Arsenal Vs Leicester City: Unai Emery had the right plan

Unai Emery switched to a 3-5-2 formation with split strikers in Arsenal’s 2-0 defeat to Leicester City. While his team would ultimately lose, it was the right plan of action.

Arsenal’s recent deplorable run of form culminated in a crucial defeat to Leicester City on Saturday evening. After slipping to six points off the top-four pace with three winless matches against Sheffield United, Crystal Palace and Wolves, the Gunners travelled to direct rivals Leicester short on confidence and in desperate need of a win.

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With those many external contexts all in play, Unai Emery heavily adapted his team, wary of the threat Leicester posed in attacking areas and recognising that his team had neither the horses nor the confidence to meet them head-on.

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Emery devised a defensive gameplan, using a 3-5-2 formation with split centre-forwards. Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang and Alexandre Lacazette would track the full-backs, Mesut Ozil pushed onto Wilfried Ndidi, while the centre-backs were allowed possession throughout. That meant Lucas Torreira and Matteo Guendouzi could man-mark James Maddison and Youri Tielemans, while the wing-backs opposed their opposite wingers in one-on-ones also. Finally, three centre-halves were left to deal with Jamie Vardy. The two spare then had the opportunity to step into midfield to cut out passes and pressure touches if they decided to.

While the conservative, counter-attacking approach has been criticised since, especially in light of the scoreline, it was the right strategy to take in this given fixture. Arsenal were the better team for the first hour, despite ceding possession, and shortly after half-time, they began to exert themselves on the game, the spare centre-halves becoming a major benefit in possession as well as out of it. In his post-match press conference, Emery spoke at length about he felt the team executed the gameplan well:

"“We can be disappointed with the result but with the attitude of the players, they did the game plan we prepared for. We started the first half by having chances by controlling the game, and at the start of the second half too, in our moment like we wanted <…> The attitude was good, the game plan was prepared for and the players did that. The other team are in a good moment, at home and feeling strong. We had chances, we had our moments, to reduce the deficit, but they had chances too and scored two goals to win <…> We need to improve defensively. I think we had a good balance today in the first half. When they scored the first goal, maybe that’s the moment we lost the balance.”"

Again, some have criticised Emery for conducting such tactic, but for this given game, this was the best way for Arsenal to secure the victory. And had Alexandre Lacazette had his shooting boots on, they very well might have done precisely that.

This does not absolve Emery of the blame for the team’s recent struggles. The very fact that he had to approach this match in such a manner is evidence that his management is not effective. The team lacks confidence because they are playing poorly as a result of Emery’s muddled, confused and largely unsuccessful tactics.

Nevertheless, for this one-off match, Emery got his tactics right. The plan was the correct one, well-executed for an hour. Sadly, however, it still led to nothing. Under Emery, that is just where Arsenal are right now.