Arsenal’s 1-0 defeat to Manchester City last Sunday may well come to define their season. Indeed, the two sides have met twice in the last month and on both occasions the Gunners have been on the losing side. It so happens that throughout both of these 1-0 defeats Arsenal looked like the better team for long periods, but a lack of cutting edge in the final third (RVP aside of course) has cost them. Arsenal are at risk of being ‘nearly men’ once more, a tag they’ve suffered with for seven years now.
It may also come to define their season because it has served only to further exacerbate Arsenal’s injury crisis. It was disheartening in the extreme to see Johan Djourou limp off the pitch just a minute into the second-half. He may not inspire much confidence as a centre-back anymore, but he’s been a more than adequate fill-in full-back and given Arsenal’s lack of options his versatility will be missed.
Arsene Wenger himself has highlighted the problem his team is facing:
“We suffered because we had to shuffle the defence. We cannot just bring someone in, we have to move players,”
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Andre Santos is out for three months, Bacary Sagna wont be back until sometime in January and Carl Jenkinson and Kieran Gibbs don’t appear to even have a timeline for their convalescence. When we’ll see either of them again is anybody’s guess. After the City game Wenger was asked if any of his defensive casualties were on the mend and how close they were to featuring. His response wasn’t reassuring: “At the moment, not very close unfortunately.”
With a back-four spread tighter than Louis Spence’s jeans, it’s hard to see Arsenal coming through this difficult stage of this season unscathed. Aston Villa may be low on form, but they’ll fancy taking on this makeshift defence when the two sides meet next week.
Ignasi Miquel is such a raw, young, undeveloped talent, that it’s extremely dangerous for both club and player to rely on him too much over the Christmas period. But it looks like that’s what will happen. I think it’s fair to say that Miquel hasn’t been tested yet – I’m just a little afraid about what will happen when he meets a winger prepared to really run at him and take him on.
To be without four full-backs would be a challenge for any team, but to be without them for such a long period of time may well turn out to be crippling for Arsenal. But such is Wenger’s luck and it’s up to the likes of Miquel to stake his claim and make a name for himself.
Let’s hope he’s up to the task.
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