ANYONE who knows me or reads my articles will know that I am an admirer of Mikel Arteta but even the best coaches get tactics and decisions wrong.
On a lucky day the odd poor call may not cost your team, or you may have time in a match to readjust or even reverse a decision within the 90 minutes.
Saturday was not such a lucky day for the Arsenal boss and in my humble opinion he made multiple poor decisions – in selection, tactics, man-management and even in-game with the substitutions.
One has to admire such self-belief in such a young manager and we must hope that he will begin to show he can admit errors in judgement and learn from his mistakes.
On Saturday Arteta needed his team to bounce back from a Selhurst Park horror show but here are five mistakes he made that resulted in Brighton winning.
Tavares was Arteta’s own signing and began his Arsenal career well,
initially keeping Kieran Tierney out of the team on his return from injury.
Read More on Arsenal
However, having hardLy been called upon, the young Portuguese talent has twice been withdrawn by Arteta after poor displays against Nottingham Forest and last week versus Palace.
If Tavares has a future at the club, man-management surely meant an arm around the shoulder in the week and backing him on Saturday.
Not the cold shoulder and replacing him with a slow central midfielder.
In my view, the only justifiable reason not to play Tavares was if Arteta had switched to a back three.
FREE BETS AND SIGN UP DEALS – BEST NEW CUSTOMER OFFERS
Obviously, we know the Swiss skipper can do a job at left-back but
moving him there on Saturday not only will have been a kick in teeth for Tavares but severely weakened the midfield, already deprived of the injured Thomas Partey.
Sambi Lokonga is an able deputy with the experience of either Xhaka or Partey alongside him, but to ask the youngster to play there on his own with so little football of late, was preposterous.
The knock-on effect of moving Xhaka to left-back and playing Lokonga might have been mitigated had Arteta reverted to 4-2-3-1 for solidity and played the experienced and ever-reliable Mohammed Elneny alongside the Belgian.
Instead, he asked Emile Smith-Rowe to play infield as a left-hand side eight, or so it appeared.
This may be a role suited to the young England star but why experiment on the back of a 3-0 defeat in a must-win game.
With Smith Rowe and Martin Odegaard not supporting Lokonga sufficiently the youngster was overrun by a three-man Brighton midfield, including the fabulous Yves Bissouma and an inspired Enock Mwepu.
Arteta had the tools to change his system to combat the visitors’
dominance but he failed to do so.
The Spaniard could have brought Rob Holding on to match systems with Graham Potter’s tactically astute selection, allowing Xhaka back into the midfield, or brought on Elneny.
But instead he made poor late attacking changes, chasing a match which he could have retrieved long before his late desperation dice rolls.
We all like the Frenchman, we really do.
He has laboured like a trooper on his own, linking play, inspiring his younger colleagues and assisting goals but the simple truth is that his legs have gone – as has his confidence in front of goal with them.
Arsenal need a striker to be scoring and Lacazette simply isn’t, so Arteta needed to make a call – to either support his captain by changing the system to give him a partner, or try Eddie Nketiah or Gabriel Martinelli through the middle.
For most fans, myself included, to see both Smith Rowe and more so Martinelli withdrawn on Saturday whilst Lacazette stayed on the pitch was bordering on inexcusable.
Follow Dave on Twitter HERE.
