Last Minute Joy But Massive Warning Signs

0:27This podcast has been brought to you by the show. Luckily for Arsenal fans, I've always said that needing two own goals and an injury time winner to beat a record-breakingly bad team is actually the sign of champions. This is the Arsenal Vision post-match podcast and it's me, Phil Costa, in the hosting chair while Elliot is travelling back to sunny Minnesota after podcasting away from home this week. He did, of course, attend the 3-0 win against Club Bruges with me before finding himself at Emirates Stadium on Saturday for the 2-1 thriller against Wolves where everything went to plan and absolutely nobody was stressed out.

1:03Thank you as always for being here. And you see, it's not just those tanned athletic legs in the Arsenal team that get tired. Vocal cords get tired as well. And I'm sure there might be a sore head and maybe some jet lag to nurse. So we're going to go through some rotation today while he gets his bearings and his voice back. Don't worry though, I've got two guests joining me for today's main pod episode, two heavyweights who will make you forget all about Elliot. And one of those guest is tim hello tim hello there and uh i don't appreciate the heavy weight uh even if it is true nowadays look it was just a title as opposed to a an observation tim and obviously we've also got clive hello clive hello hello people said i lost a little bit of timber on saturday look i'm seeing the cheekbones clive i'm seeing them i was about i think i put on all the weight i have lost on one day in the pub the stress eating and the stress drinking to deal with whatever we saw on saturday night i mean before uh i mean obviously if you haven't listened already there was an instant reaction from the ground on saturday night with elliot clive and andrew from arse blog who tried to dissect what they had just witnessed before getting kicked out of the ground uh but now we've had some time to sit on things and hopefully discuss what happened in more detail um before we get into the game let's talk the lineup because there were five changes from the team that won against Club Bruges with William Saliba, Jurian Timber, Declan Rice, Eberechi Eza and Bakayo Saka all coming back in for this one.

2:29The big boys and I was happy with that. Nothing too unusual. Although there was one thing that stood out to me, the absence of Myles Lewis Skelly, obviously with Ricciardo Calafiore suspended. He felt like an obvious inclusion at left back with Timber and Saliba coming back into the team. Ben White probably needed a rest as well, some load management after basically three 90s in a week um unfortunately we flew a bit too close to the sun with him and we're probably going to miss him now for the foreseeable future but we can touch on that on a bit more detail later i mean clive what were your initial thoughts on the lineup was there something you liked didn't like uh tell me about it yeah well when you see timber and saliva back in and rice back in i saw the lineup went yeah i'm really happy that so I tweeted it out before the game and half a million impressions later were people giving me stick saying we should have done this, should have done that hold on a minute, we weren't sure Sleba when he was going to come back so I was really pleased to see him back so that was my initial thoughts and when the game starts off you see straight away what the intention was and we basically went straight to a back three with Hink Happy on the outside Sleba in the middle and Timber's right-sided three and Ben White was just set free to go ahead and so that was obviously the plan you know and then when we play lewis gay there we tend to invert with a you know with a left back inside and we have like a double with with a superman we all know the shape the three two but um but yeah i i was fine with it i honestly i was i wasn't going to get too angry about the start 11 i could see what we were trying to do there are things i don't like at the moment about our structure which i'm sure you've all heard me say a few times and And I don't like where we've defaulted to under stress.

4:15You know, I don't. I really like when we sort of play in pairs and squares, if you know what I mean by that, rather than wide triangles. I don't like to see Rice too high too early. I don't like to see Ben White staying next to centre forward with Timberley. These are things I don't like. It doesn't mean I'm right. I just don't like it. So yeah, so the line-up itself was absolutely fine by me. but then you read your Twitter and suddenly people are talking about Miles who I think was maybe a little bit unfortunate but I thought when he came on I thought he let people know that I'm still here do you know what I mean and I thought that was a really interesting start to his sort of cameo I mean Tim I have to be honest I don't really understand why Lewis Skelly didn't start here not even from Lewis Skelly's perspective but from a Ben White perspective because he's barely played this year um I was going to say this season but I do mean this year you know he hasn't been able to put a string of games together obviously there's been reasons for that he hasn't been super sharp and fit enough to play Timber's been excellent but after three uh almost 90s as I said earlier it just felt like this was the right time to bring him out Wolves at home it's a chance to get Lewis Skelly back in can you make sense of why he went for um or decided to keep Ben White in the team as opposed to bringing miles back in i mean not really i think what clive says there is right he was clearly a part of the tactical game plan with how far advanced he was and he wanted that and he probably felt that you know against a low block you want a bit more of an overlapper um compared to timber but obviously and and i think there were elements of his selection that would have been influenced by the fact there's no midweek game perhaps if we had a midweek game he might have gone well actually I'll sit Ben White out for this and I'll bring him back in midweek but I wonder if they just looked at first midweek off since August let's just like let's just go for this and then you know everyone gets a couple of days off or something but I can't make a huge amount of sense of it beyond that to be honest I think it was clearly a mistake and I don't even think that's a hindsight thing to say I also think Hincapia like I think while Gabriel's out keep him going at left center back because he's kind of learning it and I feel like moving him back to left back and then probably Everton is going to go back to left center back like I think when you're feeling such an important position like that I think continuity is important I think we've seen that with Jakob Kivio before by the way when he'll come in a couple of games might look a bit ropey but whether it's left center back or left back he eventually settles And I think when you've got quote unquote backup defenders, that's important.

