Patrick Vieira knows a thing or two about winning big games in an Arsenal shirt and he was on hand on Sky Sports today to offer first-hand critique.
Vieira battled Roy Keane and many more over the years as Arsenal’s leader in midfield and since then, he’s gone on to be a successful coach.
With so much at stake for Arsenal, the performance against United was a bit of a letdown and in the first-half in particular, despite going ahead, the Gunners never pressed on.
What was Arsenal’s biggest problem against Man United?
A lot of criticism in recent weeks has come around the forward play Arsenal are displaying.
And for Vieira, that was once again an issue, especially when it came to the wide players.
Patrick Vieira criticises Arsenal’s wide players once again
People seem to be on different sides of the fence in terms of Arsenal’s attack.
For some, the wide players are doing their job and it is the central striker who isn’t contributing enough.
However, some believe that Viktor Gyokeres and Gabriel Jesus are finding it hard due to a lack of service.
And speaking at half-time on Sky today, Vieira seemed to side with the central players.
“They’re not putting the ball inside the box enough and when they managed to put it inside the box, you have a lot of players inside, and they managed to create danger and to score, even if it was an own goal,” Vieira commented at half-time.
“But it’s interesting to see so many bodies inside the United box. And of course, they were lucky with that touch, but it was an own goal by Martinez.”
Arsenal’s crossing stats against Manchester United
While the point from Vieira is valid here and in the first period it did seem like Arsenal could get the ball in the box more, overall, they did try the tactic a lot.
Arsenal attempted 25 crosses in the game overall, the big problem is that they had an ‘accurate cross’ tally of just four from those 25.
Finish the sentence: Arsenal’s attackers are struggling because _______________
They also had nine corners, two of which they managed to scramble a goal from but ultimately, from open play, it all looked a bit haphazard.
This has been a problem for weeks now for Arsenal and Mikel Arteta does need to try and sort it out.
We see with Man City how many times Erling Haaland converts from balls from wide areas. It’s a place where the Gunners need to improve and in the end, could be a title-deciding factor.
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