Mikel Arteta seemed to have Arsenal in order last season, even though they fell short of their ultimate goal of winning the Premier League. But with Ben White bombing on the right, Aaron Ramsdale a big personality in goal, Gabriel in centre-half, Thomas Partey in midfield and, usually, a recognized striker in Gabriel Jesus or Eddie Nketiah, they were again a force to be reckoned with. to keep up. .
That’s why, in what was an unconvincing start to the season, fans and pundits were somewhat bemused to see him tear up that formula and start over.
Partey now plays as a full-back who moves into midfield. Gabriel cannot look in as White has advanced to the center half. Against Fulham, Arteta had Leandro Trossard as false number 9, one of those tricky, technical players who floated forward; and David Raya is signed, do you suspect he will replace Ramsdale in the long run.
With Manchester United, their opponents on Sunday, not quite consolidating their credentials either, Manchester City’s potential rivals are already at risk of looking like phantom title challengers.
Why mess with a winning team? Part of the answer lies in the fallacy of that statement: Arsenal finished five points behind Manchester City and need to improve. Evolve or die is the mantra.
Arsenal were a force to be reckoned with last season as they used the same system all season
However, the Gunners have made adjustments this season and have looked unconvincing at times
Eyebrows have been raised over Mikel Arteta’s decision to shake up a winning formation
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Yet it also lies in the plethora of assistant coaches, techies, tacticians, TV viewers and software experts employed by every Premier League club these days.
Each club has a war planning room with several employees, some with PhDs from MIT and Cambridge University, known as the analysis department, who produce charts and statistics on all their opponents.
Arteta says the technology is evolving so fast that it’s not just a game changer from a decade ago. Even from this season to the last you have to change again.
“Believe me, it’s a different game,” Arteta said. And in a year it will be very different. And it’s very different from a year ago and two years ago.’
Where ever a 4-4-2 would suffice, Arteta answered questions about his formation on Friday by questioning the interrogator about which formation he meant? “Recently there were 36 different formations in the game,” said Arteta. “To Manchester City, 43. So I don’t know what formation we’re talking about?”
He then compared the questions he was asked about tactics to him, a Spaniard with a few years of experience living in the capital, to questioning a Londoner. taxi driver about the possibilities.
“I wouldn’t know anything compared to him because he’ll tell me all the backstreets and options and the best times.” The message was clear: my work is a lot more complex than many think.
An analyst working for a big club sympathizes with Arteta’s dilemma. “Arsenal needs to be better than last season to win the league or keep up with City and they need to adapt,” the analyst told Mail Sport.
Arteta says technology moves so fast that you have to make changes or fall behind
An analyst who works for a big club sympathizes with Arteta’s dilemma so far this season
“Coaches and teams can’t get away with doing the same thing. If they try something on Saturday, the rest of the league will have analyzed it on Sunday.
“Because of the size of the analysis teams and the access to the software they have, they may even know what the triggers (the team’s supposedly secret signal) are for a team to turn fullback.
“They will be able to identify that and come up with a plan to counter that and exploit the weaknesses. That’s what sets the top coaches apart. Pep (Guardiola) is clearly the big one, in his ability to innovate and make the smallest adjustments.
“Clubs might be working all week to stop a move and then he might change it just a little bit, so players say, ‘Well, we’ve been working to stop this? But they don’t! They’re doing something different!”
“That’s what separates the top coaches from those who might be a bit of a flash in the pan.” An analyst working for a big club sympathizes with Arteta’s dilemma.
Once you could surprise a team with a new formation and get away with more or less the same tactics for a few weeks. In 1987, QPR manager Jim Smith played a 3-5-2 system with a sweeper in the old first division.
Coaches Albert Stuivenberg (center) and Nicolas Jover (left) have influenced the Spaniard
This had never been seen before in England and QPR were unlikely to top the league after ten games, winning eight of them. The plan only failed when they met eventual champions Liverpool at Anfield in October, losing 4–0.
But QPR still finished fifth. In the digital age, life is not like that. They would be discovered within a fortnight and the job of a Premier League coach is truly a ruthless game of shadows, feints and bluffs.
“It’s something that has moved so fast over the last decade and the rise of analytics departments has a lot to do with the quality of football we’re seeing in the Premier League across the board, not just top teams,” said the analyst. .
Coaches can’t afford to go three, four, five games to see if something works. They have to change on the fly. It’s definitely a game of cat and mouse. There is a lot of double bluffing. “We want you to think this is our weakness, but we intend to make you think that: We’re prepared for that.”
For Arteta, his analysts are Kevin Balvers and Ben Chadwick. Probably his main influences are his coaching team, Albert Stuivenberg, Nicolas Jover, Carlos Cuesta and Miguel Molina. Together they will have hatched these current plans.
Linked by their time at Barcelona and then as colleagues at Manchester City, Arteta is often seen as Pep’s Mini-Me, which explains why he works so hard to outshine Pep’s mentor.
Ben White (left) could return as right-back against Man United, paving the way for Gabriel to get back into the group
“Pep does some things on the fly because he has that quick-thinking brain, but he will have been working on new plans and Arteta is cut from the same cloth,” the analyst says.
At the end of it all, with Oleksandr Zinchenko supposedly fit to play today and Partey injured, Gabriel could be back at centre-back with Ben White at right-back, returning him to last season’s game plan.
And yet Arteta will undoubtedly say otherwise.
The game keeps changing. His nemesis continues to evolve. And until he can innovate Pep Guardiola, Arsenal will remain in second place.
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