6:56And I also think with Saliba coming back into the team, like we just, we shifted a bit too much, like Saliba going to left centre back. You know, I think Saliba and Hincapier fitness permitting will start at Everton and that's not really a partnership we've seen much of. So keep it going, get Myles Lewis Skelly in there. I don't know how much the red card against Wolves last season influenced anything there. I mean, it shouldn't have been a red card, so maybe not. And, you know, Clive, to your point, when Lewis Skelly came on, I was looking at him and I was thinking, why were we not comfortable having this from the start?

7:34I think like a left back that goes into midfield, again, against a low block that you're trying to rely on moving around, would have made a lot of sense. And I think in hindsight, overall, I'm not pretending I thought this before the game, it was a bit lumpy as a team. Some of that's dictated by fitness of attackers, but not enough technicians in there. It was a bit, you know, Martinelli and Jocherez against a low block, probably not quite technical enough. No Marino, who I think is a very underrated technical player, understand that Trossard couldn't start. I think there's an element to which we tried to muddle through this game a little bit selection-wise and it didn't quite come off.

8:19so wolves 15 games played going into this one 13 defeats two draws uh 33 goals conceded and only eight scored i mean they're on a five point pace for the season which would leave them six short of the current 11 point record set by derby county in 2007 uh 2008 so as home fixtures go i don't think arsenal could have asked for much more in terms of bouncing back after the late defeat against Aston Villa and I don't think complacency is something we see very often in this Arsenal team I don't think it's a word that exists in Mikhail Arteta's vocabulary but there was an air of complacency to this game in the performance because I think mostly the feeling going into this was oh we're going to win two or three nil easy days and be on our way no matter how hard you try to avoid that seeping into your bones into your psyche we're only human right and even for us it can happen for the pros it can happen and even just dropping your levels five or ten percent um in the premier league things can things can escalate very quickly something felt very off um yeah yeah sorry nipping yeah yeah yeah so i was gonna say this at some point in the pod i don't think i maybe there was complacency i think what happened mentally certainly in the crowd and i'm not blaming the crowd for this um was like a fear of ridicule like the crowd got antsy much earlier than i think they would have against pretty much anyone else in the league there was like i was listening to the crowd sometimes and don't get me wrong i felt like this as well and it was like come on come on come on oh my god and i was looking this is our game it's like it's 55 minutes you know what i mean like the the crowd got 85th minute energy at 55 minutes and and again i'm not blaming the crowd for that's kind of what the team gave us but it felt so tense so early and I think in the crowd there was that fear of oh my god I'm going to go on Twitter and everyone's going to take the piss out of me which I think is really infecting our fan base a lot this season I think there's a lot of fear of ridicule and fear of being perceived I don't think the players felt like that I think the I think quickly they got quite tense as well And I don't think it was the same thing as the crowd.

10:35I think for them, it was a bit, oh my God, we're expected to, this is like much harder than we probably thought it was going to be. So maybe you can call that complacency, but I think it was a, oh shit, like everyone thinks we should be three or four nil up by now. And it just, it felt quite desperate because even everything I've said about not having enough technicians in the starting lineup, we brought them on early. we brought them on 55 minutes and nothing changed and I do think for the first time there was a genuine psychological element to this performance for me which was a bit like oh shit if we don't beat Wolves like you know I think I think we got we got the fear a little bit in this game I have to say I mean I was one of the the few people on this podcast that weren't in the ground so you'll you'll be able to give me that insight and Clive you the same yeah but something fell off very early on and it's something I've noticed a lot with this group is that you can always tell how things are going or how things are going to go within the first five minutes I mean I don't think we've ever been fast starters under Mikel Arteta maybe barring that first sort of title challenging season with Zinchenko and Jesus coming into the team but the way we were moving the ball the lack of punch and conviction in our in our movement worried me and you've complained a lot about the balance of the team recently and how certain players might be um redundant or stepping on each other's toes what do you think went wrong in this one was an issue was it an issue of profile was it an issue of balance all of the above sort of take me into your tactical mind for this let's talk let's start with the pub first right before the game and everybody i spoke to was talking five nil i even heard eight and maybe because elliot was there you might get your 10 nil you know and the monday night just blame him it's fine the monday night versus manchester united informed many of us this is the worst team in the premier league and it's expectations the game starts right the ball starts rolling slower than i can run informed wolves too by the way clive i thought they were much better they got humiliated on monday i think that's a key point we need to give wolves some credit as well because they came here they sat in their 5-3-2 they were very aware defensively, resilient, hardworking.

