting debut to Nicolas Pepe, the record signing from Lille. At the back he had Luiz, the defensive leader who was signed in order to bring order to the chaos.
The link between the two was immediately obvious. From the start, Emery’s instruction was clear: Arsenal were going to sit so deep that Luiz would have chalk from his own goal line permanently embossed on his heels. This would draw the insistent, eager Liverpool midfield forward and into the space they vacated, Luiz would drop one of his 40-yard wallops. The idea was for Pepe and PierreEmerick Aubameyang to chase after his ordnance.
It may not have been the beautiful aesthetic to which Arsene Wenger insisted his Arsenal should aspire. But a couple of times in the first half the rope-a-dope almost worked. Arsenal sat back, Liverpool pressed and Luiz hoofed over their advancing heads for Pepe and Aubameyang to gallop. Had they both been sharper in their finishing, Arsenal might have exorcised the demons of last season well before half-time.
But they weren’t. And all too soon it became clear the old Arsenal frailties were in danger of infecting the new incarnation. Especially when Trent Alexander-Arnold lasered in one of his perennially accurate corners, Joel Matip eased above Matteo Guendouzi and scored. After the ball had hit the net, Nacho Monreal led the Arsenal complaints to the referee that Matip had climbed illegally. But he hadn’t. This was simply a determined opponent exploiting Arsenal’s melted butter approach to set pieces. In fact, had Liverpool not scored, they might have had a penalty after a tug on Virgil van Dijk.
Luiz ignored the moans, however, clapping his hands together, yelling at his fellow defenders to grow some spinal capacity. Not to mention to have a bit more nous.
But as the imperious Van Dijk was demonstrating with every intervention at the other end of the pitch, leadership requires more than simply shouting the odds.
Luiz’s own brain power was not hugely vindicated either when, with the second half barely started, he hauled back Salah’s shirt in the Arsenal penalty area, an infraction so plain not even VAR could intervene to obstruct the obvious.
Given that he does not play for Manchester United, Salah got up and scored the ensuing spot-kick.
Arsenal managed a consolation goal and spent the last ten minutes trying to push forward. But the difference with last year was mapped out only in the scale of defeat.
After this they still appear to be well away from the required standard to compete with the very best. It may be a harsh comparison to make, but there was not a single player in the Arsenal away shirts who Jurgen Klopp might covet for his own squad. The biggest difference was in the identity of the defensive lynchpin. Arsenal have restructured and invested. But Van Dijk against Luiz remains a no contest.
Given that he doesn’t play for Man United, Salah got up and scored the penalty