Arsenal: How does Mikel Arteta set up against Man City for title charge?
Bournemouth tried to apply the pressure more aggressively. Rather than lining up with a flat front four, left-wing midfielders James Tavernier moved inside to support the midfielders – especially when Kai Havertz dropped deep to form a midfield trio with Martin Zubimendi and Declan Rice.
This decision freed up Ben White in the right-back position, but striker Evanilson constantly tried to skew his runs to block passes to the right, making access to the full-backs difficult.
City and Bournemouth’s press were slightly different but there were effective principles they both used; one of which was the way both sides directed Arsenal’s play down the left. Gabriel had to dictate play from deep areas; This is something his counterpart William Saliba is better at.
When the game got tough on that end, Andoni Iraola’s team managed to lock down the game in man-to-man fashion. When this happened, Arsenal’s players and coach frequently made signals to Gabriel to wait long for striker Viktor Gyokeres.
Since the start of the year, Arsenal have tended to attack spaces that open up when opponents press man-to-man, with the likes of Noni Madueke, Gyokeres, Gabriel Martinelli and Havertz theoretically possessing the fundamental skills to punish teams in transition.
The problem against Bournemouth was that Swedish striker Gyokeres, despite his physicality, struggled to win individual duels against Premier League defenders and Arsenal failed to dominate possession and get up the pitch. His strengths lie in moving his team forward by managing channels where he displays his strong ball-carrying ability.