12:49They were tracking runners. So obviously they have a role to play in this game as well. But I'm obviously looking at the Arsenal side because we should have enough to beat them either way. Yeah, not just a 5-3-2, but quite a narrow 5-3-2. And they're giving us the outsides, hence why Ben White probably started this game because he knew what was coming up against Arteta and that makes a lot of sense. And they were not going to get embarrassed on live TV on a Saturday night. They were going to go and see what happens and see how tense we've become. So I do think there's a level of complacency. Last time I felt that confidence before a game was probably the ball and were 3-2.

13:22Everyone thought we'd win that one. It would be a few seconds that we were down. And suddenly the tension coming in. Tim's absolutely right about the really cool side of things. It's perfectly put. And I think that you can extrapolate that for the season. We've been set up to be the champions. And suddenly, every time we drop a point, it's like, oh my God, we're going to get told we're bottlers again. Do you know what I mean? And so that sort of emotion is everywhere, really. so what i will say about the start of the game phil is that we have an expectation of the ball moving and going around and we go around the outside and we're having lots of off the ball runs and slip through passes mate what's the first thing to me it's that game again free kick after free kick foul injury stop start restart long throw rubbish mate no flow there it's no one's fault it's just the game players staying down not quite getting the training on but staying now long enough to slow the game.

14:18Everyone does it. I'm not blaming Wolves. To slow the game, to try to make the first 20 minutes really messy. And they got it, didn't they? They got a messy first 20 minutes. I can't remember a shot. I can't remember much. A couple of crosses that were headed out. Timber had a header that he took from Jokeres again. Again, he flashed in front of him. And I'm thinking, hmm, this is just a steady, normal Premier League game. But of course, the tension did hit a little bit quicker, really. so from our side of things i just think we've become a little bit passy passy to the man pass to the next man pass the next man everyone's pointing where the ball should go and it's almost like 30 passes and a goal we're not enough people running off the ball apart from one man who you'll know we'll probably get to later on who wants to dart in and dart around and move and and suddenly we're just looking a little bit i don't want to say it version 1 as elliot said version 1.0 is from last year and it's just it's just where we are emotionally at the moment we just got to take it and and get away from it but i'm i'll say to you every single game this year i've been to at home have been really interesting and quite joyous and i didn't have the joy if that sounds and that's not good analysis but I didn't have the joy I just had the fear of what we could lose and if I felt that I think I think I'm not the only one who felt that and I'm sure it's on the pitch as well right so this one's out of the way and in some ways it should have been the best game for us to have it it's probably the worst before a break last day at work before you go on your summer holidays you're never that good are you do I mean and um sitting in the corner flag yeah and we weren't that good and now they've got a chance to decompress for two two three days and then come back at the weekend and we need it all of us do I mean you mentioned it there it was a very slow non-eventful half Wolves were looking to stop the flow of the game at every opportunity Arsenal a bit limited to the crossing um from wide areas although Ben White on the overlap was a key part of this game uh he pulled up I mean there was it was that in that passage of play when he was chasing Huang.

16:32I mean, how he somehow found himself through on goal in that moment with nobody around him amazed me. I was almost waiting for the camera to pan back to see somebody there and there was nobody there. And I thought, oh God. So I think Zubimendi might have lost it on the edge of the box and all of a sudden we're sprinting back. It gave me Gabriel vibes, chasing Adama Traore a little bit. And you could see very clearly his hand goes straight to the hamstring. And that's what, three to four weeks out, unless we got some very good news coming in the post again Arteta said post-match that we were buying tickets for another injury because we didn't have anybody else I have to say I'm not sure that's true in this particular case I thought we could have chosen Lewis Skelly he was available we know how physically demanding it is to play at fullback especially if the idea was for Ben White to be on the overlap getting in behind supporting Saka it's it's just frustrating to me because we found him again we found him again and he's found a good level.

17:29He's playing well. We're seeing more of the old Ben White that's comfortable inverting. There's a Ben White that's comfortable sitting in a three as well. He would have been so useful to have across this busy Christmas schedule. And now he's gone for a month. So naturally that pushed our back four into something a bit more familiar, as you mentioned, with Timber at right back and Capier coming in at centre back. It didn't really do much to change the way that we were playing though. There were a couple of nice runs from Lewis Skelly going through the middle. There was a header for Martinelli at the back post that he should have done better with, in my opinion.

