Arsenal 3 – 1 Olympiakos: Vermaelen’s grim warning + a striking dilemma
October 4, 2012
Thomas Vermaelen attempted to show last night that not only does he have a supreme talent for steely eyed defensive Vermination, he’s also pretty handy when it comes to a nifty visual metaphor.
On a night categorised by sloppiness, particularly at the back, the Verm reacted to Laurent Koscielny spurning a free header in the opposition box by leaping up for the spectacular crossbar grab and swing only for his hands to slip and leave him crumpled in a heap in the back of the net. It seemed at the time like that might well be the enduring image of a difficult night at the office. Thankfully, despite the errors, despite the sloppiness, despite the driving rain and the resolute and well organised Olympiakos side we managed to get the result that we needed.
Vermaelen himself had been one of the key culprits when it came to sloppiness. As early as the fifth minute he was involved in a misunderstanding with Vito Mannone that could well have led to an early Olympiakos goal. Vito looked slightly more at fault as he passed the ball from his area two feet ahead of TV, but he was less than impressed at Tommy’s lack of awareness as the ball was presented to the Olympiakos striker on a plate. Later in the first half it was all on Thomas as he inexplicably and under no pressure passed the ball out to an Olympiakos man.
In his defence Vermaelen was hardly the only man to blame but his lack of concentration at times has been a bit of a worry this season. Last night we saw a return to his marauding tendencies of last year too which while they often lead to confusion and panic in the opposition half quite frankly I think we could do without. At 2-1 up in a tight game with fifteen minutes to go there doesn’t seem a lot of point one of your centre backs pushing up, chasing the game and potentially leaving gaps at the back. I thought that was something we’d consciously tried to curb this year. Apparently not.
Thankfully we got away with it last night. And Tommy got away with his parallel bars act. It would be just our luck if he’d broken both his legs when he hit the ground. Maybe he did. If it had been me I’d have just run around with broken legs for the rest of the night, too embarrassed to say anything.
Of course despite our mixed display the important thing is the result which we got in a fairly unorthodox way for an Arsenal team – by taking our half-chances. I was screaming for Gervinho to pass as the ball broke to him on the edge of the area towards the end of the first half. He ignored me. I was delighted that he did.
The shot looked a little scuffed and seemed to take the keeper by surprise but it just showed that good things can happen if you shoot low and on target and with a bit of confidence. That’s five goals for Gervais in seven games and while we’re all still on the fence a little bit about his role as our new centre forward the fact is, if he was a new signing this summer who we’d paid twenty million quid for we’d probably be very excited indeed. We’d be all like “Wow! Look at his ability to score even when we’re not playing well! He took that chance out of nothing! He does assists too! Defences can’t cope with his movement! I’m going to the barber to get my hair cut just like his!”
Good for him. I mean I’m still not convinced that we should be playing him in the centre but that’s partly because of all the damage I still think he can do from the wing and partly because I still think we might have stronger candidates in Giroud and Podolski.
I know Lukas has done a sterling job for us from the left wing and I know how valuable his defensive work can be down that left hand side and I also know in his early performances in the middle at the start of the season he looked less than convincing but, honestly, can we really afford to have a finisher of that quality stuck out on the wing?
His stats for yesterday’s match read one chance, one shot, one shot on target, one goal. I’d actually adjust that slightly to read half a chance. Because when he got hold of that ball in the box with his back to goal it didn’t look like there was a whole lot of danger. But his spin and shot took the keeper by surprise and we were 2-1 up. Imagine what would happen if we gave him five chances a match.
Olivier Giroud also seemed keen to remind us that he’s still a possibility up there with a fine cameo from the bench yesterday. Admittedly by this point there were gaps appearing as Olympiakos chased the game but Giroud showed the benefits of playing with a target man. He was desperately unlucky not to get his name on the scoresheet, first flinging a foot at an excellent Walcott cross which landed safely in the keeper’s arms and then somehow hitting the back of a defender from Cazorla’s cutback when it looked like he was bound to hit the net.
But with the seconds ticking in injury time his headed flick from Mannone’s clearance found Ramsey in space and the boy took his chance exceptionally well, drifting past the last defender and then cushioning a chip over the keeper and into the net. It made the scoreline look a little bit generous but showed the value of having such a strong bench.
It could easily have been a different story had Olympiakos capitalised on our early defensive lapses and their number five Machado will have been particularly sheepish on the journey home with his teammates after skying the easiest chance of the night from six yards out at nil-nil.
But a good result. And if we could do the same in the next one at home against Schalke then we’d have qualification for the next round all but sewn up. As Tommy V attempted to demonstrate last night with his thought provoking piece of visual theatre , if we can keep our concentration and resist the urge to show off hopefully we can avoid any embarrassing slips.
