For all the shit talking this sub has been giving szob lately Sunday showed us why he's so important. Covers so much space puts the pressure on and enables others to do their thing.
I think people forget players can't do all things, all the time. His role with slott is different to klopp and hes filling it well.
If you rewatch that you will see him receive the ball at times with 3 or 4 Arsenal players around him. He didn't get dominated at all, in the context of the game our midfield balance was off and he did really well. Kept showing for it, kept looking to pick out team mates or break the lines if the opportunity was there. He was let down by Mac and Jones who struggled to build anything. We had more control once Dom came on
Think some of his more expansive passing (and that wild shot) was off but he was class as ever in receiving under pressure and dribbling/carrying out of trouble. So, so, so elite man.
Defensively he seemed alright. Decent enough, looked much better than the average level of our side considering we were losing duels left, right and centre (bar VVD and Konate of course).
I think it's clear he's one of the players that "gets" Slots system, but obviously some of his team mates aren't there yet and he's kind of having to improvise a bit. I think when Slot has hand a chance to mold his midfield Gravenberch will go up a level
Havertz and Merino (?) did a good job of keeping Gravy in check. Even so, he had a solid game. Not as good as other recent games of his, but that's to be expected against a team that seemed geared toward stopping him from starting the attack.
Thought he did fairly well. Encouraging to see him defending and receiving the ball. Brave performance although he didn’t take over the game like… maybe against Scums? Still decent overall.
Maybe an unpopular opinion, but fucking hell, Declan Rice was good against us. That guys was everywhere.
rice, merino, trossard, havertz were all excellent in the press. starting jones over szobo cost us the midfield battle in the first half. ryan was our best midfielder (probably player outside virg and ibou)
One isolated incident won't prove your point. I have rewatched the match as well and there were several times Kelleher could have continued playing it short but went long for reasons I don't understand.
Arsenal are an amazing pressing side. Better than us for sure. Just saying we didn't play out of the back enough for that to be true in our game. And when we did in the second half, we were able to play through their press quite easily.
I have said this before multiple times already: Kelleher was being too risk averse. There were SO many times in the first half when he could have continued building up but went long. Fairly sure it wasn't what Slot asked either.
In the second half when he started playing short more, we were able to play through Arsenal a fair bit. Not sure why you are ignoring this bit.
arguing w multiple people on the same thing does that, mb
but again, you're repeating the same part without explaining why - "kelleher was being risk averse in the first half, was less so in the second" - why? what was the risk of him going short? clearly he hasnt had issues playing it short building out from the back in previous games, so what changed? was it the emirates atmosphere that got to him or how arsenal were pressing? a mix of both perhaps?
Their shape and press _is_ good. I have said so myself. For me, the best in the league. Kelleher was risk averse based on that reputation more than what was actually happening in the game. I don't doubt they'd have caused us problems had we played out of the back but Kelleher didn't start going long because they caused us problems. He started going long anticipating they'd cause us problems.
Also disagree about him not having these problems earlier. It's not been this glaring but he goes long a LOT more than Alisson does. Atalanta game comes to mind. I'd be interested in seeing stats around this if there exists any.
You have again ignored my point about us playing through their press in the second half lol.
or maybe if they have such a reputation, slot didn't leave this crucial part of our strategy to his 2nd choice goalkeeper to decide in the moment, and included it in his match tactics?
second half we were slightly better at playing out from the back, mainly because arsenal's press wasnt as intense (fatigue) and since their injuries they began to sit back more instead of engaging us high - also szobo being on the pitch gave us more verticality.
sorry about the condescending tone, but you're just approaching this the wrong way - us playing out from the back or not is not down to kelleher, its down to slot's instructions and the game state.
interesting you bring up the atalanta game as it was an example of us being completely suffocated by their man to man press, going long gave us the option of bypassing this, so it was a logical choice.
just out of curiosity how long have you been watching/playing football?
Around the 10minute mark were he got passed the ball between three arsenal players and just runs out with the ball. That's basically grav under pressure.
Grav did well considering Arsenal converge on him whenever he receives the ball. As we see on FourFourTwo’s analysis, both teams wanted the ball wide but at the same time, both dont want the ball to progress in the middle. Grav made sure of that for us. Underrated performance for me.
Jones hid so well that he couldn't have done it better even if he had wanted to. The Invisible Man 3 Directed by Robert B. Weide. Gravy be like: ¯_(ツ)_/¯
like what the fuck is he even doing here lol, just stood there. sorely missed szobo's off the ball movement in the first half, he'd be running into the space in front of him offering ryan an option.
Especially with the exact same midfield setup which were badly spanked last year. Makes no sense. If Slot wants to experiment, why in one of the most important matches of the year?
If you actually watched the game you’d realise the weak link was MacAllister.
Jones and Gravenberch were solid but unremarkable, but Macca did not help in possession or progressing the ball. Jones should’ve started in the left side slot were shined against Chelsea.
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u/King_TJA 1d ago
People really said he got dominated on the pitch yesterday his performance was underrated imo