Prior to the start of this battle on King Mountain, Arsenal have been trying to reduce the importance of this match.
In his pre-match press conference, coach Mikel Arteta said "the whole season cannot be defined by the result of this game", and captain Odegaard also said in an interview that "this game is important, but not the final." ”
The manager made similar statements together to clearly want to relieve a little pressure on the team, especially Mikel Arteta's sentence, the meaning is already very clear: even if they lose, Arsenal's season is still successful.
This is true, but in addition to the fact that all the points advantage has been eaten away, if there is a high probability of losing, how to lose this game and make everyone continue to believe in them is still an important issue.
However, Arteta does not offer everyone potential change and hope for the future.
In the opening 6 minutes, Arsenal conceded a goal:
Throughout the whole process, Arsenal tried to press opponents high as in the past, and in fact was forced to let Manchester City open a big foot, which can be regarded as a successful pressing, but Manchester City's big foot is to give Haaland a one-on-one opportunity with Holding.
Holding's single question has become a hot meme on social media in the past few days. Fans joked and helped Arsenal find ways for Holding not to be exposed, but he was exposed, and more than once:
And Manchester City's counter-attack using Haaland and De Bruyne has not only happened this time:
It's hard to say that Pep Guardiola's game tactics are designed that way, but objectively, Manchester City did play a two-striker effect this time.
On the counter-attack, Haaland has the ability to go one-on-one with any opponent in any way, so De Bruyne swims around him, catches his opponent's cramped in a large space, gives Haaland the ball, and lets the latter drop the opponent in a one-on-one.
The remaining 8 players will have to focus more on defense, such as Grealish, who also performed well before, and try to help the teammates behind him in this game:
So in terms of thinking, Guardiola played this game very simply, 10 people in the outfield, the strongest 2 in the front, although this "double striker" is not particularly compatible in type, but in the general environment of the counter-attacking battle, the incongruity can also be well hidden.
Especially against the backdrop of Arsenal's defenders, it is even less visible.
From this point of view, Arsenal's loss today is indeed a high probability thing, and this trend and result are difficult to reverse, but even if he loses, he should try his best to cause problems for Manchester City on the road.
As Pep Guardiola's assistant for many years, Arteta has the same idea, and when off the ball, Arsenal will also look like 442:
The biggest difference between Manchester City and Manchester City is here.
With a slightly lower posture, Haaland and Kevin De Bruyne can put pressure directly on Arsenal's defenders, and what about this "double striker" of Arsenal?
Jesus can at least guarantee that he is not afraid or flustered when holding the ball in the crowd of Manchester City defenders:
What did Odegaard do with this game?
To put it bluntly, does he deserve to be at the front of the line? Does he deserve the lightest defensive duty?
This is not what Arsenal have been saying in this game, but what Arteta has been trying to present over the past few years.
Last September, we mentioned in "Arsenal's lower limit is solid enough, but there are still explicit and hidden problems that will test them", one Jesus and one Saleba, very well raised Arsenal's lower limit, these two new signings, plus Martinelli and others, let Arsenal adjust the gap in the squad at Manchester City all the way to the top position.
However, in the article at the time, we mentioned that one of the hidden concerns on Arsenal's side was actually a problem:
"At that time, who will be able to stand at the front of 442 with Jesus and not have to take on heavy defensive duties when defending positions?"
A season is almost over, and Arteta's choice is still Odegaard.
This left Arsenal unable to put enough pressure on the Manchester City defenders, as Arsenal's second-stronger, Martinelli, was dragged behind by defensive duties.
In this game, Martinelli was indeed difficult to play well against Walker, but after the game, the person who could help Arsenal speed up was still Martinelli:
Is such a performance not enough to replace Odegaard and stand at the front of the team?
And, Martinelli may not really have a high chance of winning against Walker, but what if he goes against Stones, against Ruben Dias?
It's actually an interesting option, but Arteta is still stuck to his system, Martinelli is a wide player, and the wide player needs to defend, even if Odegaard is useless in front, he can't put pressure on the opponent at all, he can only contact the weak side with his left foot like this, and bring up the teammates in the central midfield one by one:
This left-footed line is what Arteta values most, but as a result, all the people in front of Holding are called up, leaving him and Gabriel in a large space to deal with Haaland's head-ons.
Towards the end of the first half, Manchester City extended the score to 2-0, which was actually a good time to use the situation to make a change, and it was possible to consider changing Odegaard to the back or even replacing him directly with a striker.
However, Odegaard is Mikel Arteta's captain handpicked at the beginning of the season, how to take the captain for such an important game?
So back at half-time, Arsenal didn't make any progress, and Haaland and De Bruyne continued to cooperate in the counter-attack:
Killed the game in the 54th minute and it ended there:
At the end of the game, the desperate Arsenal substitutes helped Holding score a goal, saving a little face for the team and comforting Holding, who was bound to be targeted after the game:
The England centre-back has indeed been poor, even saying that the last four games he has been a starting point for Arsenal to not win, and in the last goal, it was Holding who took a step and gave Foden room to pass to Haaland:
But Holding is only a substitute after all, and it would be irresponsible to put the responsibility for not winning or even losing the championship on him.
The real problem is with Arteta. In four games, facing weak teams such as West Ham United and Southampton, after leading by two goals, they did not know how to strengthen the defense, and they still tried to solve the game with attack.
The draw with Liverpool is already a painful lesson ahead, Jesus and Martinelli can kill Liverpool defenders, all replaced early, and the underperforming Odegaard and Saka can stay on the field longer.
As for this crucial game, Odegaard's performance was obvious to all, and even City's third goal in the game was a mistake he sent with his best pass.
In "Arsenal's lower limit is solid enough, but there are explicit and implicit problems that will test them", it ends like this:
"So in this situation of trade-offs and doomed chaos, Arsenal are hopeful to play well this season and, ideally, should not be limited to finishing in the top four.
However, given the pressure of Arsenal's fixture, apart from Gabriel, Arteta still needs to make the most important decision in attack in order to become a promising impactor.
Otherwise, the regret at the end of last season may be repeated again. ”
Losing to Newcastle last season and thus losing the top four, Odegaard's performance may have been forgotten by many; Losing to Manchester City this season and thus losing the title, Odegaard's performance is just around the corner.
For Arsenal, just like Arteta's statement, this is of course still a good season, even if you lose to Manchester City and lose the title, but can Arteta guarantee that one day in the future, she will not lose to Manchester City again, and she will not lose the title again?
Just take this game as a node?