Arsenal: 4 positives from the 4-0 Liverpool hammering

Losing 4-0 is never, ever welcome. To be outclassed in any fixture will never be easy to stomach. Arsenal were comfortably beaten by Liverpool on Saturday and there are no qualms over the scoreline.

Few envisaged a different outcome. On one side is a team challenging for the Premier League title bursting with players who’ve been alongside one another for years, mastering their craft under one of the finest managers in the world.

Then in the other corner is the youngest squad in the division who’re yet to have played double figures worth of matches together. Yes, Mikel Arteta has been in the job for nearly two years, but this group is nothing like the one he inherited.

‘Work in progress’ is apt.

Arsenal: 4 positives from the 4-0 Liverpool hammering as Mikel Arteta’s side see ten-match unbeaten run ended at Anfield

Even considering the already well-known gulf in class, there were aspects of the defeat that were concerning. The structure of the team had fallen apart as soon as the second goal went in, and the sloppiness that seeped into many of the players in the second half was an unusual reaction to what had transpired in the first half.

The result leaves Arsenal fifth in the Premier League table, exactly where they were before kick-off. Results had gone their way prior to them taking to the Anfield turf, and the goal of being the best of the rest remains firmly within their sights.

Was it all bad? No, it was not.

Everything about this team is based on progress: are there signs of the team growing as a unit, improving in certain aspects and showing competitiveness where they otherwise wouldn’t have? While the analysis will look at the worrying elements of the performance, there were also positives to take, even in such a heavy loss.

1. The Belief Within the Team

The Arteta critics have been in full voice in the aftermath of Saturday’s defeat. Looking at the underlying metrics of the season – goals scored, xG and chances created – there is reason to be concerned.

Losing at Anfield shouldn’t be the springboard for a pile on, though. Arsenal were beaten by a team miles ahead of them in their development and few expected any different.

What Arsenal did do, however, was come to play.

Even in horrific defeats to Manchester City and Chelsea, the belief within the squad was evident in the early exchanges. On this occasion, and for longer this time, Arsenal played with real confidence that they could turn up at Anfield and get a result.

The team was near enough the same from the previous outing, with the same youthful and inexperienced personnel, and the word that has become Arteta’s buzzword, unity, was evident as the group believed in themselves and the manager’s approach. They thought that playing the way they know against one of the toughest opponents in Europe would get them a result.

It didn’t. Obviously. In the end the Reds superiority was far beyond what Arsenal were capable of, but for a large period of the game they didn’t let the opposition or the occasion get to them. Whether or not it is getting the performances and results that most would like, this team truly believes they’re heading in the right direction.

That is something to draw solace from.

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2. Arsenal Had Defended Well for 40 Minutes

The first goal was gut wrenching. Not because there was a belief that it wouldn’t eventually arrive, but because Arsenal had up until that point defended stoutly.

Led by Gabriel and Benjamin White, they had stood firm against most of anything Liverpool threw at them.

Aaron Ramsdale had to be ready to make saves. Every single goalkeeper has to at Anfield. For an Arsenal side in their current position, if they were to have any chance of securing a positive result then they knew Ramsdale would have to have a good game.

Prior to the opener though, every ball pumped into the box was batted away by the head of White, and every ground duel was mopped up by Gabriel who had done brilliantly shifting out to the left to aid Nuno Tavares against Mohamed Salah.

Even with a ferocious frontline charging at him, there was trust in Gabriel to handle whatever was thrown at him. For 40 minutes of this game Arsenal were compact, determined and combative in defence.

Takehiro Tomiyasu was getting chopped up by Sadio Mane throughout the half, and while he was lacking some quality in the final third, he was doing his job, too.

Did everything fall apart after the break and the second goal? Yes. Heads dropped, structure vanished and the calmness shown from the defence in that first half was replaced with rashness. That is concerning. It wasn’t pretty, and most of the things the backline did well prior to the half-time whistle was replaced with the opposite.

But, we’re looking at positives, and for a good while there was some brave defending on show both in and out of possession.

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3. Nuno Tavares & Sambi Lokonga’s First Half

Remove the second half from the equation. Wipe it off the face of the earth. What happened to and with both Nuno Tavares and Sambi Lokonga after the break was a cold, hard lecture in Premier League football.

Both had horror second halves. They’re young, they’ll learn from it, move on.

As for the first halves, plenty of positives can be taken from their individual performances. Neither were spectacular, but they both played with energy and courage. In Nuno’s case, he had barely put a foot wrong up until his mistake for the goal.

He ran the touchline, dug in to cover Salah, made underlapping runs and got himself into good positions to withstand what Liverpool threw at him. He was fearless.

As for Sambi, the complete lack of Thomas Partey in the game meant he was left almost to hold the midfield on his own. Liverpool had marked the Ghanaian out of the game and wanted centrality from Arsenal to go through Sambi, and while in an attacking sense he struggled to offer a lot against the hosts’ lethal press, he never shied away from receiving the ball.

Slow in transitioning in the early parts of the half, he grew into the game and started making first time passes around people in the way everyone had hoped Partey would. He wasn’t exceptional and in general the midfield was lacking, but he did some elements very well with his midfield partner nowhere to be seen.

On reflection of the performance, there is no greater example of a ‘game of two halves’ in regards to individuals’ displays. There is a lot to be encouraged about by Sambi and Nuno in that first half before inexperience took precedence. That should be the main focus, not what came after.

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4. Aaron Ramsdale Remains Outstanding

This wasn’t a game for Ramsdale to flex his distribution muscles. Almost every pass he made was either five yards to one of White or Gabriel, or a long ball into Aubameyang.

But Arsenal left Anfield losing by four goals and their goalkeeper was their best player. Again.

He loved it out there. For a while, anyway.

When the scores were level and he’d made two or three key saves to keep Arsenal in it, the most memorable moment of all was when he tipped Trent Alexander-Arnold’s drive over the crossbar. The grin across his face when he made that save just before the opening goal was something unique. A wry smile before screaming at his defenders to up their game.

Were it not for his interventions then Arsenal could, and should, easily have left Merseyside with their biggest defeat of the Arteta era. Ramsdale never stopped shouting, never stopped organising and barely ever stopped saving.

He’s been on the end of some hammerings during his career but this was his first one at Arsenal, and despite feeling he should have kept out Mane’s header and not fumbled Salah’s first half shot, he can leave feeling he played his part.

What a brilliant goalkeeper he is.