I’ve been listening to a song recently by Becky Hill called “I could get used to this”.
Three North London Derby away wins in three seasons for The Arsenal.
I definitely could get used to this.
I said pre game yesterday and in the days leading up to this that I hate this game in the season. It has for many years been an unhappy hunting ground for us and the fact that prior to this winning streak at The Toilet Bowl we’d gone something like eight years there without a win in the league, shows why I hate this fixture. But as I said on the Same Old Arsenal podcast yesterday, I need to update my priors, because as an Arsenal fan I am still living in the fear that everything will eventually collapse. I am still living in the past in terms of shattered dreams, which as such, means that I do not appreciate how good this Arsenal side is that Arteta has built.
I had a BBQ with mates on Saturday and one of them is a Spurs fan. We had a decent chat and I told him that he must be delighted because we had injuries, we hadn’t clicked this season and this is probably a good time to be playing us. And their fans in the ground seemed like they knew it for the opening 10 minutes or so. Tottenham started more brightly than us, created a couple of half-chances and Raya made one decent palm away and I honestly thought it would be one of those difficult afternoons. But as Gary Neville had talked about in commentary, Arsenal knew exactly what they were doing and they approached this game with the air of a side playing a specific game plan to the letter of their manager. We slowed down play, we took the sting out of the intensity of the match and despite Jarred Gillett delving our cards like they were sweets to children, we remained composed. There was that one moment that at halftime Sky pundits got a bit weird about with Jurrien Timber, but Arsenal remained unfazed and saw it out to halftime at what felt like a game planned 0-0.
On the Timber situation, that’s not a red card in a million years, I wasn’t even sure if it was a yellow to be honest, because Timber wins the ball and gets there first before Porro comes in. The Spurs player of couse made a meal of it, but what was also good afterwards was how calm Timber was in walking away from the situation after Vicario tried to provoke him.
So we’d got to halftime and even created a couple of chances, as Arteta’s game plan played out perfectly and you’d have to say even the way the second half went, it felt as though Arteta had mapped out this game in the lead up to it. He even said afterwards that he had a plan he’d been preparing for days, then that all had to be ripped up after the injuries we sustained during the week, so it really goes to show you just how impressive he is as a coach that he pivoted to Plan B and his players acted on it.
Plan B is of course to remain compact, give no space through the middle, push the Scum out wide and have them deliver balls in to the box that Gabriel, Saliba, then occasionally Partey, could nod away. There was talk from some of us in the week leading up to the game that Arsenal could deploy a back five, but given how we move out of possession, it almost feels like a bit of a redundant discussion. That’s because at times we saw three at the back with Partey dropping in between the centre halves, which enables us to fan out at the back and create more width for White and the excellent Timber to move forward. It’s things like this that are anbling us to control certain parts of territory on the pitch and I think it worked perfectly in the North London sunshine.
We’d had the defensive side sewn up and the approach was spot on, but the only thing missing was that goal, which Big Gabi duly obliged us with on 64 minutes. Honestly though guys, will ‘Big Ange MATE’ ever learn? As we said on the pod yesterday, personally I’d be fuming if I was a Spurs fan seeing Gabriel in the centre of the six yard box unmarked to head the ball past Vicario. One of Romero or the ‘keeper has to deal with that, but of course for us, we are delighted that they didn’t. Last season we were awesome at set pieces, Spurs were terrible, so it felt like the most obvious situation play out and it left the Toilet Bowl quiet, save for the limbs happening in one corner from the away end.
Tottenham had more possession, more shots, but they never really massively threatened as Arsenal did what we do best – defend imperiously. And the result is that we come away with three massive points.
The points are massive because it’s a hard ground to go to and beforehand I would have taken a point. In fact, if on Saturday somebody could have offered me three draws this week, then I’d have taken that too. But instead we have all three and from a purely numerical perspective, we’ve ticked the points box already with three instead of two. But I also think this will be a massive tick in the box for those players as well, because they’ve won the NLD, they’ve shown a defensive solidity that sends a message up to Manchester and even though we’ve got a load of injuries, we’re showing that we’re still up and ready for this fight.
We’ve picked up six points from Villa and Spurs already this season and were it not for some shocking refereeing we’d have maximum points so far from what has been a really difficult start. Whilst other teams have had it relatively easy starting the season, we’ve gone in to this one in the most difficult of circumstances playing some of the toughest teams, yet here we are just one more game domestically to go in the ‘death Run’ of matches and with 10 points. I’d have taken eight points if you’d have offered me them at the beginning of the season up to this stage, so the fact we’ve got two more is brilliant.
Now, bring on Atalanta.
Catch you all tomorrow.
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