18:01There was a moment for Jocarez to attack the six-yard box, but he was caught on his heels a little bit when Saka just put in a dream of a ball. And it's not the first time that's happened, unfortunately, with Jocarez just being a little bit slow to the mark. Again, when it's a half like this, we're always putting the microscope on one or two moments because they feel important right but just tim i i will ask you again about that moment with jockerez in my mind he's too slow there he's not anticipating the ball in he's not creating separation from the defender is that how you saw it in the ground yeah um i you know sometimes you know doing these podcasts and stuff like we're fan media right so we want to tap into like the emotion but we also kind of owe it to the audience to be sensible and try and do sensible analysis so if i tell you what i was saying about yokra i won't tell you what i was saying about yokra's in my whatsapps and post match point release the files probably it's it's ungenerous and not for public consumption is pub chat um yeah i i because i'm trying to i sent out tweet at halftime um which was basically as close as i'd get to nowadays doing that kind of pub chat thing where i say like everyone says like with a team like arsenal oh they just need someone to put the ball in the net they just need a striker to do that and it completely undervalues and underrates the striker's role in the actual build-up i think there's two things that really come out in this game about the personality of this Arsenal team the personality of our team is still our structural solidity I don't want to say defensive so much but structural solidity when we went on that run before the November international break where we won I think seven and then just drew the Sunderland game when all the attackers were injured what did we do we went two nil lockdown that I think that's what Arsenal probably in their bones like doing the most you know get two nil up maybe one of the goals comes from a set piece shut the game down make the last 20 minutes very very kind of boring and we've lost that personality because we lost kind of both the centre backs and we've had to do a lot of change back there so we looked more come basically this block has flipped on its head last block loads of attacking injuries lean back on the out of possession stuff we look much better this block it's gone the other way around we've lost the defensive personality of the team and now we've got all these new toys to play with an attack and actually it's you can tell it's a bit bumpy at the moment and there's a lot of change as well so there's there's I think Elliot kind of pointed out how many different attacking lineups we've had so that that's the kind of slightly generous explanation if I think of the maybe two games where Jokeres has played really well Burnley away Newcastle away well what are Burnley and Newcastle away defined by centre backs who want contact who want to smash your ankles who want to elbow you in the small of the back and you back into them those are the two games Jokeres has played really well against low blocks where the centre backs are like we're staying here we're staying in our penalty area we're not engaging we're not coming over to you he looks a lot less effective he still looks very heavy and lumpy to me that was my initial impression but I kind of thought well he hasn't had a pre-season and you know he's obviously quite a heavy set guy it did remind me of I think Troy Deeney used to say that he'd deliberately be very bulky at the beginning of the season because he knew that his physique would taper down a bit.

21:55And once it came to challenging for the playoffs and stuff or fighting relegation, he knew that March, April, he'd be in really, really good shape. And I did wonder if there was a bit of that with Jocheres, but he still looks very heavy, very lumpy. And I'm afraid we're past the point of they don't create for him because when Marino plays up front, when Jesus plays up front, when Havertz plays up front, they get shots. That's not a problem for them. The quote-unquote problem there is none of them are mega, mega clinical. But the other thing about the personality of this Arsenal team, I think, is from an attacking standpoint, it's at its best when it's an orchestra.

22:39It's not one person you're trying to create for or one person driving things forward. This game is Saka. everyone else like sorry you're getting if I'm the keep you're getting one out of ten the rest of you this game is Saka wins us this game and it's such it's such a it's criminal that he's not getting anything in the assists column for this game but and I don't think Arsenal are their best like that Arsenal are their best when it's you know it's like a liver it's like an organism you know it's it's like more of a choir I don't think we're a an attacking unit who like let's just create chances for this one guy and yes at the moment I think Jokeres there is some truth we're adapting to him he's adapting to us but I'm sorry mate like you've got to be on the end of those to justify your place in the team because you don't do enough else and but I do also think with strikers like that you kind of have to score 40 or 50 to justify I do think that's just the way it is if you're Haaland if you're Lewandowski yeah you can do like absolute non-entity in the build-up if you're scoring that many goals and I just don't think he's ever going to do that and I think the the number of circumstances I can think of where he's really useful seem to be diminishing a little bit I mean look you you were unhappy with my heavyweight description earlier, but you've just compared Jochores to Troy Deeney.

24:10So I think that's a one all in my book. I mean, Clive, I was going to touch on him more individually later, but just give me, give me some thoughts on Jochores. I mean, it's been a difficult few months for him. Like Tim said, he came in cold with no preseason. He's been injured. We're having to learn how to play with him. He's learning how to play with us, but you often speak about that night in Lisbon where you saw him up close he certainly gave Gabriel and Saliba things to worry about but he looks he looks a shadow of that player at the moment and we need to find ways to get him more involved I mean in 81 minutes 15 touches three out of six passes completed one shot and eight possessions lost I know he was a little bit better in that second half and there was one moment where he pinned Agbadoo and spun him but if we're squinting and looking for moments like that it doesn't look good already how do we get more out of this player without it affecting the rest of the team we have to make a decision how we want to play and in the games where he's played well we've got to him early so this team which is based on our collective abilities with basically 11 midfielders on the pitch they're not used to saying like giving away what they want to do and giving it to one guy that may not win all his races that may not keep it that may not get his shots off in time, they're not prepared to divulge everything and give it to that person.

