It ended 2-2. Twice Arsenal had the lead and twice Liverpool brought them back. Towards the end, Arsenal had a back four that did not contain a single first-choice element in its usual position and yet looked strangely tested late. Lay it out like that and it sounds like a silly thriller, and yet somehow it all felt a bit flat.
Arsenal had even ruled out what many on the pitch were celebrating as a stoppage time winner, although it turned out that referee Anthony Taylor had already blown for a foul on Jakub Kiwior, something that should have been obvious from Gabriel Jesus’ body language as he crossed the ball over the line. This is Arsenal, and so there had to be a conspiracy theory, which, apart from the irrefutable fact that Taylor is from Greater Manchester (like, you know, Manchester City: coincidence? Really?), seemed to focus on the fact that the referee He waited a moment before making a fairly simple decision. Wait and see if there might be an advantage? Or taking orders from the shadowy anti-Arsenal forces running the game?
While it is easy to mock the persecution complex of some Arsenal fans, it is true that, after a long period of reasonable luck with injuries, they are now experiencing a regression to the mean. The fact that William Saliba was suspended last week after his red card in Bournemouth was his own fault, but losing Gabriel and Jurriën Timber due to injuries sustained during the match while he was already without Riccardo Calafiori and Takehiro Tomiyasu was deeply unfortunate: a back four of Thomas Partey, Ben White, Kiwior and Myles Lewis-Skelly is not what anyone had in mind.
That’s enough to boggle any mind, especially when captain Martin Ødegaard remains absent and Bukayo Saka, excellent after his return from injury, was always likely to have to be withdrawn before the end. Arsenal have been guilty of dancing with disaster, always focusing on the frustration of referees’ decisions going against them and players being unavailable, but in this case they were unlucky with injuries. Maybe they could have done something different to close out the last fifteen minutes plus stoppage time, but when Trent Alexander-Arnold measures a pass behind your 18-year-old full-back and Darwin Núñez with such precision, then, for once, you choose the right option to To beat Mohamed Salah, Arsenal cannot blame themselves much.
The surprise is actually that Liverpool were unable to exert more pressure after the equalizer. It was Arsenal who threatened, which inevitably, if perhaps not entirely fairly, leads to the view that their response to the injuries was too cautious. Arne Slot was clearly frustrated and protested against Arsenal’s wasting time, but at 2-2 he showed no inclination to gamble.
But these aren’t gamblers. Football is at a remarkable point in its evolution on the field. The game has been becoming more and more offensive for years. Improvements in the fields and changes to the laws have encouraged passing and ball possession. Sitting inside and being pampered is very unusual these days. Last season we saw a Premier League record of 3.20 goals per game. This season the average is 2.90, which is still extremely high from a historical perspective. But the elite is always a bit ahead and leads the evolution. Before 2008, there was only one season in which the number of goals per match in the knockout stages of the Champions League exceeded 3.00. From 2008-09 through 2019-20, there was only one season where it fell below 3.00. But it has been under 3.00 in each of the past four seasons.
It is true that the last three of these coincide with the UEFA competition abandoning the away goals rule, but the trend predates that point. Jurgen Klopp even suggested in 2019 that if everyone focused on attack, competitive advantages could be found by improving defense. Slot and Mikel Arteta are coaches of this new warning.
There were of course four more goals scored in the Emirates on Sunday, much higher than the Premier League average. But this was a typical game of modern elite football. Arsenal had the best defensive record in the Premier League last season, Liverpool have the best this time. Neither Arteta nor Slot are instinctively defensive in the manner of, say, José Mourinho or Antonio Conte – although, as he showed in the draw at City, Arteta has his moments. But both have a risk-averse approach to possession. They are not like Klopp, who urges their teams to move the ball forward at every opportunity and continually roll the dice. They want control, to dominate games by denying the opposition. Possession, or at least possession in dangerous areas. It is the logical path for football, after its harum-scarum years. And the result is games like this: matches that seem to have all the ingredients of a thriller, but somehow don’t feel that exciting.
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On this day…
On October 28, 1865 Arthur Wharton was born in the Gold Coast (now Ghana) into a wealthy family. His father was a Grenadian minister of Scottish and West African descent, while his mother was a Fante king. When he was 17, he moved to England to train as a Methodist minister and, in addition to his studies, he proved to be an exceptional sportsman. In 1886 at the Amateur Athletic Association Championships he won the 100 yards in a time of 10 seconds, which equaled the world record. He was also an excellent cyclist and played cricket and football, keeping goal for Darlington and then, in 1886-87, Preston North End.
However, he had moved on before the league was founded, preferring to concentrate on his running, thus missing out on Preston’s unbeaten double in 1888–89, before joining Rotherham in 1889 to become the first black professional footballer in history. He subsequently played for Sheffield United and Stockport, while coaching Stalybridge Rovers, for whom he signed Herbert Chapman, who as manager would win the league with Huddersfield and Arsenal. When his career ended, he found work in a mine. Struggling with alcoholism, he died in poverty in 1930.
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This is an excerpt from Soccer with Jonathan Wilson, the Guardian US’s weekly look at the game in Europe and beyond. Subscribe for free here. Do you have a question for Jonathan? Email footballwithjw@theguardian.com and he will provide the best answer in a future edition