Arsenal Vs West Ham United: 5 things we learned – Champions League hopes alive

On Saturday afternoon, Arsenal hosted West Ham United needing a win to keep their top-four hopes alive. Here are five things we learned from the 1-0 win.

Arsenal’s performance against West Ham United on Saturday afternoon certainly was not their best showing under new head coach Mikel Arteta. In fact, it might have been their worst. But by hook or by crook, they got the job done and eased their way past the Hammers thanks to a late Alexandre Lacazette strike which keeps their Champions League hopes alive amid a tight race for a top-five finish.

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Here are five things we learned from the 1-0 victory.

5. Central midfield problematic

In recent weeks, Mikel Arteta has seemingly settled on his starting central midfield pair: Granit Xhaka as a slanted left-sided option who often slips into a left-back area, and Dani Ceballos, the deep-lying conductor tasked with controlling play from deep while also instigating attacks with probing, progressive passes. On Saturday, this combination was a major weakness of the team.

The distribution of both was poor, neither eclipsing a 90% pass accuracy rate. They were both guilty of poor passes straight to West Ham players that immediately made Arsenal vulnerable in transition. Neither was willing to push the envelope and play more testing passes into the final third, while Xhaka especially lacked quality in the final third when given opportunities to create.

And all this comes with the added caveat that starting both is a defensive liability. They are slow, not natural defenders, and can be painfully exploited on the counter-attack, as West Ham did to great effect. While the Xhaka-Ceballos pivot may be the best option that Arteta currently has available to him, it is a problematic set-up overall and one that must be solved come the summer.