Arsenal will want to quickly forget about their 1-0 defeat against Newcastle United on Saturday.
However, despite being keen to commit this fixture to the history books, this result may in fact haunt Arsenal for some time.
After all, losing 1-0 at St James’ Park dealt a hefty blow to the Gunners’ hopes being crowned Premier League champions.
The North London club have now dropped points in precisely half of their ten Premier League matches so far this season.
This has allowed both Liverpool and Manchester City to build up a healthy cushion of points ahead of Arsenal.
Newcastle went ahead via an Alexander Isak header with just 12 minutes on the clock. This left Arsenal with plenty of time to find a way back into the match, but they never seriously threatened to mount a comeback.
Major Arsenal flaw exposed by Newcastle
As the game went on, and the Gunners were still in search of a goal, Mikel Arteta turned to his bench.
Around the hour mark, Oleksandr Zinchenko and Ethan Nwaneri replaced Gabriel Martinelli and Mikel Merino. Ten minutes later, Gabriel Jesus and Ben White came on for Leandro Trossard and Jurrien Timber. Finally, Jorginho took the place of Thomas Partey for the final few minutes.
White and Zinchenko are both full-backs, whilst 32-year-old Jorginho is a defensive-midfielder. Meanwhile, the only true attacking options Arteta would call upon were Jesus and Nwaneri.
Nwaneri is a huge talent and is admired by Arteta. However, to expect a 17-year-old who is yet to make a Premier League start to change a game such as this one is an enormous ask.
Meanwhile, Jesus has netted just once for the Gunners since January. On top of that, Arteta clearly doesn’t trust Raheem Sterling, as the Chelsea loanee remained on the bench.
Whilst Arsenal fans accept Martin Odegaard’s absence is a problem, Arteta otherwise had a healthy complement of attacking players available to him. The truth is, Arsenal simply don’t have enough attacking quality in their ranks.
Mikel Arteta must address lack of Arsenal squad depth
Arsenal’s lack of strength in depth looks set to be their undoing this season as far as the Premier League title race is concerned.
Arsenal were linked with a host of strikers over the course of the recent summer transfer window, but neglected to strengthen in that part of the pitch.
Arteta could sign a goalscorer in the upcoming January transfer window. However, unless the club’s form improves dramatically and immediately, then the Gunners will already be out of the title race by the time the winter market opens.
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