25:34That's not in our mindset. So everybody wanted a centre forward, a true centre forward, a true nine. But actually, are we psychologically set up for a true nine? Do we think the first thing in our body is to get it forward and give it to that guy? So in the teams he played with before, he was that guy. If he raised his eyebrow, the ball was coming to him. That's not how we play. that's not saying to me that we all agree he's not at his best at the moment right so let's just go let's go a bit deeper into this right we don't play like that we don't give it to one guy is this one guy we're going to give it to is number seven right so we don't give it to our center forward early we don't we're not defined by that we never have been and we tried it at the start of the year and people are helping it around the corners and things like that really really quickly and away from home i think he's got a useful value i do i think someone of our one of our friends sort of sort of said online this started at the villa selection the villa selection was wrong for that game if we'd had jokeres and a couple of sprinters for the villa game i'd be much better this was a technical close to box game this was not the right game for him this wasn't the right this is more of a marina game where the arena played at villa was hooked at half time.

26:49Does that mean? So the balance issue started from then and they're flipped on game after game with dyslexia not being right for the game that actually transpired. The good thing this year is that we can make substitutions when we get it slightly wrong and we can, because we've got good players on the bench and not a bunch of kids. And so for me, are we, the question is, are we prepared to say this is how we play and we're just going to give it to the number nine? I don't think we are. And player, I don't think the players wholly trust all aspects of his game. And I don't think he's getting the ball.

27:22I'm not saying he's doing well with the ball, but I don't think we're set up for that psychologically. So for me, if you want to play him, you've got to do things very, very quickly and directly and instantly to get the best out of him. And in this low block game with three absolute monsters standing in the centre part of that pitch, there was no instant passes for him. It was the wrong selection for this day. It really was. This was a day for midfielders, combinations around the corners. Probably a Mikel Marino day, to be honest, but he's played a lot of football, right? And where we don't even bother with centre-forward, he rolls out and runners go past him and we go from there.

28:00So that's the ideal combination for this game. So Jokeres, I did see him in Lisbon and I did. I was saying, Tim, you was at Newcastle, weren't you, mate, in that game? He was high up there. I don't know if you saw him, I just saw the top of his head. but you didn't look at him and think he's rubbish on that day does what i mean uh he was far from it he was really robust and he got around people again the game was longer we were more direct we went down the sides really good performance well i you know what i do when i despair i go back and watch these games again so i watched the newcastle game again to see if i what i saw and he was really quite good in that game so once you see something you know it's there so why isn't it not coming out partly i don't think we're ready to divulge ourselves to that center forward but secondly i think he might be struggling a little bit with the weight of responsibility and the weight of i'm you know i'm being judged by goals and i'm not scoring i'm not getting the ball i'm not getting the touches and you can feel it weighing on him you can just feel it weighing on him is that is he but can he accept that responsibility can he accept it i'm not sure and i'm not sure if the players are quite there with him neither and it's not to make excuses for him it's just me trying to go deeper and find out why because i've seen it i've seen him do well he's done well i remember the leeds game in the leeds game we beat them he's knocked it into madelowake run around the outside and smashed the side of the post where's that player gone we when he stepped up he scored in that game when he sat tight for the penalty there was not a single person in that crowd didn't think he was going to score when he scored against Bill Barrett at the home game flashed across the guy and headed it in everyone goes well what have we got here don't forget what you've seen ask yourself why is it not coming out and since that Burnley game what's disappointed me is we all thought he's turned a corner but it was the wrong corner he's actually gone back to exactly where he was we were helping him through the pre-season no pre-season bit of the season and he's gone back to that.

30:02So that's my concern. So yeah, I just think he's struggling a little bit. He is. He's struggling a little bit. But I do think this game didn't suit him. And I think there are others that maybe did. But I think he needs a reset as well. Let's see where we are. Let's see who we are. But when I start seeing Kai Havertz compilations go around my Twitter feed, and I've got slagged for supporting him for so long, when you start to see him getting thrown around, you're thinking okay people are coming to a conclusion aren't they the guy who doesn't play is suddenly the best forward in the world right so come on Kai hurry up and get back yeah I mean personally I like the idea of signing Jokeres this summer because in a pretty awful striker market he was this single-minded ruthless relentless force who was coming off two amazing seasons in Portugal someone who had shown a capacity to fight and improve with each season And more importantly, he offered qualities this Arsenal team was lacking in terms of his running in behind, the aggression of those runs, taking shots, being on the end of things.

