Arsenal 4-1 Leeds United: Shrugging
A few hours of distraction for the fans, some exercise for the players, Saturday afternoon ended and Saturday evening began.
This game slipped away from Leeds United in a series of frustrated shrugs. Each goal against them was aggravating but felt inevitable, and how angry can you get with fate? The players just had to accept this. Arsenal? Better than them. Better than every other team in the Premier League, according to the table. This is not 1991, or 1999, and Leeds can not compete with Arsenal as equals. Even back then, Leeds did not often win against the Gunners.
This week’s trio of matches look like a test of United’s character, and this was probably the biggest to kick things off. Yes, a lot depends on how they ‘bounce back’ against Nottingham Forest on Tuesday night, and Crystal Palace on Sunday. But first that depended on how they got through ninety testing minutes at the Emirates. The results: the scoreline was heavy but not disastrous. The players did not lose their heads, there was no repeat of the red-cardarama of last season’s big teetering defeats to Arsenal and Chelsea. No new injuries to add to all the ones we’ve got so far. In fact, under the stern gaze of their new head coach, Leeds went through the last half hour like a necessary training drill, gaining ‘minutes’ for Rodrigo, Pat Bamford, Weston McKennie and Liam Cooper as they recover their fitness, gaining ‘experience’ for Georginio Rutter. From a fan’s point of view, watching this was agonising. But agony ended on the final whistle and then it was just what we’d expected at the start anyway.
Javi Gracia’s line-up was not what anyone expected, but gave Leeds enough foothold in the first half for them to regret the final score. Jackie Harrison, a winger, and Rasmus Kristensen, a full-back, played either side of Marc Roca in a midfield three, so they could drop in between Junior Firpo and Pascal Struijk, and Luke Ayling and Robin Koch, to play like two more centre-backs. Up front, Gracia chose Crysencio Summerville, Luis Sinisterra and Brenden Aaronson, because they’re the fastest runners and could break with the ball behind Arsenal’s back line when it was tempted into attacking. Them three also spent a lot of time at the back.