Aubameyang and Pepe cannot be passengers at Arteta’s Arsenal

by James O’Conners

On Sunday, Manchester City thrashed Arsenal 3-0 at the Emirates Stadium as they ruthlessly exploited the Gunners’ lack of work rate in attack. As talk of a permanent long-term successor to Unai Emery swirls, with Mikel Arteta the favourite, it’s clear that whoever does take the helm will require more from the side’s African superstars Nicolas Pepe and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.

Coming into the game, Pepe had scored and assisted against West Ham in his previous Premier League outing. That day, he faced a very physical Aaron Cresswell and got little joy, but ruthlessly exposed the left-back’s replacement after injury, Arthur Masuaku.

Having seen the problems faced by Benjamin Mendy in recent weeks, he should have been licking his lips at the prospect of running at the France full-back.

Meanwhile, Aubameyang led the line in his preferred central role with Alexandre Lacazette only on the bench after interim coach Freddie Ljungberg stated that playing the duo together unbalanced the side. He would have seen Marcus Rashford causing all sorts of difficulties for the City rearguard with his movement in the channels for Manchester United last week.

What followed from the Arsenal captain was perhaps the worst performance of his Arsenal career. In the first-half, he only touched the ball eight times, three of those from kick-offs after City had scored.

Effectively, he received the ball only five times and just twice in the opening 30 minutes.

8 – In the first half of Arsenal’s game against Man City, Pierre-Emerick Aubamayeng had just eight touches, three of which were from kick-offs and none coming in the opposition’s box. Anonymous. #ARSMCI pic.twitter.com/qcwm371ObW

— OptaJoe (@OptaJoe) December 15, 2019

Some may argue that there is not much a striker can do if he does not receive service. However, that could not be further from the truth in this game; ‘Auba’ almost never made runs, either for himself to receive or to vacate space for teammates. On the few occasions that he dropped deep, Fernandinho tracked him and once brought the Gabon striker down to take a card.

Rarely did he isolate Nicolas Otamendi in a pace mismatch, work the channels or simply show for the ball when his backline or two deeper midfielders had time and space and were facing forward.

Aside from giving little to his side in terms of movement or providing an out-ball, Aubameyang also did not defend from the front. Against City’s build-up, it would have been unwise to press in isolation, but he rarely looked to block passing lanes to Rodri or drop back to form a compact 4-4-2 in defence on the same line as Mesut Ozil.

Fernandinho and Otamendi found Rodri and Ilkay Gundogan a combined 17 and 20 times respectively in the game – progressing the ball from the back was a breeze. If he couldn’t screen those passes, he could at least have cut the pitch in half horizontally to funnel City’s play up one flank and allow Arsenal to shift over to compress space.

He did none of that.

In the second half, the captain did manage two shots. One good layoff and run into the box saw him head wide under pressure from a right wing cross, whilst in the 74th minute, he made a rare run into the left channel, but shot from a very wide angle on his weaker foot and the attempt never threatened Ederson.

As for Pepe, it was not a game to remember either.

Unlike Aubameyang, he was at least heavily involved when the Gunners were in possession. He had an early shot blocked, went past Mendy on the outside and had his cross cleared after some stopovers.

He delivered one inviting cross on the second phase of a freekick in the 34th minutes, but there were also poor moments, with back-flicks going wrong, trying to beat Kevin De Bruyne on the flank but losing the ball and one poor delivery from a free-kick after he had been pulled back by Mendy.

At least there was some urgency to Pepe’s game in flashes, something lacking from his early Arsenal appearances. What there wasn’t though, was any real defensive nous.

His attempts to block a couple of crosses from Mendy were token gestures and it was often Ainsley Maitland-Niles who pulled out to engage the full-back, thereby creating a chasm between right and right centre back; Gabriel Jesus and Kevin De Bruyne both created goals from that area.

Possibly the most damning indictment of the lack of effort from the Arsenal attackers came from De Bruyne, who very simply stated to Premier League TV: “We saw in the videos that the attackers try to press up, but when we pass the front four, they really don’t help the Arsenal defence.

“They always stay with four up front, except [Gabriel] Martinelli who comes back a bit more. We always get spaces somewhere on the pitch and it’s really difficult for their six defenders to control that.”

The Belgian completely sums up this Arsenal team; they are a ‘broken side’, with the defenders tasked with defending and the attackers only interested in the possession phase. However, the out-of-possession and defensive transitions phases are completely ignored.

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This is made so much worse with makeshift full-backs, even though Bukayo Saka did decently at left-back after coming on due to injury.

If Arsenal are going to turn around their poor form, under Ljungberg, Arteta, or another candidate, Pepe is going to need to undergo a huge improvement in his defensive positioning and effort, whilst Aubameyang, for all his elite-level finishing, offers close to nothing else to the team and has to be carried by those around him.

If that doesn’t change, no new manager or personnel changes are not going to improve the organisational and attitude issues within this side. Defending is a team task and Aubemeyang can’t pretend he doesn’t know that after playing under Jurgen Klopp at Borussia Dortmund.