On Wednesday evening, Arsenal revived their title hopes. It wasn’t pretty. In fact, not a lot about this season has been easy on the eye.
Alas, they were back in the title race, narrowing the gap to Liverpool to four points.
Well, they may well be out of it again after a frustrating 2-2 draw at home to Unai Emery’s Aston Villa.
Mikel Arteta’s side created plenty of chances – as they did against Manchester United a week ago and Spurs in midweek – but were ultimately undone by some poor defending.
Given the Gunners have struggled in attack it was refreshing to see them go 2-0 up but Villa rallied well and ran away from north London with a point courtesy of Youri Tielemans and Ollie Watkins.
It wasn’t a great day at all for the Premier League’s second place side but there were some standout performers in red and white.
Arsenal’s best players against Aston Villa
After a wealth of criticism for his performances since Bukayo Saka got injured, Leandro Trossard has come up with the goods in consecutive games now.
The Belgian scored the winner against Tottenham a few days ago and was perhaps Arsenal’s biggest threat on Saturday evening.
Trossard created both of the home side’s goals, manipulating the ball well down the left before crossing for Gabriel Martinelli to prod home in the second half.
He was the provider in the second half too, crossing for Kai Havertz whose powerful effort couldn’t be stopped by former Gunner Emi Martinez.
While the attack looked as though it was starting to click, Arsenal nearly ran away with all three points but for VAR who ruled out a late goal. A long-range strike cannoned off Havertz’s arm and found the net.
A big positive from the night was that the German found himself back among the goals. Beyond him and Trossard, teenager Myles Lewis Skelly also starred once again and nearly clinched the game-winning assist, sliding the ball in behind for Trossard deep into injury time, only for the former Brighton man to put the chance wide.
In contrast, it was a pity that Arsenal’s chief creator, their captain, was not at the races.
Martin Odegaard’s performance in numbers
This has not been the greatest of seasons for Martin Odegaard.
Performance in Numbers
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The Norwegian suffered an ankle injury on international duty with Norway back in September, a moment that led to a 12-game absence. Since his return, he’s not performed too well.
Notably missing a penalty last Sunday in the FA Cup, the skipper appears to be suffering from a lack of confidence, something that isn’t being helped by Saka’s injury.
Still, with the Englishman missing, someone needs to stand up and it should be Odegaard. He’s Arteta’s leader on the pitch but isn’t showing the qualities required both in a leadership department and on the ball.
His performance against Emery’s men was so bad that it was described as a “stinker” by Arsenal reporter Con Harrison, while GOAL handed him a lowly 5/10 match rating.
The stats told the story of a really poor evening for Odegaard who supplied just one key pass. Usually the conductor of chances within the Arsenal side, he really struggled to pick up pockets of space between the Villa lines.
Minutes played
90
Touches
61
Accurate passes
36/39 (92%)
Key passes
1
Accurate crosses
2/11
Shots on target
0
Shots off target
0
Dribble success
0/1
Ground duels won
0/5
Aerial duels won
0/1
Possession lost
18x
What summed things up was his late free-kick, a moment that turned out to be the last kick of the game. Odegaard swung the ball deep and straight into the arms of Martinez.
That was one of 18 times he gave away the ball and to make matters worse, he didn’t win a single duel, a fact that Arteta will no doubt be concerned about.
He also had just one shot and failed with his only dribble attempt. This was easily one of his worst performances in an Arsenal shirt.
If the Gunners are going to have any chance of winning the league, they need their captain to improve quickly.
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