31:04But there was just always this little voice in the back of my head that said, can he step up? Will he be able to step up? And nobody could argue with his output. I think he scored 102 goals in 97 games for sporting. So that's not the question for me. I think part of the question came from who those goals were coming against. and there was just a nervousness about you know the level of the Portuguese league I mean 37 of his 39 goals last season were against teams in fifth place or lower only two goals came against those above that and they both came against Braga so no goals against Porto or Sporting you know I just look at him at the moment and I think whether it's a mobility issue a football IQ issue looks tense yeah confidence issue a mentality thing he needs to thrive on those moments where it's about him against the defenders but he's barely creating any separation and that means in close quarters or in the bigger spaces and I'm just starting to worry a little bit um that he's being exposed by the level but I'm not ready to write him off after four months I think that would be ridiculous um but maybe there's there's a question that we need to revisit in in a few months just to see where we are because I'd be lying if I said I wasn't worried a little bit but yeah let's get on to the second half anyway this is the closest he's gonna get to playing a crap portuguese team by the way absolutely yeah this this was rio arvi you know and and he couldn't score against them so um to be honest heading into the second half i was shocked that nobody was hooked at halftime because we clearly needed something different on the pitch a different set of qualities more lock pickers than runners uh maybe but it didn't really matter because they got 10 minutes and nothing in those 10 minutes would have persuaded the manager to keep things going as they were.

32:51So it was Erdegaard, Marino and Trossard coming on for Zubimendi, Ezer and Martinelli, who actually nearly scored just before he came off. He did really well to spin Matt Doherty maybe on the outside and run through on goal. I mean, that was one of the only times we saw it in the game. But Tim, I'll ask you again, what did you think the motivation was behind those changes and with those guys on the pitch how was Arteta planning to change the game yeah I mean clearly that tells you the starting line-ups wrong right and and I think if it's not for the Ben White injury that is a half time at least one of those guys is on at half time I think probably having used one sub already was a bit like okay I'll give it 10 minutes but I often say this on the podcast like you can tell when Arteta makes an angry substitution I can see him he's directly in front of me I see those arms waving out the corner of my eye and it's just like right all of you get on come on get on um and I don't think that's a bad thing by the way I think clearly he was trying to inject a little bit more technical quality into the game a little bit more movement Marino Trossard they're very much in that kind of you know tricky players they find spaces they find pockets and all of that I did think I kind of feel a little bit for Zubimendi because he tends to get hooked in this scenario just because Declan Rice can sit deeper and Declan Rice just has such an extraordinary all-round game and his set piece delivery is very important so like Zubimendi almost comes off by default because you can't take Rice off and he can sit He wasn't happy about it either.

34:32No, no. And also, look, Zubimendi's played a lot. He starts every game, doesn't he? The most minutes, Tim. He's had the most minutes this year. Yeah, exactly. So, you know, there's no big drama there. But I did wonder if, like, having that control a little bit deeper might have actually been useful, I think, against low blocks. Zubimendi's very, very important. I talked about this a bit when we played West Ham and we played Odegaard and Eze. and that was the one game Zubermendi didn't start. And like, I know it was only 20 minutes, but we created bugger all. And then Zubermendi came on and all of a sudden the ball starts going into the box.

35:10It's that same thing I was talking about earlier. Like your centre forwards movement creates chances, right? So you can't just say, oh, if this guy just stands on the penalty spot, he'll tap in a load of goals. And so, you know, there was maybe something to that. I mean, I thought it was absolutely right. I thought that that fixed the balance of the team for sure. I'm pretty certain that in the ordinary run of things, Arteta would have liked to have started at least one of those players. Probably Trossard. I was slightly surprised not to see Madueke, actually. And I do think, again, that might have been helpful for Jokeres to have more of a winger, perhaps going on the outside, getting to that touchline, getting balls into the area to attack.

35:54and having that crossing from both sides, because Saka's crossing is always on point, but maybe as well from a left footer on the left, you get that going on the outside and you get that low cross in as well. And from there, own goals can happen as well, particularly when you're playing a team that's got 10 players in their penalty area, you keep whipping it across the area low and that's not Martinelli's game. So I guess I was slightly surprised not to see Madueke, but at the same time, I think maybe he should have started over Martinelli, particularly because of the game Maduaki had on Tuesday, Wednesday night against Bruges.

36:34And so, I don't know, maybe again, they're just looking after his fitness, but it just didn't feel like the balance was right. That triple substitution on paper corrects the balance. But like I say, I think by that point, we had a bit of a case of the scaries and it was like oh my god this is the consequences of not winning like any other team in the league I think we'd have probably still been quite calm at that stage so it helped a bit but it didn't it didn't massively help um I don't think I don't think it it significantly changed the performance yeah we look it was a very low bar the first half and I think to have maintained that level would have been super worrying so any kind of improvement any way we could have injected something else into the game helped us and I think it did you know we were generating some shots from the edge of the area there was pressure and crosses and corners and free kicks so naturally there was a swing in momentum even if it wasn't us peppering the goal or their goalkeeper I mean I think it was the 66th minute um the rice shot from the edge of the box that was our first shot on target in the game so against Wolves at home you can imagine what the game is like at that point although I did like Trossard's cameo coming off the left you know he was very cute and smart with some of those passes between the lines some touches helped free Lewis Skelly in behind he was finding rice centrally but then the goal does arrive and it comes from Bakayo Saka for me Clive he was the standout performer of the day and it's you know we have to wrestle with this idea a lot because it's quite simple we don't win this game without him he was levels above any other player on the pitch maybe right in the second half I think had it had a good performance as well but um Arsenal will always have a right-sided bias because he's really fucking good that's how I see it with Saka like there's no way we we can truly balance this team it's because we always look for him as you said we always look for number seven he had more touches in the opposition box created more chances and completed more take-ons than any other Arsenal player in this game and won all 10 of his jewels in the game.

