Eddie Nketiah’s strike caps Arsenal’s stirring Champions League group campaign
This was an obligation Arsenal had no choice but to fulfil and, with the outcome of scant consequence, they joined PSV Eindhoven in serving up a presentable enough spectacle.
Nobody could have expected anything edgier although one wonders exactly what it would have taken for Mikel Arteta to give Ethan Nwaneri, Reuell Walters or Lino Sousa a dose of big-game experience. The three youngsters in his travelling party remained on the bench throughout and any of them would surely have gained more from a runout than, say, the 89th-minute substitute Gabriel Jesus.
Arteta, though, could not shake off the determination to close out the group stage with a win. He would have been granted his wish if Leandro Trossard or Jakub Kiwior had scored in the game’s final attack but nobody was ever going to leave this dead rubber feeling particularly unhappy. Two heavily rotated sides had already reached the last 16, Arsenal secure in their position at the summit, so all that remained was to make a box-ticking exercise appear meaningful.
That is why Arteta’s reluctance to throw one of his teenagers a bone appeared jarring. “I don’t think it was the right context,” he said. “Making eight changes already, to throw them in there against a team that hasn’t lost at home in nearly two years, I didn’t think it was the right moment.”
He suggested injury concerns, among them a hamstring problem for Mohamed Elneny, had forced his hand with earlier substitutions and pointed out that handing a return to Emile Smith Rowe in the latter stages was a priority.
It meant his most eye-catching experiment was the decision to send on Declan Rice for half an hour’s work at centre-back. He replaced William Saliba and the move was seemingly pre-planned. Arsenal lack depth in defence and Rice, who began his career at centre-back, has the pedigree to help out in an emergency.
Ismael Saibari gave him a tough reintroduction to the role, holding him off immediately before striking the inside of a post, but otherwise the switch passed successfully. “We’re very short at the back and I really wanted to try if something happens, how we’re going to resolve that situation,” Arteta said. “I thought he was really good.”
Arsenal did not reach that level collectively in a game notable for the absence of crunching tackles or any sustained intensity. Most of the incision came from PSV and their excellent right-winger Johan Bakayoko, a 20year-old Belgium international who is being courted by Brentford. They have won 15 successive games in the Eredivisie and, while they could not match their 2-0 win in this fixture during last season’s Europa League, Peter Bosz’s team were more than worthy of a draw.
When Arsenal did conjure a flowing move, it brought a fine goal. They had offered little for 42 minutes beyond a long-range Elneny strike that grazed a post but then burst into life down the right flank. Reiss Nelson combined smartly with Cédric Soares, who started his first Arsenal game for 13 months and was preferred to the 18-year-old rightback Walters, before slipping a pass infield to Eddie Nketiah. From his perch just inside the box, Nketiah shifted the ball on to his left foot before arrowing a precise low finish past Walter Benítez.
PSV had come close through Bakayoko and Yorbe Vertessen, also seeing a combination of Saliba, Gabriel Magalhães and Aaron Ramsdale somehow thwart a double chance at point-blank range in the sixth minute. Ramsdale was hurt when diving at the feet of Patrick van Aanholt but continued after treatment, which was a relief to anyone who feels he has endured enough bad luck; Gabriel’s intervention to block Ricardo Pepi’s followup was a masterclass in defensive reactions.
So PSV had already done more than enough to suggest a response was possible and, when it came five minutes into the second half, it was executed sublimely. Arsenal’s shape was questionable as PSV carved through them with three passes but Vertessen, fed by Pepi, got around the ball and bent a beautifully placed shot past Ramsdale. Proceedings remained open but opportunities were spurned at either end, Kiwior blasting the last of them well over.
It was hardly the occasion for micro-analysis and Arteta was at his most talkative when assessing Arsenal’s Group B campaign as a whole. “Very positive,” he said. “Having not been in the competition for [six] years and having a team that hasn’t got that much experience, I think we’ve competed really well. Now we have to close that chapter until February.” Their next European assignment will feel rather more relevant.