Still TOTL. A nice place to be. And deserved on that performance even if that last ten minutes was more angst filled than it need to be. A good week all in all. A convincing destruction of Lens followed by a blistering start to the game.
This was seemed over after 20 minutes. Wolves are a decent team. Certainly, an improvement on Burnley and Sheffield. However, we dominated and controlled this game much quicker thank those games. Maybe it’s the benefit to actually having our attacking group all back and finally fit.
The only team selection issue was whether Have-That had earned the right to start over Trossard. Unfortunately, there was no debate about who’d start in goal. After Wednesday selection, we can well and truly consign poor Aaron to first the bench and then secondly another team. Rumors this week were that Wolves were interested in him. He deserves – and needs – to play somewhere and it clearly won’t be with us.
The start of this game was much more reminiscent of our play from last year. We tore Wolves apart from the start, sliced through them and were a pleasure to watch. None of the backwards and sideways interchanges were witnessed earlier in the season. And it’s not like they gave us any more room. Saka, care of the support from Tommi, looked more electric; Martinelli terrorized them down the other side. And Jesus linked up all our play.
Jesus was instrumental in both our goals. Playing more like a center on a basketball team, he joined up all our play. Firstly feeding the ball back to Saka and then playing a perfect one-touch pass back to Zinny to set up Odegaard. It’s this type of play that amplifies the intelligence and value he brings to our team. Sure it would be good to see him score more – how can that ever not be the case – but the creativity and movement he provides is not matched by anyone else we have. Maybe Trossard though he seems to prefer to operate on the left.
It was noticeable how much more Tommi overlapped and therefore provided Saka with more options. This liberates Saka and fuels our attack. The only cloud on the day was the injury Tommi picked up. Not that it’s bad to have White being able to replace him. But we need Tommi; he provides cover and competition for both full-backs. We can’t afford for him to be out as we enter the Christmas period.
We really should have put this game away earlier though with a third goal. I thought it would come before half time. And then in the second half, when we seemed to relax, we still created chances. Eddie had a one on one where he hit the post. He has to score that. And we hit the post another time and also Trossard had a difficult chance as well.
Overall it seemed plain sailing. There were a few worrying signs though. As with last week against Brentford, Zinny remains careless in defense. In the first half he made a few mistakes in possession. These were largely unforced errors. And then he proceed to hand Wolves a way back into the game,. Dithering inside our box he handed them a chance. And then the last ten minutes became quite tense. But even then, Raya had very little to do. Throughout the game Saliba and Gabriel controlled the game perfectly. These two are surely the best center-half pairing on the league. And for Arsenal, it’s the backbone of the team. I still have nightmares of the Mustafa and David Luiz combination as well as the Mustafa and Sokratis. Well, Mustafa and anyone would give you nightmares.
And in front of these two we have the majestic Rice. He had already defended their attack when Zinny decided to dither inside our box to give them that goal. As brilliant as Zinny can be going forward, you can see why City were prepared to let him leave. It’s that defensive vulnerability that keeps getting exposed. Which is the reason we brought in Timber. And the reason why we need Tommi to stay fit.
Odegaard was as involved and fluent as he has been in a long time. Hopefully this is him rediscovering his form. With him controlling the game, we looked as smooth and fluent as we have all season; that first 20 minutes was electric. That second goal was beautiful to watch. We just needed that third goal.
Back to Rice though. He was remarkable. How many times did he snap into tackles to break-up their play inside their own half. His reading of the game and anticipation is as good as I have seen. There is no way anyone would have know how good he can be for us. And there is no way we’d be top of the league without him. We should got back and apologize to West Ham for not paying enough for him. We should throw them an extra £50m. He’s worth it. What’s also amazing is that (fingers crossed) he does not seem to pick up yellow cards (or reds). I can’t even remember close calls. Yet he puts in ferocious tackles; he just knows how to time the tackles. And he provides that additional cover to Saliba and Gabriel. And that’s why we’ve conceded fewer goals than any other team. Mustafa must be so envious.
Now we just have to protect Rice. At least we won’t need him to play in that last Champions League game. We can let Jorginho and Elneny carry that one. And maybe see a little more of Nelson and others. But before that we have to play North Arsenal on Tuesday night. That will be tough; we’ve seen Liverpool struggle there. We know it will be physical but we have the team for this now.
Before departing it would be remiss to not comment on the genius ideas emanating out of the great brains of IFAB. Their latest masterful idea is to consider introducing sin-bins. And you wonder why football is in such a fucked up state? Really, when there is madness all around caused by VAR these great minds conclude that the resolution of all the anger and frustration is to introduce yet more stoppages, more subjective rules. And this time to protect the referees – to protect exactly those people most in the glare from the fucked up process and game decisions? That’s like trying to reorganizing the deckchairs on the Titanic just before it hit the iceberg. Or like, deducting Everton 10 points when City have violated 115 rules and have had no consequences.
There is so little referee abuse. Yet this is the problem they want to solve. It’s like a magician waving his hand to distract you from the real trick. With this level of stupidity, I’m surprised it was not IFAB that came up with the European Super League. When the leadership of our game is controlled by a combination of IFAB, PGMOL, FA, UEFA and FIFA is it any surprise that the continue to try and destroy this game. It speaks to the beauty and resilience of this game that they had, so far, failed.
City are likely to destroy the wankers down the road but that will still leave us TOTL for the weekend. So we can sit back and relax. And continue to admire this team. This coach. And this club.
-LB7