The song sung by the Arsenal faithful goes ‘we’ve only got one Song’ but against the top opposition it is a huge part of the Gunners failure to win on the big stage.
Alexander Song has been a shining light for the young Gunners over the past couple of seasons and is the most improved player in the squad.His performances in the holding role in midfield eased the problem of losing Mattheiu Flamini two seasons ago.
His work rate and defensive skills have allowed the likes of Fabregas, Wilshere, Arshavin, Nasri, Walcott and Rosicky to bomb forward at every opportunity. His discipline also plays a big part in allowing our full-backs to play high up the pitch.
But this season has seen the Cameroon international add goalscoring and venturing forward to his all round game. He has come up with vital goals this season, none more so than in the last minute against West Ham. But his new attacking mindset leaves Arsene Wenger’s defence fully exposed.
The likes of Laurent Konscielny and Sebastien Squillaci have come in for criticism in some quarters but without protection from midfield defending becomes even harder. The 1-0 defeat at Old Trafford was a primary example. The number of times players such as Rooney, Nani, Anderson and Park were allowed to run at the defence was extremely worrying.
And in past seasons one of the major defensive problems has been dealing with the high ball but this year that has only been a major worry in the defeat to Newcastle when the defenders were given a torrid time by Andy Carroll.
But most of the time our defeats have come at the hands of skillful players with pace, such as Peter Odemwingie of West Brom and when teams win back possession and break in numbers like Tottenham. Every good side has a disciplined defensive minded midfielder.
Claude Makele did the job magnificently for both Real Madrid and Chelsea. Barcelona, the form team in Europe at the moment, are protected by Javier Mascherano and or Sergio Busquets. So why do Arsenal think they can’t get away with defensive protection. Against lesser teams Wenger might feel he can get away with it but quality sides like United and Chelsea punish sides who forget their
defensive duties.
It shows as Arsenal have not one against the Red Devils or the Blues in their last 11 attempts. There is a case for arguing players like Nasri and Arshavin are to blame because they fail to track back to help the full-backs.
But it is likely Wenger gives them the licence to attack and not worry too much about the defending side of the game. This is the problem. Not everyone can attack, someone has to do the flair players dirty work in midfield and in the Gunners side the obvious choice is Song.
But if he is pushing forward there is a distinct lack of a defensive midfielder. Ofcourse Wilshere and Fabregas can fill in but it is against there nature. It begs to question what Song’s role within the team actually is and when asked the question by the Mirror’s John Cross Wenger’s response was intriguing.
He said: “My philosophy is not to be in trouble, but to fool the oponnent into trouble. The teams close us down so much high up because they know we play through the middle, that I push my midfielders up at the start a bit up to give us more room to build up the game. Song is naturally a bit high up because I want home to be.”
This is a huge problem when Arsenal lose possession in the final third. It leaves huge gaps and space for the opposition to pull the defence whichever way they want to.
Not everyone in the side can be the star attraction and if Arsenal are to get serious about ending their trophy drought the need to close the space and protect the back four is vital.
And Wenger needs to instruct Song to show the necessary discipline or sacrifice Wilshere for another defensive minded player in Denilson. But The French manager cannot keep allowing everyone to bomb forward. It might be ok against lesser opposition but against the big boys it is vital as Wenger is finding out.
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