Last Sunday, Arsenal went down 3-1 last Sunday against Manchester City and the gap between the Gunners and the Josep Guardiola club has reached twelve points after eleven rounds of playing in the Premier League. Former Arsenal midfielder Emmanuel Petit saw the defeat of his old team with sorrow and found that Mesut Özil failed to make his mark.
Arsène Wenger was fair at the end of the game and called the opponent the superior team. But in the first half, he was too shy. He was afraid of Manchester City and his team was too passive as a result,”Petit starts his column for Paddy Power,” I think that there should have been more changes in the midfield: Özil was on the field, but he was a spirit “.
Arsène said before the competition that Arsenal would come to the Etihad Stadium to attack. He wanted his team to make goals and not only defend them, but in the first half, he made a number of tactical mistakes which made that impossible. First of all, it was a mistake to put Francis Coquelin at the centre of the defence. Coquelin was still being booed in the Europa League by the fans, he couldn’t have any self-confidence for this match.
So it was a strange decision to put him in an unknown position against the most dangerous team in the league,” the Frenchman continues,” To be honest with Arsène: he tried something new, but it was a mistake. Arsenal failed to really threaten Manchester City in the first half and he was forced to change his mind halfway through, that worked almost immediately “.
Do you think Mesut Özil should have changed against Manchester City?