Striking Early: How Pep’s defenders contributed to a clever victory by stretching a compact Arsenal

In what has been an inconsistent season, Manchester City have appeared to find an extraordinary level of consistency that sees them sit 10 points clear at the top of the Premier League. Arsenal, on the other hand, find themselves in the mid-table battle, 25 points behind the league leaders. Talismanic forward Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang has just eight goals in 21 games this season, with three of those coming in a single game against Leeds, and has struggled to find the form that has seen him challenge for the golden boot. For City, however, Pep Guardiola has lacked a striker for the most part of the campaign so far but regardless, have found a talisman in İlkay Gündoğan with the German scoring 11 goals in 19 appearances this season. It is still not too long ago that Mikel Arteta was at Guardiola’s side in the City dugout but with apprentice facing master, the onus was on either of them to show that they had other tricks up their sleeve. In this tactical analysis, we will highlight the crucial tactics that saw City score early and secure a 1-0 victory to strengthen their position at the top.

Lineups

Arsenal started with a 4-2-3-1 formation, with Pablo Marí and Rob Holding the preferred centre-back pairing. Kieran Tierney and Bukayo Saka have been a crucial part of Arsenal’s side down the left-flank this season and loanee Martin Ødegaard started as well. Aubameyang led the line and would have been looking to continue his recent goal-scoring form.

As for City, it was the rock-solid Rúben Dias and John Stones that started at the back with the versatile João Cancelo starting as well. Gündoğan has been at the forefront of all things good for City in recent times and he started along with Kevin De Bruyne, who returned to the lineup from injury, and Fernandinho. Once again City started without an out and out striker, with Bernardo Silva occupying this role on paper, with Riyad Mahrez and Raheem Sterling on either side.