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11 Responses to “Arsenal 3 – 1 Olympiakos: Vermaelen’s grim warning + a striking dilemma”
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Hilarious today.
If it had been me I’d have just run around with broken legs for the rest of the night, too embarrassed to say anything.
ha ha ha
My theory re Pod wide and Gerve central is that *because* Podolski is a better finisher and Gerve creates more chances, you maximise the goals. Forehead creates 5 and scores 1 when central, Poldi creates 2 and scores 1 wherever he is. Gerve would create fewer chances if positioned wide so we would end up with fewer goals. What do you reckon?
Re Giroud, one of the things I loved from watching the compilation tapes I saw when we signed him, was the way he’d just do anything to score – just hurl himself at the ball. I’m very very happy with him and think he will be a huge asset from about Christmas onwards. Three assists and a goal so far. Not bad.
Hilarious piece. Hope the Verminator didn’t read this. But yes, it’s always good to keep the concentration and resist the urge to show off in order to avoid embarrassing slips. Hahahahaha.
I just tove to watch jenkinson…
@ MH – spot on write up. Vermaelen had a poor game and whilst I think it’s an asset that we have a player like him who can confidently attack and shoot, yesterday was a problem. His passes across the face of the goal made me nervous and his marking of Olympiakos players was ineffective.
I like Gervinho’s unpredictable game. I thought he looked exciting in pre season and is getting better with every game. No one really knows what he is or isn’t capable of doing as I think even he is on a journey of self discovery. I might be in a minority that thinks that not only is he showing capability in the spot that he is playing in now, I think there is much more to come as his confidence and experience grows. Gerv is clearly working on something AW and it is paying off.
To me what really didn’t work so well yesterday was the Santi, Coquelin and Arteta midfield. I am not sure why, but Arteta does not link well with Le Coq and I couldn’t really work out what was going on as Arteta seemed to prefer passing to almost anyone but him, forcing us to pass the ball around in our own half and limiting Cazorla and Podolski’s access to the ball. I am sure the stats will show a high pass completion rate for Arteta & Coquelin, but far too many, for want of a better word, are ‘impotent’. I found myself wondering about how alternative midfield combinations would fair. I don’t think le Coq’s performances are bad, but they haven’t been good enough to give Arsene Wenger a selection headache in midfield when Wilshere, Rosicky, Diaby or even Frimpong are passed fit. Not in the way that Jenkinson, Per, Mannone have impressed anyway.
I think Poldi would be great in the middle, but I think Wenger sees it like I do, which is that many players can score consistently from the middle, while not as many can do so from the left. If Podolski can continue this kind of goalscoring from the left (and his Germany history shows he can, or better) than our overall goalscoring might be higher than with other lineups. Of course you can’t play each game with him in both positions to find out whether he’d have scored more in the middle which others spurned, but hopefully that’s the way it works out.
On the goal we conceded, i am not entirely convinced that it was the CB’s fault. It should have been Jenk covering or atleast preventing that cross into the arsenal box. I mean come on he had ample of time to look and cross…
I thought Koscielny was poor last night too, our fullbacks were better than our centre backs and I can see that becoming the norm with the way Gibbs and Jenkinson are developing. Gibbs is obviously a different class to Jenko but as uncle Arsene said, the boy has gone straight from primary school to university.
We were alright in the second half, certainly good value for the win but they matched us in the first half and stopped us from having any rhythm.
I can’t really understand why, but what Zinc says is definitely true. We now have two fairly reliable, consistent fullbacks and two erstwhile centre-half dominators who are slowly turning into Laurel and Hardy. And yes, Verm’s theatrics were definitely the icing on that cake. I hope it’s just a matter of them both having problems with settling in the Bould’s conception of Arsenal defense. Since both are fantastic professionals, it should just be a matter of time when they’ll finally start to play it right. Anyway, we’re badly missing Mertesacker, and that’s saying something.
Jencks culpable for the goal? Not really. He had to cover both no. 20 and no. 27, since Gervinho was too slow to come back to cover. And he did that as good as possible. The cross was something Kos & Verm should have prepared for much better than they did.
Giroud is impressive even if he doesn’t score. It’s his movement, the chances he gets and creates. When he’s finally hit his stride, he’ll be a beast. Possibly better than Benzema.
At any rate, thanks for the post, MB, great as usual.
I’m not writing our CB’s off, just commenting on how improved our two young FB’s are and how reliably they’ve been so far this season. All without Sagna too. I’m sure Koscielny and Vermaelen will sort themselves out, Bouldy needs to threaten them with violence or sexual advances or something, I’m sure that would work.
I think Rambo killed 2 people on Wednesday. Giroud’s confidence gives me hope. Remember when Torres wasn’t scoring?