Arsenal Vs Cardiff City: The need for speed

Arsenal played terribly slowly in Tuesday night’s 2-1 win over Cardiff City. It is why they struggled to create many meaningful chances. I, therefore, have the need, the need for speed.

Unai Emery’s halftime substitution of Alex Iwobi made all the difference in Arsenal’s 2-1 victory over Cardiff City on Tuesday night. Emery, renowned for his in-game tactical awareness and alterations, recognised what his team required and then supplied them with the perfect player to provide that element.

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On this occasion, it was speed. And not just speed in regards to a player’s individual quickness, but the speed of the overall play. Specifically, the speed of the ball. That is what Emery wanted to increase. And he believed that changing the rather ponderous Mohamed Elneny for Iwobi was the injection of pace that the team needed. He was not wrong.

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It is no coincidence that the Gunners’ two goals came from quick plays: Iwobi sliding Sead Kolasinac in behind a confused and unprepared Cardiff defence, because of the earliness of the pass, to ultimately win a penalty; a direct, deliberate, explosive surge forward by Alexandre Lacazette into a surprising amount of space in the penalty area. Who knew that injecting pace into an attack would cause panic in the opposing defence and create chances?

Not only are Arsenal a slow collection of players — only Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang could be classed as a real burner, and even his loose dribbling slows him significantly when he has the ball at his feet. Contrast that to Liverpool and Manchester City who have two, three, four attackers who boast searing and terrifying pace, with and without the ball — but they also play slowly. And that is criminal in the modern game.

Defences are too good if you allow them time to settle into their positions and protect their distances between one another. Attacking teams must either strike when the opposition is disorganised and unhinged in defensive areas or play at a speed that pulls individual players out of the spaces they should be protecting and then exploit that space. Arsenal do neither.

Is this is a systematic failure or a personnel problem? I doubt that Emery is asking his team to play so painfully ponderously in the final third as they did on Tuesday night. He was the one who made the switch to Iwobi after all. He has also routinely stated that he wants his players to be protagonists with the ball, implying that he wants them to take risks, to try things, to be adventurous and inventive. Passing slowly and sideways does not classify.

Arsene Wenger once said that you could tell if his Arsenal team was going to play or not in the first few phases of possession depending on how quickly they moved the ball. Both he and Pep Guardiola — and many other top managers, for that matter — have an almost obsession with moving the ball from player to player with speed. The first-time pass is the most precious skill. The more touches you take, the less likely you are of scoring.

There is a need for speed in the modern game. Only, no one seems to have told Arsenal. If Tuesday night is anything to go by, Emery and his players must quicken up in everything they do.