Match report – Player ratings – Arteta reaction – Video
I remember many years ago now, watching Arsenal play Barcelona in the Champions League at the Camp Nou. It was 1999, and this was a side that had won the double the previous season, but for long periods of the game it felt like we couldn’t get near the ball because how technically proficient the opposition were.
In more recent years, we’ve seen Arsenal teams much less accomplished than this one endure similar against the likes of Man City when they were at their absolute best, but it’s been quite some time since I’ve seen a team do to us what PSG did in the opening 25-30 minutes of last night’s game. I won’t lie, I wasn’t expecting it to play out that way, but there was a point at which I looked at the clock (around 22′ in) and thought if we could get to half-time at just 0-1 I’d be pretty pleased.
Their start to the game was superb. We can definitely ask some questions of our own performance, but there are also times you need to just give credit to the opposition for what they do and how they do it, and for me that’s where I stand on that first half an hour. They were breathtakingly good, by far the best team we’ve played this season, and I include the Premier League title winners in that.
The atmosphere was great as kick-off approached, but much like the game in Madrid, it was punctured a little bit by a moment of pre-game silence which felt completely at odds with the occasion. You could hear some fans try to turn it into applause but that fizzled out, and you lose something. When PSG scored just three minutes in, it felt like someone had let all the air out of the balloon. It’s not to say the pre-game silence was at fault, but – with all due respect – I don’t think it was useful.
The goal was well worked, no question, but as they worked it towards our box Declan Rice left Ousmane Dembele free on the edge of the box to double up on Khvicha Kvaratskhelia, which left the Frenchman free to fire home in off the post. Perhaps a touch of good fortune in that he shinned it down into the ground, it skimmed through some bodies and in off the post, but it was just what the doctor didn’t order. You could also ask if Mikel Merino, having seen Rice engage with Timber, could have taken his place as he chased back, and made life more difficult for the goalscorer.
I think we were rattled a bit by the goal and the ease with which PSG just kept possession. Popping the ball off in tight areas, demonstrating a level of control that’s a bit demoralising when you’re chasing their shadows. They had other chances, Marquinhos had a header which Raya saved; there was, for me at least, a reasonable penalty shout when Timber held Kvaratskhelia in the box, and later the Georgian shot straight at the keeper; then Desire Doue forced Raya into a brilliant low save with powerful shot – the follow-up hit the post before the offside flag went up.
That was the 31st minute and we’d barely had the ball in their half. 1 shot to their 6, 32% possession to their 68%. This was not the plan. In his post-game press conference, Arteta said he’d identified an issue, one he didn’t go into the specifics off, and said:
We had especially one issue that we corrected after 15-20 minutes and we sustained that for the rest of the game, which I think turned the game around.
I’m telling you [specifically what it was] it’s just something that is very specific but very important, especially the way we played. We corrected it and it’s not easy to correct it constantly but we did it and we did it much better.
I think it took a bit longer than 20 minutes, but certainly we looked better in the final stages of the first half. Saka made a chance for Martinelli at the back post, but he’d have likely been offside if he had made good contact on the stretch; there was a shout for a penalty on Merino but the PSG player won the ball; and who knows what might have transpired had the linesman not given the softest foul to PSG when Saka robbed Nuno Mendes out wide and had the penalty box at his mercy.
The half ended with a great chance for Martinelli, put through brilliantly by Myles Lewis-Skelly. With just the keeper to beat, he couldn’t apply the finish, and your mileage may vary on whether it’s a bad miss or a great save by Gianluigi Donnarumma. More on that anon.
The second half began with Arsenal finding the back of the net, Merino heading home a Declan Rice free kick, but VAR intervened and eventually the Spanish international was deemed offside. It wasn’t even that close so I don’t understand quite why it took so long, but there you go. A few minutes later a superb driving run from Rice created a chance for Trossard, again Donnarumma was equal to it, producing a fingertip save to deflect the ball around the post.
Arteta spoke after the game about ‘fine margins’ which I don’t think is unfair given those two chances. And while I think the second one in particular is an outstanding save, at this level I think we have to take at least one of those two opportunities. You don’t get many of them in games like this against opposition of this quality, and for me it’s slightly reflective of a wider issue where I feel we’re not as clinical as we need to be in the final third. If we want to win the biggest trophies, those are the moments you have to make count.
At the other end William Saliba produced a sensationally timed tackle in our box to deny Hakimi, and without much on the bench to call on to change the dynamic of the game a bit, I started thinking about the second-leg. I wanted us to score, obviously, but I was worried that in going for it we might leave ourselves open to conceding another. There were chances for PSG to do that, substitute Bradley Barcola went through one on one when we found ourselves too easily exposed, but I think replays showed Goncalo Ramos offside in the build-up.
The Portuguese striker then hit the bar with a toe-poke, and while I’ve seen suggestions he was off, I’ve looked at it again and if he is the margin is razor-thin. To the naked (not semi-automated) eye I’d put money on him just timing his run well enough to stay on. You can click the image below to make up your own mind, but I think that goal – had it gone in – would have stood. We got away with one there.
My gut feeling this morning is that while I’m obviously disappointed to have lost the first leg, it could have been worse. Fine margins for us in terms of the chances we didn’t take, but also at the other end when PSG’s margin of victory could have been doubled, at least. That would have made next week even more challenging, but while 1-0 at ‘half-time’ isn’t ideal, it also isn’t terrible.
Not least because I don’t think we played anywhere near as well as we can last night. I can’t say for sure the occasion got us, but this was our first Champions League semi-final in 16 years. PSG have had 4 or 5 in the last few years. I think that can make a difference, and going back to the start, the early goal really did wobble us for understandable reasons.
If your glass is half-full this morning, you’ll point to the fact that once we got a foothold in the game, we stayed in it. We had chances to score, we had a goal disallowed, and there were things we did that caused PSG problems. I’m sure Arteta and his staff will study this game closely, and think about how to do better next time out. If your glass is the other way, I get it, we could have been punished but weren’t, and there’s a big improvement required if we are to make the final.
Arteta said afterwards:
If you want to win the Champions League final, you have to do something special and we’re going to have to do something special in Paris to be there.
We are alive at 1-0, it’s all still to play for, and anything can happen in a 90 minute game (perhaps even 120 minutes). But collectively we can’t allow PSG take control the way they did again, and I think individually we have a few players who need to step it up. Not just the players tasked with finishing, but Martin Odegaard had a worrying off-night when we need more from him. I know his form hasn’t been at the level you’d expect this season, but on the biggest stage you need your biggest players and he’s got to find something in his locker for next week. On plus side, I thought Lewis-Skelly was superb again, and Rice – goal apart – stood up and stepped up well.
So, not what we had envisaged, but it’s far from game over. We now have to follow in the footsteps of Arsenal Women who lost frustratingly at home in their first leg before producing something extra-special in the second leg in France. Nobody said it was gonna be easy, and we are the Arsenal after all – we never, ever do things the easy way. All eyes on Paris now, with a weekend visit of Bournemouth sandwiched inbetween.
For more on last night, we’ll have an Arsecast for you a bit later on. For now though, have a good one.
