Song was high up the pitch when Arsenal lost possession for the first goal and with the full-backs also caught out, Adebayor and Saha were in a two-on-two situation with Thomas Vermaelen and Laurent Koscielny which they exploited. But after five minutes, Song grasped the situation and started to play deeper, only venturing forward occasionally. And apart from Luka Modric’s through ball, which led to Gareth Bale’s penalty appeal, Song hardly put a foot wrong all match which really affected Tottenham’s creativity.
And talking about creativity, Arsenal just shut out Tottenham’s main attacking outlet in Bale for the entire match. A few teams have done that before, but it was how Wenger stopped him that caught the eye. We’ve seen many teams put out two defensive players on the flank to stop Bale and teams like United did succeed with such tactics, but it also meant sacrificing one of your natural forward players. Arsenal decided to go the other way round and boy did they succeed! Walcott repeatedly moved towards the middle when in possession, drawing his marker Benoit Assou-Ekkoto inward as well. This left a lot of space out wide and with instructions to go forward at every opportunity, Bacary Sagna kept penetrating this space in the final third. So Bale had to drop back and defend while Sagna bombed forward.
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Simply put, Arsenal heaped the pressure on Bale instead of shutting him out with two markers. With the Welshman never having experienced such pressure, the deficiencies in his defensive play became apparent. He struggled to mark and close down Sagna and the free run the Frenchman had for Arsenal’s first goal was directly a result of Bale’s shortcomings in defence. This indirectly affected Assou-Ekkoto, as the Cameroonian struggled to choose between Walcott and Sagna when both attacked together.
When Harry Redknapp switched Bale to Arsenal’s left flank in the second half, the Spurs winger again exposed his own limitations and Kieran Gibbs had very few problems dealing with him. Gibbs played deeper when Bale switched flanks and apart from winning his battle against the Welshman, it also freed up space for Song to go forward as evident in his contributions to Arsenal’s second half goals. Bale struggled to cross with his weaker foot and looked completely out of ideas on the right flank. I am sure the likes of Barcelona will have second thoughts now about signing him, especially after Sagna tore him apart with such ease on Sunday.
Great post, AW was tactically astute to say the least. We started with both full backs heading forwards leaving just the 2 CB’ s back to be pulled around by Saha and Adebayor after the over the top ball as they couldn’t use midfield. Later in the game AW pulled Gibbs back and left it to be selected when he could join the play thus cutting out the direct ball but not losing anything from the dominating midfield. If AW shows as much nouse v the scoucers we will surely win 2-1 to the Arsenal!! COYG!!!!
Insightful article. One thing I would like to point out also was that the full backs bombing forward means possession becomes important. This is where Benayoun played a critical role. He was a very strong outlet for the midfield, and kept possession well. The one problem we usually have with both Gervinho and Theo is that they lose possession frequently because they attack more directly, and also both of them lack great close control. With Benayoun, there was balance that Wenger was talking about. So Benayoun was definitely the master stroke in this game.
Good article. No doubt the key to that game was posession, as with most games against top Premiership teams, and Benayoun was the best option on the left. Walcott was an interesting selection in those circumstances but he is very effective against teams who feel capable of playing attacking football against Arsenal and it proved the case in that game. The problem that Walcott has is that he is brilliant on the counter but Arsene will never go into a game with the intention of playing on the counter. It comes as a consequence of the opposition needing to force the game.
great analysis. One suggestion : please mention ‘tactical analysis’ in the headline when u r doing so.
FFS … tacticaly astute about 5 months too late. We have needed more in midfield to keep possession all season. Instead he has insisted on using a 433 with 2 erratic wingers who are potentially dangerous but too often lose the ball. Our midfield has at times been over run. Meanwhile Benayoun is creative and hard working but hardly ever used. The belated change also enabled Walcott not to be stuck out wide on the right wing … failing to cross a decent ball. And now someone writes give credit !!