Danny Murphy believes there’s a simple blueprint for teams to follow to upset Arsenal this season.
The Gunners have won 14 of their 17 matches across all competitions this term, and they subsequently sit top of the Premier League and second in the Champions League table.
That said, Mikel Arteta’s men suffered a blip at the weekend, drawing away at Sunderland to end their ten-match winning run.
While the Gunners were minutes away from beating the Black Cats, they did show some signs of vulnerability in the clash that Murphy believes can be replicated by other teams.
Danny Murphy says teams can upset Arsenal by being ‘pragmatic’
Paul Merson thinks Arsenal’s kryptonite is the 5-4-1 formation, although the evidence doesn’t suggest that the Gunners struggle against teams that play with this system.
In fact, the North Londoners haven’t found any style or way of playing particularly difficult to play against this season, as they’ve simply been able to breeze past most of the sides that they’ve come up against.
Sunderland defended well in a low block for periods against Arteta’s side, but ultimately should’ve been beaten based on the chances the two sides created throughout the 90 minutes.
However, former Liverpool midfielder Murphy believes the Wearsiders demonstrated to the rest of the league the way to frustrate Arsenal.
Speaking on talkSPORT, the pundit said that teams have to be ‘disciplined’ and ‘pragmatic’ to nullify the Gunners.
“So I think it shows you or shows a lot of teams in the Prem that if you play Arsenal and you are disciplined and you are pragmatic, you can nullify them,” he said.
“It was a hell of a goal [Ballard’s], wasn’t it? I think it was a long free kick, was it? I think he won or got challenged, the first one, then it dropped to him, and all of a sudden Arsenal can’t be patient anymore because you’re one-nil down, and the intensity went up for Arsenal in the second.
“That’s where I say the first goal is important because their quality and their persistence generally mean they’re going to get one.
“But yeah, I think now Arsenal have set this bar of their level early in the season, I think we will see teams be more and more compact against Arsenal, and just sit in and say, ‘come on then’, especially at home.”
Arsenal face the highest defensive line in the Premier League
Murphy’s point about teams being compact and sitting deep against the Gunners is moot.
Arsenal have, on average, faced the deepest blocks in the Premier League, and by some distance, as shown by the graphics below. Clearly, Sunderland’s tactics weren’t exactly revolutionary, but they represented just a slightly more extreme example of a low block.
As reflected in Arsenal’s results, this approach doesn’t tend to work for the opposition. When they sit deep, they ultimately end up unable to create anything of note because the Gunners are so adept at containing counter-attacks.
This is why Arsenal have kept so many clean sheets and they’ll continue to if their opponents approach the game in this same defensive manner.
Sunderland ultimately scored twice from 0.44 expected goals on Saturday, and this won’t happen most weeks for teams that play Arsenal.
Murphy hasn’t identified a way to beat the Gunners; he’s merely extrapolated this from Regis Le Bris’ side’s fortunate result.
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