The marquee fight of the round.
Arsenal (name)
host
Manchester City football club
Arsenal (name)
Lined up in 433 with defenders Gabriel, Saliba, Zinchenko, BenWhite, midfielders Jorginho, Rice, Ødegaard, and on the front line Jesus, Nketiah, Trossard.
Manchester City football club
Also played 433, with Ruben Dias, Aké, Walker, Gvardiol in defense, Kovacic, Rico Lewis, B. Silva in midfield, and Haaland, Foden, Álvarez in the forward line.
(Pre-emptive link)
Arsenal (name)
Losing both Saka and Martinelli, a game in which Martinelli was already on the bench but didn't start, and apparently holding back a bit for fear that he'd get re-injured in a close game.
Arsenal (name)
It's like having both wings broken, so it's obviously more careful.
Manchester City football club
Intending to steal the opening period and take advantage of
Arsenal (name)
Foden took a corner at the 4:00 mark and Gvardiol nearly scored at the far post, it was Rice who cleared on the goal line but after a scramble it was headed back to the 12-yard box where Haaland jumped to back the ball up and Aké fired a shot from eight yards out that went just wide but the two consecutive shots nearly broke the game open!
Arsenal (name)
goalmouth (in soccer)
As the first half progressed, it was evident
Arsenal (name)
It was hard to attack from the left, and without Martinelli it was difficult to break through the in-form Walker, so they could only attack the right flank, relying on the skillful and in-form Jesus and Ben White to press on and try to form a breakthrough as much as possible.
Manchester City football club
It seems that placing Gvardiol on the left side was also arranged, the Croats are super stiff and have a lot of body clashes, it's not easy to get past him
Manchester City football club
Instead, they tried to play as fast as possible to get to the front, and it was up to Haaland, Álvarez, and Foden to start the fast breaks to score, though
Arsenal (name)
The linebackers are holding tight with the center field.
Manchester City football club
It's not easy to get a chance after that.
Manchester City football club
The second wave of pressure didn't look strong enough either, RicoLewis was obviously playing well, but B.Silva seemed to be put in the middle in place of Rodri, but he wasn't as good at going up and distributing the ball as Rodri was, so
Manchester City football club
The back rows are not strong enough to advance and get the ball out, and do not seriously threaten the
Arsenal (name)
backline
A foul occurred at 27:00 when Ødegaard was shanked by Kovacic as he was going back into his own half to receive the ball. The shanking was terrible, not only did Kovacic miss the ball, but the shanking was from the back of the field and directly onto the ankle of Ødegaard, who was awarded a yellow card by the referee, but the VAR was activated to see if it met the criteria for a red card. But it felt like the referee clearly didn't want to throw someone out in this kind of game, and it ended up being a yellow card decision
Then in the 34th minute, Kovacic did it again, when Rice was passing the ball in the backfield, he rushed up to shovel the ball again, and it was a backward shovel, so Rice couldn't see it at all, then he missed the ball and touched Rice's ankle, this time, he slightly retracted the leg, but he still put Rice down, but the referee even told Rice to get up and continue the game.
Kovacic's two fouls alone are horrible, even a red card would not be too much, the referee is already letting him off the hook.
The first half ended at a fast pace with both teams going at it.
Arsenal (name)
The defense was obviously good, defusing the
Manchester City football club
of several threatening offenses.
Manchester City football club
This side also tries to put
Arsenal (name)
Jesus was isolated outside the penalty area, although Jesus kept trying and actually threatening, but it was always difficult to form a cross. At the beginning of the second half, Arteta replaced Trossard and Martinelli, and finally began to strengthen the left side of the attack.
At the start of the second half.
Arsenal (name)
Clearly changing their attacking style and starting to dominate Martinelli's left side, Rice also started to push forward to help distribute the ball, Jesus on the right flank was no longer responsible for pushing forward but running without the ball into the box, he even started leaning towards the baseline to try and get the ball back to the center for a steal, Nketiah was doing the same and the approach was actually very effective, they got the ball at the bottom line of the box in the second half a the ball many times, though
Manchester City football club
They were also guarding them very tightly, they tried a pass to the center or a direct shot, but they were all blocked.