38:43So he wasn't just on it from a technical and creative standpoint. He was on it physically as well. He was playing against a back five that sometimes turned into a back six on occasion. So you're having to be two players at once all the time. That's quite special. And I agree with Tim. It's a shame that he's not coming out of this game with a couple of assists because he was the guy that was really making things happen. Did you see his performance or stature growing in that second half, Clive? And where did things really shift for you? Don't worry too much about him. He's probably going to come out of this game with a contract, right?

39:17So that's the highest paid player in the club. Which he absolutely deserves. I think what stood out on the weekend when we were all a little bit tense and a bit nervous, that he doesn't get that way. He doesn't default into bad behavior. So you could see, you know, let's just go through it, right? Martin Ely, schoolboy missed on the far post. One yard, two yards out. That's crap. Got to head it in, right? Jokeres, I've called him a relentless runner. Did you see any relentless running in the forward areas in this game? I didn't see much relentless running. I can think, but we're not going to him.

39:52But you've got to keep making the movements and the players will eventually think, you mean business, I'll come and find you. Your body language tells you things. Eze, really, really quiet in this game. Didn't get on the ball enough. maybe a bit too right-sided, where he's much better for me, supporting the centre forward. Essentially, he was tucked in off the left. Again, the balance on our side wasn't right on the left-hand side to allow him to tuck in. The team selection was wrong. We all know this now. Wrong selection for this day. And so as a group of forwards, we have one guy that does it all of the time.

40:26You know, when we... By the way, he doesn't take easy work. When other people are sticking it in top corner with three-four and up, he doesn't think, or I'm going to stretch myself out to join the party. He knows when to step up, when it's hot, when it's like this, when everyone else is down. He says, no, I'll take care of this now. Give me the ball. And he turns into something like a true player. I think it's a worry for me where people go under stress. This is the first time I've seen it. And I don't like it. I don't like it, I'll be honest with you. I didn't like what I've seen. I've seen nothing but courage, relentless ability to press the ball off the ball, to get up the pitch.

41:07I don't see people scared to play, playing without courage. I'm scared to go and press the game. It really disappointed me. Wasaka was just so available to do the hard work, to take it, to take a foul, protect the ball properly, to deliver his corners on point, deliver his crosses between the sticks, not to the over the top for the ball boys to pick up. he drops it properly in the areas he just does things correctly and doing things correctly under pressure is the key thing that separates players from normal players to elite players and he keeps doing it and but phil i'll be honest here it's great and we've done millions of podcasts together where we've praised bakaya saka but we're arsenal people and this is not going to last this one man attacking it's not going to last we've all been here before you know every time he touches that hamstring we're going to be we're going to be petrified this is not going to last unless other people take their load you know and um and we need to happen quickly because the defenders did it in the first phase of season tim alluded to earlier on to restrict people not having a shot on target and now we need our forwards lift our defenders so they're not dragging their hamstring so we need them to do the business and we're not caring the same way about finishing chances stroke half chances the way we care about stopping shots going on our goal it's not equitable we need to care a lot more with that last little sprint that last little run to get on the back post to head it properly this stuff needs to be upped because right now if we want to win this league there are there's another team that's quite free scoring and i don't sense the same tension with them around the goal and we need to change this in our heads we can't just rely on number seven that's probably why i've got the hump i've had it for a while because i've watched it and it won't work eventually like by munich will do they'll put two left backs against him and don't bother with the other side and say you beat us from the left side you beat us from the center forward at the highest level can we do that and that's the question i'm asking forget walls right we'll done on the bus Christmas party this week enjoy yourselves this is a question we have to answer can we if Bakayasaka doesn't do it who else is gonna do it continuously and consistently right so that question is still to be answered in my opinion I mean I think we saw a little window into what that world could look like midweek obviously Madueke with a really impressive performance, scored the worldie from 25 yards, got into the back post to score again.

43:47But for me, it's not about the quality. It's about the consistency of people being able to deliver. So Martinelli could score twice in one week and then he won't score for another month. Madueke the same. Can he do that week on week, which is for me the issue. I think Saka can always deliver or most of the time he can score the goal that gets us ahead or he can score a goal that puts us in with a chance to win the game late on but I just don't get that feeling yet from any of the other attackers I mean there was an option to maybe bring Ethan on in this game Madueke but I thought that the changes were pretty obvious and signposted when when we made them we go ahead the goal slightly fortunate but again it's down to the delivery it's a really horrible one for John Stern he sort of taps it onto the post we get a bit lucky with the Martinez ricochet but that's fine I'm not complaining and then I think you did see Arsenal lose some weight from their shoulders there was a freedom in the center of the pitch Trossard had that chance where he went through but couldn't quite sort his feet out there was Odegaard running through hit the side with his right foot so there was a bit of intensity and intention to get that second however those last 10 minutes were a mess an absolute disaster and you could see the equalizer coming from miles away whether it was fatigue nervousness where the wolves just threw caution to the wind, whether it was a tactical issue, maybe a combination of all of the above, we were dropping deeper and deeper.

