Or...
Arsenal Robbed By Another Referee
What's the story to take from Saturday's match?
Depends on your perspective, I guess. Here's mine:
Arsenal is too big a club to drop points against Hull at home. Arsenal is too big a club to blame results on a referee decision that took place 75 minutes before the match ended.
Arsenal is too big a club to win just 2 of its first 8 EPL matches. And Arsenal is too big a club to be 11 points behind the league leaders at such an early stage.
Arsenal dominated the opening 15 minutes against Hull. Alexis Sanchez scored a fantastic goal to take the lead. Sanchez was miles better than any other individual player on the pitch. But Hull were a better team than Arsenal.
Hull were level within 5 minutes of Sanchez's goal. The referee missed a foul when Mo Diame pulled back Mathieu Flamini. But Arsenal also made 2 mistakes in the build-up.
Nacho Monreal played like a fullback thrust into an uncomfortable position. His timid "challenge" on Diame when the Hull player first received the ball was downright cowardly. It's the type of defending you'd expect from a player thrown into an unnatural position.
But luckily, Mathieu Flamini was in position to cover for Monreal. Flamini darted in front of Diame and was in a great position, but rather than booting the ball out for a throw or corner--with Diame (literally) on his back--Flamini bizarrely attempted to play a 5 foot pass to Mertesacker rather than clearing the danger. This is where "keeping the ball" goes wrong.
At the end of the day, I try to analyze what Arsenal can do better. It's useless to worry about what a referee could have done better. We have no control over referees. We have full control over ourselves. And Arsenal made two glaring, foolish mistakes on the buildup to that goal. Mistakes that got punished.
Diame's goal was in the 17th minute. From that point on, Arsenal only had 3 more shots on target.
Not good enough.
This is a tactical problem.
Hull set up with 3 center halves and 3 central midfielders. They simply clogged up any available space for Arsenal to try their preferred short, intricate passing game. And like we've seen so many times, Hull's pragmatic, negative, defensive approach neutralized Arsenal's attack quite easily.
Wenger praised Hull's defending post-match. I'm not sure why. Our new 4-1-4-1 formation is hopeless. Anyone can defend against it.
Arsenal spent more this summer than Hull have spent on their entire starting XI. It's not all about the money, as so many want to believe. Sometimes its about executing a game plan.
Arsenal rarely does.
Hull's second was scored just 31 seconds into the second half as Arsenal came out from the break complacent and lazy. Like a team who thought Hull's first goal was an unfair fluke. A team that deserved to be winning. An over-confident team.
Even after falling behind, Arsenal could not muster a shot on target until the 86th minute, when Sanchez's header was pushed out for a corner by Hull's 3rd string goalkeeper. Santi Cazorla, who had a poor match, took the set piece with his weak foot, overhit it, and Hull nearly countered for a victory-clinching 3rd goal. A miserable pass by Jake Livermore wasted a 2 on 1 opportunity.
When Sanchez received the ball in the center circle in stoppage time, Arsenal were lucky to still be in the game. He proceeded to dribble past multiple Hull players and find Danny Welbeck in a great position inside the box. Welbeck had great composure as he poked the ball in with his left foot.
At that point it actually looked like Arsenal could steal a win. Kieran Gibbs nearly scored on a cross to the back post but the Hull keeper saved it well. And on the very last corner of the match, the ball fell to Monreal in the box with no one near him but the Spaniard whiffed.
Poor preparation led to a situation where Arsenal was forced to play Nacho Monreal at center half. Poor motivation led to Hull's second goal just seconds after the second half began. And poor tactics have led to a toothless, predictable Arsenal attack.
Poor management continues to cost Arsenal a chance to win the Premier League. We can only hope Wenger will eventually recognize his mistakes and address them.
Problem is, there is a decade-worth of evidence suggesting he won't.
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