Tony Adams wrote:Remember when people wanted rid of Emery to get a more attacking manager?
Who was that attacking manager?
Emery had to go. He lost his marbles after the EL final embarrassment. I wanted Arteta because I expected him to follow the trajectory of Wenger and Pep. He turned out to be a defensive manager. Even then, my first choice was Pochettino. My first choice, before Emery, was—in fact—a defensive manager named Conte.
Arteta is managing like a Gooner would: pile up 11 men who defend, act like a authoritarian, play a defensive system..
And profit?
That's not how it works. Wenger said that Mikel has got the defensive aspect right. Now, it's his turn to sort out our attack. He hasn't been able to. He took attacking football for granted. It's his first job.
Arteta, the manager, is replicating Arteta, the player: a superb CM who excelled in recycling possession but could never launch an attack. Subsequently, Wenger played Arteta as a DM and Song as a B2B guy in Mikel's best season for us.
That's why he can't understand an Ozil. That's why, as rumored, Szoboszlai isn't fitting in their statotonic radar, as he's awful in defending (per stats) and isn't a Xhaka-like player (per stats again; haven't watched him play).
From what I've seen, Arteta's dream XI is a CAM who's Xhaka with Ozil's vision, Willian on the right, and Auba with Kola's workrate on the left; Giroud up top.
We have been abysmal in attack. The last time we were good we were the envy of world football even after Wenger was past his prime.