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Arsenal v Anderlecht Collapse Symptomatic Of Poor Mentality
So. That happened. Arsenal v Anderlecht. Not one that’s going to make any Arsenal highlight reels in the future. However we have to accept that it did happen, and take a look at why Arsenal seem more fragile than we have in recent years.
Why did Arsenal collapse last night? What can be done to stop this spiralling decline in Arsenal’s mental strength
I mentioned a few weeks ago that I thought Arsenal needed a mentality change, and it’s even more evident after last night’s awful 30 minute collapse. When we beat Anderlecht in the last match after a 3 minute turn-around Alexis Sanchez stood on the pitch shaking his head at the Arsenal player celebrating like they’d won the league, and I’m pretty sure he will have had something to say in the dressing room after that match,
For the first hour Arsenal were by far the better team and looked as though they had sewn up the tie when they went 3-0 up through a well taken finish from Alex-Oxlade Chamberlain, after a beautiful volley from Sanchez and a cool penalty from Arteta. But then we tried as hard as possible to not have an easy time for the rest of the night.
Although the first goal was offside it was the speed at which we seemed to switch off after going 3-0 up. “Oh we’re 3 goals up. They’ll give up now and that’s fine,” seemed to be the collective though bubble that went out for all Arsenal players. After that we failed to look anywhere near as interested when we lost the ball, which by the way was the reason for scoring the third, and some clumsy defending only highlighted the matter.
The manager today has come out and blamed the defence for the collapse, which on the surface of it seems fair enough. Ignoring the first goal which was offside, the second was from an awful Monreal challenge leading to a penalty and the third was Mertesacker once again showing a turn of speed that was reminiscent of a Giant tortoise waking up as he was beaten to the ball for a headed goal. However I think the fault lies further forward, in the midfield.
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The lack of a midfield general has never been so obvious, with no-one getting the boys together after the first Anderlecht goal and just saying, “OK that’s 1, and we’ve got a cushion but keep it tight from now on. Keep possession and push up the pitch to keep pressure on. But keep working hard.” The first goal went in and although they were annoyed the goal was given it has to be said that no-one seemed interested in actually getting the match back on track.
Sanchez kept working hard but there was no-one backing him up, and after Chamberlain was substituted off he had no-one that was with him keeping pressure on the Anderlecht team. And whilst the defence may be to blame in this match, why is Monreal playing centre-back? Why did we sell Vermaelan, let Sagna go and loan Jenkinson out and only bring in Chambers and Debuchy? We were already tight for defenders and we lost numbers over the window. If Wenger is blaming the defence, he need only look at himself as to why they didn’t perform better.
However I do think we need a proper DM to help the strength throughout the team. But a decent centre-back would also be great because right now we’re paper thin. West Ham’s Winston Reid has been heavily linked so far, but any move for the New Zealand captain is only likely to take place during next summer’s window. Either way, Arsenal v Anderlecht is a match that will have some serious ramifications.