Risers & Fallers: Crystal Palace (h)

Three Risers and five Fallers from a game that clearly was more of an obligation than a priority.

I had to go to a coworker’s bridal shower today. I’m going to be frank: I didn’t want to be there. This person worked in a different department of my company and had come aboard relatively recently. I’m pretty sure I’ve never spoken to her directly. On top of that, I had a few assignments clients were pinging me about that I needed to get to, but there I was about to spend the next hour playing trivia games, eating mediocre catered food, and being required to look excited for a person I didn’t know at all. And for better or worse, I’ve never been someone who can feign enthusiasm. I’m either interested or I’m not, and you’ll be able to tell which pretty quickly.

I think we were all able to pretty quickly tell how interested Arsenal were in their match against Crystal Palace on Wednesday. After Jakub Kiwior headed Arsenal into the lead after three minutes, the Gunners’ play felt a little uninspired. The tempo of the passing was slow. Players didn’t exert themselves more than they needed to. The vibe was almost lackadaisical. In short, Mikel Arteta’s men — the way I probably looked at that bridal shower — looked like they didn’t want to be there. Their minds were almost certainly on the upcoming semifinal showdown with PSG.

Palace pounced on their hosts’ lack of focus, drawing level via a sensational volley by Eberechi Eze. Arsenal regained the lead through a clever Leandro Trossard strike late in the first half, but a lackluster second period saw Jean-Philippe Mateta capitalize on an error at the back and Palace equalized again. The match ended as a draw but in all honesty, the Gunners were lucky not to lose at the Emirates, which would have given Liverpool the league title then and there. Palace were thoroughly the better side, with more xG, more shots, more touches in opposition box, and more duels won.

In the end, Arsenal dropped two more points. Since their loss to West Ham on February 22, they have achieved three wins and five draws in their last eight matches. On the season, they now have 13 draws, meaning over a third of their matches in the Premier League have ended with the spoils shared. It was the ninth draw in a league match in which the Gunners led, two more than any other side and the most since the 2008/09 season. Even considering the context of injuries, refereeing decisions, and the other moments of sheer bad luck Arsenal have experienced this season, that’s just not good enough. It also means that Liverpool now just need a draw at home to Spurs to be crowned Premier League champions.

In the meantime, Arsenal have bet big on trying to win the Champions League. They have yet to clinch qualification for that competition through league position, and with a fierce battle for the three spots below theirs raging between Manchester City, Newcastle United, Nottingham Forest, Chelsea, and Aston Villa, the Gunners likely need another couple of wins to ensure they don’t get caught up in that melee. Performances like their recent showings in the league won’t help in that regard. I’m probably overthinking it and this match is likely to end up not mattering all that much when all is said and done. But I can’t help but feel that with a week to rest before PSG, this was an opportunity to lock down second place.

Anyway, onto the Risers and Fallers.

Risers

Jakub Kiwior

Kiwior was probably the lone Gunner who didn’t really put a foot wrong throughout the match. His run for Arsenal’s first goal was perfectly timed and his header was guided sumptuously past Dean Henderson. The Polish defender also played some nice passes up the left flank to the likes of Gabriel Martinelli and Declan Rice. He finished with 114 of 117 passes completed. Defensively he was great as well, blocking a shot inside the box from a Palace player and also making a critical intervention to prevent an Eddie Nketiah ball across the box from becoming an assist. He won both his duels, won his sole tackle of the match, and wasn’t dribbled past once. On a day when William Saliba made a pretty woeful error (more on that later), Kiwior looked like the world class center back being chased by Real Madrid every summer.

Leandro Trossard

It wasn’t an absolutely amazing performance, but Trossard once again found the back of the net at an important juncture for his side. Between Wednesday’s goal and his brace on Sunday, it’s been a productive week for the Belgian. Which is especially nice to see, considering that PSG are up next on the schedule and Trossard is almost certain to start at center forward given Thomas Partey’s suspension for the home leg. For his goal, he got a little lucky with the finish as his shot was deflected past Henderson. However, he earned that good fortune; he did well to control Jurrien Timber’s whipped ball into him before pump-faking a shot, cutting onto his left foot, and firing a shot between the legs of a Palace defender. After a spell of questionable decision-making in the box, Trossard is in a good vein of scoring form at just the right time.

