“We need to generate more to win football matches,” uttered a desperate Mikel Arteta on the evening of 19 December 2020.
The novice Arsenal coach had just seen his Gunners outfit succumb 2-1 at his former stomping ground, Goodison Park. Yerry Mina’s header in first-half stoppage time consigned the north Londoners to their worst-ever start to a league season since 1974/75.
Arsenal’s recent brilliance means events from the early Arteta years feel like they occurred in a bygone era. They sunk to woeful depths at times, enduring crises worthy of the title. The aforementioned defeat at Everton left Arteta on the brink barely a year into the job. If it wasn’t for an Emile Smith Rowe-inspired resurgence after Christmas, Massimiliano Allegri may well have ended up at Arsenal after all.
The issues during the formative stages of Arteta’s reign were proper issues. The Spaniard inherited an ego-laden squad without the talent to boot and was aiming to appease a toxic, emotional fanbase bereft of stability. The culture shift and subsequent transformation he’s helped to oversee has been borderline astonishing, and should he see out the remainder of his new contract, Arteta would’ve spent eight years in the Emirates home dugout.
Arteta’s early woes laugh in the face of the media-driven narrative that’s gained some momentum heading into Sunday’s north London derby. Social media engagement hunters are claiming underdog status, while it has been suggested the upcoming period will be the ‘biggest challenge’ of Arteta’s still-young managerial career.
Come on, let’s play a game. Shall we guess what’s gone so horribly wrong in Gunners quarters heading into the ultimate bragging rights duel? Dressing room scandal? A dodgy lasagne? 11 players out? Ooof, this is exciting. It must be a proper crisis. Go on, enlighten us.
Arsenal have three midfielders missing.
Missing in the literal sense would be quite the drama, but no, the whereabouts of Declan Rice, Martin Odegaard, and Mikel Merino are each well-established. I know, what a letdown. The suspended Rice will miss 90 minutes of football, a bloke that’s had one training session at London Colney is out until October, while Odegaard’s ankle sprain will rule him out for merely a brief period – most likely.
This is a big-boy Arsenal team; one on yet another Premier League title hunt following back-to-back second-place finishes. Sides of such a calibre do not merely fold in the absence of three stars, no matter how significant they are to what Arteta aims to achieve weekly. Poor Arteta’s now got to rely on Thomas Partey and Jorginho in the middle of the park. He may even have to drop Kai Havertz into a deeper role, even though he was playing so, so well up front. Ugh, it’s just not fair. Who’s he going to have to lean on up front now? Gabriel bloody Jesus or Raheem Sterling and his 123 Premier League goals?
Much to Arsenal’s credit, they have cultivated a squad laden with quality and bereft of deadwood. Arteta isn’t being forced to use an ageing Mohamed Elneny or elite huffer-and-puffer Dani Ceballos in mitigation, but a pair of seasoned midfielders with all the experience in the world.
The Gunners are not of the calibre to be winning league titles if their on-field utopia is undermined by so few absences. Sunday’s derby will be a big challenge, but the very best adapt. Kevin De Bruyne missed a bulk of Manchester City’s title-winning campaign last term, with Erling Haaland also enduring spells on the sidelines. The Cityzens refused to flinch.
Arsenal, in comparison to their rivals, were pretty fortunate on the injury front last term, and the ridiculous load put onto players means regular fitness issues are cruelly now part and parcel of the game. What the Gunners are currently enduring is no crisis, far from it, and Arteta knows it. He’s endured far, far worse.
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