It must be very frustrating trying to catch up to Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City and upstaging them. Produce your best season yet and for the most part, it’s still not enough to get past The Sky Blues.
Liverpool under Jurgen Klopp went through it for a while and now it is the turn of Mikel Arteta and his men at Arsenal to go through it; and they are going through it.
After picking up 88 points and 89 points in back to back seasons, the Gunners are without a league title win despite putting together a campaign just two points shy of The Invincibles points haul.
In the 2018-2019 season, Liverpool recorded 97 points but still missed out on winning the league title but in practically any other season, that would have easily given The Reds a second Premier League title in its history.
Compared to the 2023-2024 season, Arsenal have had a very quiet player transfer period with just Riccardo Calafiori coming in as the club’s newest member.
With the core of the team intact and the return of Jurrien Timber, there is little incentive for Arsenal to make major changes to its roster almost like Liverpool.
Defending champions Manchester City have toed the same line with the move indicative of the high level of quality across the top three teams in the division. This is quite the opposite of what Manchester United have gone through this offseason as the Red Devils have roped in Matthias De Ligt, Noussair Mazraoui, Leny Yoro and Joshua Zirkzee.
There is a strong possibility that Man United get the much needed defensive midfield upgrade before the transfer window closes but irrespective of their activities, Erik Ten Hag’s side is realistically two years behind Liverpool, Arsenal and Manchester City. Again, realistically speaking, Liverpool aren’t winning the league in new manager Arne Slot’s debut season in the league.
On the other hand, Arsenal are heavy favourites to win the league after letting it slip twice despite being in pole position to win it all. However, for the third season in a row, Arsenal are on the brink of experiencing another title miss due to these three factors.
Arteta’s failure to dissociate from Pep Guardiola’s style
Run through the list of the assistant coaches who outdid their former masters after getting promoted to the top job and you’d notice a divergence in styles. Jose Mourinho was denigrated as a translator rather than as an assistant coach for Sir Bobby Robson at FC Barcelona but has gone on to achieve way bigger things than his former boss.
Mourinho’s secret to success at Porto, Chelsea, Inter Milan, Real Madrid and AS Roma was down to the Portuguese adopting a pragmatic approach and staying clear of Barcelona’s Tiki Taka style he picked up under Robson and later Louis Van Gaal.
Zinedine Zidane upstaged his boss Carlo Ancelotti by winning three UEFA Champions League titles in a row by dropping the BBC (Gareth Bale, Cristiano Ronaldo, Karim Benzema) forward tandem for the two pronged attack with Ronaldo and Benzema leading it and Gareth Bale coming off the bench.
While Bob Paisley didn’t win three Champions League titles in a row, he did win the big trophy three times after getting promoted from his assistant manager role to the main role following Bill Shankly’s departure. Paisley marked his tenure by having ball playing centre halves after noting that Red Star Belgrade’s win over The Reds in a 1973 tie was largely down to this; Liverpool lost the tie during Shankly’s era as Paisley observed as an assistant.
Arteta’s Arsenal play out from the back just like Pep Guardiola’s. Arteta’s Arsenal use inverted full backs just like Pep Guardiola’s and Arteta’s Arsenal line up centre backs across the length of the defensive line just like Guardiola’s Man City.
Failing to step away from Guardiola’s style has haunted Arteta and will continue to haunt him and his team; heading into the season, Arsenal are set up to play just like Man City with the left footed centre back Calafiori likely to play as a full back ahead of Timber who is recovering from injury same way Man City use Josko Gvardiol. Playing like Man City gives the ultra-fine margin advantage to Pep Guardiola this season too.
Man City have what Arsenal doesn’t have
While Pep Guardiola’s system can swing between going strikerless or making space for one, just a few strikers fit the profile in this system since the player must be a very good passer and be adept at playing with his back to goal.
A throwback, classic “Number 9” like Robert Lewandowski excelled in this system, Harry Kane would be a perfect fit but the requirements to dispatch this role are quite steep so much so, even the great Sergio Kun Aguero largely underperformed under Pep.
Despite Erling Haaland’s clear limitations in this system, Guardiola has found a way to fix him in it because of the undeniable brilliance of the big Norwegian at scoring. It is true that Guardiola won one of his six EPL titles with a strikerless system that had Raheem Sterling in the middle of a front three but even the great Spaniard realized he needed a top level striker to get to the next level hence the signing of Haaland.
On the flip side, Arsenal are yet to sign an out and out striker and continue to rely on its system that is made up of wing forwards and support strikers.
Man City have their fair share of wing forwards and support strikers plus Erling Haaland who has 63 goals in 66 EPL appearances and the Norwegian is gunning to win the Golden Boot Award for the third time in a row. Arsenal don’t have Haaland and this is where they fall short.
Man City’s “Sans-Rodri” situation is better than Arsenal’s “sans Partey” situation
Without two of the best defensive midfielders in the world, Rodri and Thomas Partey, Man City and Arsenal largely struggle to get going. Prior to his loan move to Ipswich Town, Kalvin Phillips gave Man City the best back up plan for a Rodri-less Man City team.
Even in Rodri’s absence, Man City have Mateo Kovacic and Matheus Nunes as fill-in options whereas Arsenal have the much maligned Jorginho and Fabio Veira as the fill-ins for Partey should the latter’s injury issues pop up again.
After scooping up 70 million euros from Atletico Madrid for Julian Alvarez, Man City could end up snapping up Newcastle United’s highly rated Bruno Guimaraes to step in for Rodri should the Spanish midfielder miss games.
