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LONDON — The good news for Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta is that a game many felt would be a landslide, a home clahs against Premier League champions Manchester City, was in fact effectively decided in two minutes. The bad news is it was an error-strewn spell which underlines that for all the collective progress being made, individual errors remain an unwanted characteristic of his side.
In fairness, some of the mistakes in Saturday’s 2-1 defeat to City were not even theirs. This was a game which will stoke the debate over precisely how VAR is used, specifically why referee Stuart Attwell was asked to look at Granit Xhaka’s second-half challenge on Bernardo Silva at the touchline monitor and not Ederson’s earlier tackle on Martin Odegaard. Neither were given live by Attwell but he was only asked to re-examine the second. Both were penalties.
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Arsenal were excellent until the 57th minute. Bukayo Saka gave them a deserved lead just after the half-hour mark by finishing a sweeping move which involved Thomas Partey, Xhaka and Odegaard before Kieran Tierney crossed for the England international to side-foot home left-footed from 14 yards.
City looked jaded, bereft of their usual zip in possession as Arsenal imposed themselves impressively. The gap between these two sides has rarely looked smaller. Still, Pep Guardiola’s side have now won 10 consecutive Premier League games against Arsenal by a combined score of 26-3.
So often, the Gunners have appeared resigned to their fate, acquiescing to defeat before kick-off in a manner suggesting an inferiority complex permeates the group. Arteta, currently self-isolating at home after testing…
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Source : espn