Gabriel Martinelli

I think Martinelli was unfortunate not to come away from this match with something. In the 45th minute he fired a shot toward the bottom corner of Palace’s goal at the end of an Arsenal counterattack that forced Henderson into a save. He also whipped in a great cross that Bukayo Saka volleyed on target from just outside the six-yard box, but the visiting keeper produced an excellent stop. Additionally, the Brazilian tapped home a cross from Timber in the 69th minute to seemingly give the Gunners their third goal, but Timber was adjudged to have crossed the ball from over the byline. In a match when most of his teammates looked a little directionless, Martinelli remained a bright spot.

Fallers

Raheem Sterling

Same old, same old. Couldn’t beat his man, didn’t have any burst, didn’t really contribute much to the match. I mean, he had some nice moments of interplay and he tried to compete physically, but that can’t be the bar, can it? Let’s go ahead and delist this guy from future Risers & Fallers columns. It just feels like bullying whenever I mention him here now. An absolutely terrible loan that should result in a summer inquisition within Arsenal’s recruitment department.

Mikel Arteta

While Sterling’s performance does deserve criticism, the decision to start him lies with the manager. And, given how Sterling’s season has panned out as well as the fact that PSG at home is the next match up, I don’t really understand why Ethan Nwaneri wasn’t afforded a start against Palace. What is there to be gained or learned from watching another hour of Sterling in an Arsenal shirt? Wouldn’t the 18-year-old Hale End graduate stand to gain more from those minutes? Hasn’t he shown that he’s a more reliable performer than the man on loan from Chelsea? And won’t he come off the bench, if he plays at all, against PSG given Saka will almost assuredly start that match? Those are all the questions that rattled around in my head when I saw Sterling in the starting lineup and, well, I still have them.

Martin Odegaard

Let’s do the good news first: his cross for Kiwior’s goal was great, I liked the through ball he fired into Martinelli that the Brazilian unfortunately couldn’t make better use of, and I generally think he looked closer to the Odegaard we know than he has for most of the season. However, the captain had some pretty poor moments against Palace. He continued to get many of his final actions wrong. At one point, he received the ball in Palace’s penalty area and insisted on dribbling with his left foot despite the fact that multiple defenders were challenging on his left side and he had acres of space to his right, resulting in him losing possession. And perhaps the piece de resistance of Odegaard’s outing was his role in Mateta’s goal. Yes, the pass was Saliba’s fault entirely. But once Mateta gained possession, the way Odegaard attempted to challenge and was easily thrown aside like a piece of cardboard was, well, honestly a little pathetic. Luckily, PSG’s midfield doesn’t boast the same robustness. But still, I’m really concerned about the skipper.

David Raya

This was potentially Raya’s worst performance of the season. The Spaniard was perhaps the most unfocused player of the lot on Wednesday, demonstrating some uncharacteristically sloppy passing. Additionally, he repeatedly failed to dominate his penalty area — typically his superpower — and instead flapped at crosses or haphazardly smacked them away, a far cry from how he usually is able to claim crosses without breaking a sweat. Eze’s goal is hard to blame on him and despite Glasner stating that they targeted Raya’s positioning for situations like Mateta’s equalizer, I’m not sure I can point the finger at the Arsenal keeper for that one either. However, he gave up several other big chances for Palace, including a close-range opportunity that Nketiah really should have tucked away. Hopefully, Raya has gotten this sloppiness out of his system ahead of Tuesday.

William Saliba

It’s a shame, because Saliba was having a pretty solid match. But then, in the 83rd minute, he inexplicably slid the ball right into Mateta’s path and was only able to helplessly watch as his countryman flawlessly chipped Raya to make the score 2-2. Odegaard was even directing the Frenchman to give the ball back to the keeper, but the pressure from Palace forced a terrible mistake out of the center back. Between this and the giveaway for Vinicius Jr.’s goal at the Bernabeu, that makes two errors leading to goal for Saliba this month. He’s still a world class defender, but if that pattern persists there might be reason for concern.

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