Arsenal 2 West Brom 3:ARSENAL WILL go into the Champions League game in Belgrade tomorrow trying to convince themselves their shambles of a performance against a well-organised, disciplined though hardly awesome West Bromwich Albion side on Saturday was just a bad dream.
Having been debagged by the Baggies they will try not to be taken apart by Partizan, but until or unless Arsene Wenger addresses his most pressing problem in the January transfer window, the nightmare will recur.
“It’s a mystery to me,” Wenger said after Arsenal lost 3-2 to Albion, who were leading 3-0 before Samir Nasri twice took advantage of a tiring defence in the final 15 minutes.
“Today in our performance something was not right. It is unexplainable how flat the whole thing looked for the whole game. I did not recognise my team today.”
More than a few among a crowd of 60,000 would have been happy to enlighten him, for they recognised exactly what was wrong, starting with the goalkeeper. Manuel Almunia’s loved ones must regularly give thanks he did not take up bullfighting rather than football, that the horns upon which he regularly finds himself are of a dilemma rather than a hunk of bad-tempered beef.
Almunia’s day began well with a sharp save from Chris Brunt’s penalty, albeit one which he recklessly gave away by bringing down Peter Odemwingie, West Bromwich’s quick-witted import from Lokomotiv Moscow, then deteriorated rapidly thereafter. Two elementary errors enabled Albion to put the contest virtually beyond Arsenal’s reach after Odemwingie had given them the lead early in the second half.
First Almunia allowed a firm but stoppable shot from Gonzalo Jara, sent clear by Brunt’s back heel, to skid past him. Then, having left his goal to meet another threat from Brunt, he hesitated and was stranded by a simple pass which set up Jerome Thomas for a tap-in.
Wenger was not prepared to single out Almunia for criticism. “You can have question marks over many players today if you look at the performances, especially defensively. Many players made massive mistakes defensively.”
Almunia could plead that all too often he had about as much cover as Gypsy Rose Lee, though with less support from the fans. From the first minute Thomas, once a member of Arsenal’s youth team, was going past Bacary Sagna as if the right back wasn’t there – and often he was not – while on the right Brunt and Jara motored through the Place de Clichy as if the lights were stuck on green. Greater awareness from the centre backs, Sebastien Squillaci and Laurent Koscielny, might have prevented Albion’s first and third goals.
On the same weekend two seasons ago Arsenal, facing Porto three days later, lost at home to the newly-promoted Hull City. This time Wenger also had the excuse of having to field a patched-up side with its fulcrum, Cesc Fabregas, among the many injuries. None of which alters the fact unless Arsenal sign a better goalkeeper there will be more humiliations.
Maybe some of Wenger’s players took West Brom too lightly. Certainly they were taken unawares by Roberto Di Matteo’s side. “We pressed very high, we pressed them all over the pitch,” he said. “We managed not to let them play their usual way and when we passed the ball we passed it very well.”
In fact West Bromwich won at Arsenal for the first time since 1983 in much the same way Wigan recently won at Tottenham. They stifled the opposition with a five-man midfield while pushing up on the flanks and giving the lone striker, Odemwingie, steady support. Nasri’s late goals offered Arsenal a great escape but any result other than a win for West Brom would have been a travesty. “Overall we got what we deserved,” said Wenger.
Guardian Service