45:13We were struggling to clear our lines. The amount of challenges and second balls that we didn't win in that little passage of play, it was inevitable. And there was a good article this morning on The Athletic where I think Stuart James broke down that little passage of play that led to the goal. And he said, we had 84 % possession in the second half and registered eight attempts on goal in that period to Wolves is zero. Even if we weren't convinced by the performance level, that's still pretty dominant and an improvement on what we saw in the first half. Between the 83rd and the 90th minute, Arsenal's longest passing sequence was three.

45:49Wolves went from barely touching the ball to dominating possession. They had more than 80 passes in that period. So Tim, you know, if you're looking at this from the touchline, And let's say you're Mikel Arteta in this moment. The team's dropping further and further back. We're not winning the second balls. We're ducking out of challenges. What happened in those final stages and why did it happen? Yeah, again, this is why I think it's a psychological thing. You could say, you know, maybe like if Gabriel's there, he wins a big header. He screams for everyone to, you know, politely screams at everyone to move the defensive line up and get up the pitch.

46:28maybe if Zubimendi's there we get our foot on the ball we pass our way out of trouble a little bit easier maybe maybe maybe but I think I think we just got the jitters I really I really think it's kind of as simple as that that it was like oh god we've got to protect this and to be fair we we do that a lot but we do it with Saliba and Gabriel and we do it much further up the pitch the West ham game in october 2-0 we shut it down nothing happened burnley away 2-0 we shut it down nothing happened we defend high and we keep our shape that way and i think we were trying to do the same thing but 30 yards further back which is why we couldn't clear the ball and it's funny what you said about the passing sequences because i don't you know um in my dotage i don't and because we're a good team I don't have cause to I don't shout many disparaging things at the team anymore but you know in a moment of stress even when we took centre after their goal we couldn't keep it and literally in the build-up to the goal I think I just shouted like try two effing passes let's let's see if we can get to two shall we and then we got to three and we scored and it really was that simple like we couldn't keep the ball and and and i just i haven't seen that in so long it reminded me of like one of arteta's more famous quotes was after that watford game in 2022 where it went we went two goals up twice and we let watford back in and that's when he had that famous quote about i want 300 000 passes in their half of the pitch and he bought zinchenko and you You know, I think something happens in every season that really shapes Arteta's thinking about the future of the team.

48:16And that Watford game, I think, was crucial in terms of what comes next with like Zinchenko and Jesus and keeping the ball far up the pitch, even if you're not like going hell for leather attacking, but keeping the line really, really high. And like, you know, never mind 300 ,000 passes, as you said, we couldn't do three. and and i just i haven't seen that in so long that i just have to think it's psychological i can't i can't look at the players that were on that pitch and go oh yes it's because he's on or whatever even like someone who you know um we all go to our hobby horses in these moments we all and anything that's nagging at the back of our minds that's where we go when we play badly so for me that was jokeres i don't mind saying that but he's not on the pitch when that's happening I think it's not his fault.

49:04He's gone off at this point. So I can't pick on him and plant it on him. These are players who have put unbelievable level of consistency and results together over the last two to three years. So when they do that, and I don't recognize it, I just have to think it's psychological. They got edgy and they were thinking. Again, I think nearly any other team in the league, that wouldn't have happened. I just think there was a psychological weight around, And oh my God, this is the bottom team. If we don't do this, this is going to be huge. I think it was, I hope it was anyway, quite unique in that respect.

49:44I think you're right to highlight a psychological issue there. But I also think in terms of our defensive basics and our technique, the pressing was wrong. I think where we were standing in our structure and our block was wrong. and I'm always pointed to an Arteta quote and he said after the game in relation to this sort of passage of play he said we generated more chances scored a goal but after we had a period of two or three minutes in deep totally passive with horrible defensive habits that is nowhere near the level that is required against a team that hasn't had a single shot and then he followed it up with there's a moment that you cannot press them that's fine but the level of activity in the block has to be very different to the one that we had every time you win in the premier league you should be happy and conscious of the difficulty of doing so but we made it even harder for ourselves today and that's the big lesson clive based on what i've just said there and what tim said as well what do you think went wrong in those final stages was it a structural issue a mental issue all of the above i mean that was very unarsenal on a day that continued to feel very unarsenal yes i rewatched the first half hour and the last 15 minutes this morning, and I looked at the front line when we should have been pressing, and we got in that front four, we got Saka, Jesus, Trossard, and Odegaard.