🧠 Food for Thought - What Derailed Arsenal's Season?
- John Maurice Otieno
- Mar 3
- 7 min read
Updated: Mar 4
The curtain may not have come down on the 2024/25 season quite yet, but it sure does feel like it. After challenging for the league back-to-back, and even taking it to the wire in the previous campaign, there were high hopes for Arsenal going into this season. And with Man City falling off, it'd be surely set in stone that the Gunners go on to finally claim the elusive esteemed prize of English football.
However, with 3 months left to play in the current campaign, it is Liverpool who sit 13 points clear at the summit of the Premier League table, a gulf which has led many Gooners to believe the title race is all but over. And with our FA Cup and EFL Cup campaigns in the dust, our only chance of lifting silverware this season appears to be in the Champions League, a competition we've never won before.
So, how did we end up here? Well, let's get stuck in. And as always, details matter.
1. Slow Start.
My experience challenging for the league against Pep Guardiola's formidable Cityzens in the past couple campaigns led me to believe a fast start was absolutely key to toppling the reigning champions. However, it was Liverpool who - in the fashion of their 2019/20 title-winning campaign - got off to a blistering start this season and essentially ran away with the league title. Did you know, we were staggering in 5th and already 7 points behind league leaders Liverpool by Matchweek 10? Not quite the fast start I'd hoped for.
Albeit we'd clawed our way up the table to 2nd by Matchweek 19, we still trailed the Scousers by 7 points halfway through the campaign.
The fact that we haven't been consistent enough to put together five wins on the bounce all campaign (best we've managed have been three-game winning streaks - Matchweeks 12-14, 17-19, 23-25) means that we were never really realistically going to catch up to the league leaders. Indeed, the 7-point gap's nearly doubled since as the Reds are currently 13 points clear.
My theory of a blistering start being key to mounting a title-winning campaign seems to have been proven right, but instead of us, it's Liverpool who seemingly heed my advice.
2. Discipline.
No Premier League team has been on the receiving end of more red cards than Arsenal's five. Some of those have been understandably frustratingly harsh. I doubt you'll ever see another player sent off for a slight nudge on the ball [à la Rice v Brighton (H)], allegedly delaying a restart a second after the whistle blows [Trossard v City (A)], or putting in a tactical foul [Lewis-Skelly v Wolves (A)]. Myles' even got overturned, but the fact of the matter is, in the five games we had to play a man short, we only managed to accrue 5 points out of 15 (W1, D2, L2). 10 costly points dropped. If you want to win the league, you can't keep playing games with ten men.
Nonetheless, Arsenal's alleged lack of discipline is something that's blown out of proportion in the media. The Gunners aren't this overly physical and aggressive "Stoke City" of a team as they're made out to be as we rank down in 15th for yellow cards amassed in English top-flight football. Only Newcastle (51), Spurs (49), City (44) and Brentford (38) have been cautioned less times than our 52.
We also rank all the way down in 19th for fouls committed (32), dispelling the aggression notion. Only the Bees (26) have committed less fouls in the league this season.
3. Injuries.
Every team suffers from injuries, but no Premier League team has had more than Arsenal's 27 so far this season. When you suffer from that many injuries, it's going to affect you. That's not an excuse, it's just a fact. You only have to look at where the likes of Tottenham are in the EPL table. With four attackers out due to injuries, it's no wonder the Gunners are misfiring.
The matter is exacerbated when the injury wave sweeps your key players. City lost Rodri and started leaking goals, hampering their title ambitions. It's no secret our best attacker is Bukayo Saka who, despite being out since December, is still our top assist maker in the league. He also tops our goals + assists charts with 15 goal involvements (10G, 5A).
The England international has also been a miss for the league as he still ranks 2nd in the division for assists (10) and big chances created (19). Only Mohammed Salah has created and assisted more (21 big chances, 17 assists).
It's true that every team gets injuries, and that a big squad helps mitigate this. However, it is also true that to win a league title, you need an element of luck on your side as some players are just not as easily replaceable.
4. Style of Play.
Even before the injuries, our attackers often came under criticism for a lack of goal conversion, and I've often said that in as much as they've needed to step up, they haven't exactly been done any favors by the style of football we currently play. Our build-up play is so slow that by the time we enter the final third, the opposition have set up shop in a stubborn low block that we struggle to break.
We used to fly out of the traps from kick-off, smothering teams, pinning them in their own defensive third, pressing high, forcing high turnovers, and breaking fast. That's long gone now. Only Brighton (13), Southampton (13) and Leicester (12) have had less shots from fast breaks than our 17 in the league this season. Also, rather than combine fast on the ground with quick one-touch passes, we seem to favor crossing now, albeit unsuccessfully. Only Ipswich (19.13%), Villa (19.06%), Bournemouth (19.00%) and Southampton (18.32%) have a poorer cross-completion rate than us (19.47%). [Stats courtesy of Opta]
We also rank 5th in the division for counter-attack goals (6), which you might argue is decent but the team we're chasing, Liverpool, rank 1st for fast-break goals (13), more than doubling our tally.
More than just quick movements, another way to undo low blocks tends to be shots from distance. We rarely do that and rank in 17th for shots from outside the box (27%). Contrast that to the fact that we rank 1st for shots in the 6-yard box (16%) as we often seem to want to score the perfect goal. That's when you hear the crowd shout: "Shoot!", but we keep on passing.
We were electric, exciting and exhilarating to watch in the 2022/23 season. In the second half of 2023/24, we found the perfect balance between the fast, fluid football we played in 22/23 and the more controlled, possession-based play of the first half of 23/24. So, to completely go away from that this season is something I'm still struggling with. We need to bring back more pace in the way we play.
5. Transfer Window.
This is, perhaps, the main factor most Gooners point to as the main reason for Arsenal's underwhelming campaign. It's been glaringly obvious that we've needed to buy an elite striker for years now, yet we still failed to sign one in the preceding summer. We then lost our best attacker just before the winter transfer window opened, then lost Jesus slap-bang in the middle of that window. So, to then fail to reinforce the attack in January is something that has most Arsenal fans understandably scratching their heads. Only City (84) and Everton (81) have used less subs than Arteta this season (95), further highlighting the boss' lack of options.
If you consider the fact that despite the blatantly thin squad, Arsenal still have the third-most goals from subs (9), it makes you wonder where we'd be if we'd maximized both transfer windows.
The mood in the fanbase hasn't been great following the transfer inactivity, and since the rhetoric has been that the club couldn't spend in January because we had to hold back funds to get our main targets in the summer, this coming window has to be riddled with mega stars to appease the fans. There are now strong reports linking Andrea Berta to the Sporting Director's job. It'd be ideal to get that done ASAP so there's actually an established figure handling deals well in advance of the summer.
The Nutshell.
"If somebody tells you at the start of the season that by this time you will have played five times with a red card, over half an hour in each of them, and you have lost this amount of players, what’s the bet? You are in the middle of the table, at least, and you are out of the Champions League."
- Mikel Arteta speaking pre-Forest (A)
I concur with the gaffer and that's credit to him for having us still competitive despite the adversities we've faced this season. In a nutshell, Arsenal found themselves struggling with serious issues in a season in which they were tipped to go on to attain major honors, especially with City's unprecedented drop. We've been unlucky with some of them, such as harsh sendings-off and injuries galore to key players, but some of our problems have been self-manufactured, i.e. the way we've been playing and failing to act in the transfer window. Notwithstanding, we have to put on our big-boy pants and finish the season strongly.
Which of the above factors do you think have hampered us? Do you think the Gunners can still achieve some semblance of success this season? Food for thought. 🧠
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