Same Old Arsenal
A comfortable victory. First 3 points of the season in the bag. Our £65m striker scores his first of the season.
Pre-game, a lot of the talk was about the lack of new forward at the club. In the pub chats, I stood strong on my opinion – anyone that comes in must be better than Kai Havertz, and as of yet no striker has moved clubs who I would have taken above Germany’s first choice.
As Havertz rose to head in our opener, I felt vindicated in sticking by my guns.
My thought was that had we signed Dominic Solanke, Ivan Toney, Ollie Watkins or Benjamin Sesko and they scored that goal, we would all be saying “what a difference a proper striker makes.”
Havertz goal was a delightful header. A proper strikers goal. Something that Olivier Giroud would have been proud of. And he has the added benefit of his all round game being superior to others who are simply just goal scorers.
I get why some fans would have been a little negative when seeing the starting XI. It contained no new players, with Riccardo Calafiori on the bench. But this is where we are with the squad right now.
Last season we pushed Manchester City all the way. So there is no need to fix something that is not broken.
It is always clubs lower down the table that make a huge number of signings. Those at the top, with world class squads, tend not to see a huge turnover in players. And those that come in need to be better than the players they are replacing.
Would Dominic Solanke at £65m or Julian Alvarez at £80m be an improvement on Havertz and Gabriel Jesus? I would say no. Meanwhile, Calafiori is a step up on Jakub Kiwior, and Mikel Merino is a better option centrally than Emile Smith Rowe.
In years gone past, we have started slowly as new players needed to get to grips with playing with each other. The advantage of signing so few was that everyone already knew their roles, and had the connections.
We saw Ben White and Bukayo Saka renew their relationship on the right – whoever the new England manager is needs to make amends with White. We have Oleksandr Zinchenko coming in off the left to make an extra man in midfield. Thomas Parety operating as a one man defensive midfielder. Gabriel Martinelli an outlet on the left. It was very much “same old Arsenal”.
It was interesting to see Zinchenko going off after 60 minutes to be replaced by Jurrien Timber rather than Calafiori.
The feeling is that Calafiori has joined to be a “Ben White” of the left and will eventually be our first choice left back. But with Timber and Zinchenko we have options to play more progressive full backs on either flank.
The sub was not an indication that Timber is ahead of Calafiori in the pecking order, but that different players will be used for different situations.
There will be games where we want to go White left, and either Timber or Zinchenko right. And other games where it will be Timber right, and Calafiori left.
One comment I heard in the ground which hit a note was about how Arteta wanted to “reduce the minutes” of players.
A criticism of Arteta is that he trusts very few, and he does not overly trust his squad. Whilst this is justified, it is also because some of the squad players (such as Smith Rowe and Nelson) are not good enough.
This season we will see Timber and White share minutes on the right, Zinchenko and Calafiori share minutes on the left. Partey, Merino, Declan Rice and Jorginho share minutes in those two midfield position. Leandro Trossard and Martinelli rotate on the left and Havertz and Jesus rotate up top.
It is only William Saliba, Gabriel, Bukayo Saka and Martin Odegaard who will all Start when fit”.
On the later two, you simply do not rest your best players. How often did Lionel Messi, Mo Salah, Cristiano Ronaldo et al get rested or rotated at their peak? The answer is rarely.
When you have special talents like Odegaard and Saka, you play them. And the more they play the more their bodies adapt to playing.
So we have the first win of the season on the board. We now have a week off until Aston Villa next weekend. And then before we know it we are on the cusp of the first international break of the season.
Enjoy your Sunday!
Keenos
