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10 August, 2014

What to Make of the Community Shield



Revenge is normally not served best in a friendly, but Arsenal’s 3-0 triumph at Wembley over Manchester City had to feel good.  Arsenal looked more like defending premier league champions today than City did, and although it is just a glorified friendly, blowing out a rival in Wembley stadium will always lift spirits at a club.  

While Arsenal appeared deeper than usual, Manchester City looked worryingly thin.  Matija Nastasic was awful for pretty much the entire match, while Fernando had an embarrassing introduction to English football when none other than the actual ball notched a crunching open-field tackle on the blues’ number six.  However, with eight first-team players not suiting up, this can hardly be an accurate judgement for the reigning premier league champions.  Then again, Arsenal are still without Ozil, Mertesacker, Podolski, Walcott, and Koscielny has only just made his preseason debut.  

The biggest area of concern lies with Nastasic.  He fell asleep and was beaten by Alexis on a couple occasions, and was bullied off the ball by Sanogo too easily in the buildup to the second goal.  Martin Demichelis will be 34 in December, while Eliaquim Mangala is untested and inexperienced.  Thus, Nastasic could have a huge role this season in Manchester.  Once considered one of the finer young players in the world, Nastasic’ stock has dropped significantly in the last year.

Similarly, Calum Chambers performed well today, but for me he doesn’t look like the answer at center back.  He has played three games in eight days at center back and looked soled in all of those appearances, but physically he won’t keep up with premier league forwards regularly.  Edin Dzeko beat him down the line too easily and at times looked outmuscled by opposing forwards.

Keep in mind that Chambers boasts a versatility that allows him to play three positions, center back being his least-talked about attribute leading up to his first few appearances.  A year or two from now Chambers could be a first choice center back, but for now Arsenal need a more physical deputy at the back.  With that being said, it should be interesting to see how Chambers does in defensive midfield, and if Arsene Wenger adds a center back, which he essentially must at this point.

Recently the gunners have been linked with Mats Hummels, who would undoubtedly thrust Arsenal into the title conversation even in Michael Owen’s mind (probably not, but maybe!).  For Manchester City, they can’t be too concerned with a loss like this seeing as how there’s nothing to lose.  For Arsenal however, they’ve gained much more than City have lost. 

Arsenal new boy Alexis Sanchez is still regaining fitness, as evident by his halftime substitution.  The  with Sanchez’ outing though was his constant habit of finding space and getting in dangerous positions.  He was outran and outmuscled by Yaya Toure on a few occasions, and it was clear his legs aren’t back yet.  Then again, barring an even worse season in fitness terms, Arsenal should be much deeper than in years past. 

Jack Wilshere looked the fittest I’ve seen him since the Barcelona home game in 2011, and Aaron Ramsey looks poised to start back up right where he left off in May.  Ramsey, scorer of the second Arsenal goal, was involved in all moves going forward, setting up Giroud’s thunderous strike and appearing dangerous whenever the ball was at his feet.  Critics were wondering if Ramsey could sustain such form long-term, but if anything he has looked even better thus far.  

Morally, the supporters have to be pleased with this friendly result as a change of scenery from the occasional beating they took at the hands of the top four last season.  For the players, I can tell you now as a former collegiate athlete that a result like this, even in a friendly, can do wonders for confidence.  

Arsene Wenger, so heavily criticized over the years for not ‘going for it’ in the transfer market, appears to have picked the right time to start spending money.  Between the clubs three sizable signings in the last 12 months and the stride that a lot of home-grown youngsters are hitting simultaneously, Arsenal fans will hope their club is gunning for greener pastures in the post-trophy drought era.  

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