Risers & Fallers: Liverpool (a)

A plethora of things to talk about from a surprisingly significant dead rubber at Anfield.

I went for a run this morning ahead of the game. Just a two-mile jaunt up the road to one of my favorite coffeeshops in DC, a place called Yellow. It’s a lovely Levantine cafe, owned by a Palestinian chef who also runs a couple of the best restaurants in the city (in my humble opinion) currently. I got a peanut dalgona and a scrumptious breakfast pita stuffed with scrambled egg and yogurt before walking back home.

Twenty minutes into the first half at Anfield, I found myself wishing I had stayed at Yellow all morning. It was by far the closest I have come to drafting an “Oops! All Fallers!” edition of this column. Up against a team that had already been crowned champions, that had every right to mentally be on the beach, Arsenal were the ones who didn’t seem willing to take the match seriously. On the ball, the Gunners were perhaps the sloppiest they have been all season. Off the ball, they simple did not honor the standards we have come to expect — against one of the best transition teams in the world, Arsenal’s midfield disintegrated when Liverpool countered and the visitors didn’t maintain any semblance of compactness.

In the 20th minute, Cody Gakpo found himself unmarked despite five Arsenal defenders being in the immediate vicinity and headed home Andy Robertson’s cross to make it 1-0. In the 21st minute, a Mohamed Salah ball in behind found Dominik Szoboszlai in the Gunners’ penalty area, who in turn laid off the ball for Luis Diaz to smash into an empty net and put the hosts up two goals. Arsenal looked like they were crumbling in utterly embarrassing fashion. After a terrible week that spelled the end of Arsenal’s season, the new Premier League champions were beating up on them with relish in front of the entire world.

When the whistle blew for halftime, I genuinely wondered whether I should watch the second half. The team had been so dire in the first half, did I really have it in me to watch Liverpool roll back the years to Arsenal’s banter era? I decided I did, after a rant to my wife about how we shot ourselves in the foot during the last two transfer windows and deserved what we were getting.

I figured Arteta would give his players a warranted rollicking in the dressing room during the interval. But I was still surprised by how different the team looked when they made their way out for the second half. The offensive distances were better, the passing crisp, the play going forward filled with intent. Only a couple minutes in, Gabriel Martinelli, who had moved to the center of Arsenal’s front three, headed a cross from Leandro Trossard past Alisson.

The Gunners completed the comeback in the 70th minute when Mikel Merino headed in the rebound after a ferocious Martin Odegaard shot. They probably could have gone on to find a winner, such was the sudden vulnerability of the home side. But Merino earned a second yellow, forcing Arsenal to batten down the hatches to close out the match. The Reds almost scored a last-second winner, but it was ruled out due to a foul by Ibrahim Konate in the buildup. The match, after looking like Liverpool would use it to embarrass the runners-up, ended as a draw.

And I think that’s significant. Arsenal could have quit on this match entirely. It would have made sense, infuriating and mortifying as it would have been; it has been a long, grueling season that has surely drained the team both physically and mentally. But instead, they found another gear within themselves. They refused to be beaten, to be the opening act of Liverpool’s celebrations. And they showed, I think, that the difference in quality between the Gunners and the champions isn’t all that large.

With that result in the books, Arsenal are now undefeated against the Big Five and Spurs for two full seasons. They retain a lead in second place, although they will need to avoid defeat to Newcastle next weekend to hold it going into the final day of the season. But they’re probably a point or two away from sealing their place in the Champions League next season. And based on the spirit they showed today, many of those players will be ready to go again in August.

Now, onto the Risers and Fallers.

Risers

Gabriel Martinelli

In recent games, the Brazilian has been found wanting out on the left. After an encouraging spell in March, Martinelli has seemingly gone back to being a rather uninventive winger, lacking the guile to consistently beat his man or the pinpoint accuracy to make his crosses count. But in the second half, Mikel Arteta allowed him to swap roles with Trossard and play as the nine at times. The impact was positive and instant — Martinelli slipped in past Konate and Virgil van Dijk to head a Trossard cross in and pull one back for Arsenal. He also made some intelligent runs in behind, but the Gunners continue to demonstrate a reluctance to take those shots over the top. With Merino suspended for Arsenal’s next game and Trossard having pulled up in the latter stages of the match, Martinelli has emerged as someone his team can deploy at center forward.

Martin Odegaard

With Martinelli down the middle, another Arsenal player benefitted as well: Odegaard. The captain seemed to thrive with a center forward making runs ahead of him — time and time again, having a target to hit brought out some better passing from the Norwegian. But more eye-catching was Odegaard’s sudden willingness to try shots from the top of the box again. Just a few days after his half-volley in Paris forced Gianluigi Donnarumma into one of the saves of the Champions League this season, it was his attempt that forced Alisson to parry the shot onto the post for Merino to head home the rebound. Odegaard was also inches away from snatching all three points at the death; his shot flew just wide but had the Liverpool keeper beaten. Suddenly, it looks like the confidence is back and the captain is once again willing to take responsibility in the final third.

Ben White

After a really stiff performance last weekend against Bournemouth, White looked much sharper at Anfield. With some more recovery time under his belt, the Englishman’s athleticism showed once more. Whether he was bombing down the flank in attack or sprinting back in defense, White glided up and down the pitch like his old self. In Liverpool’s third, he combined well with Saka, fired in some threatening crosses, and even attempted a winger-esque stepover and shot combo which forced a save. In Arsenal’s third he won two of four tackles, won five of seven duels, made two recoveries, and committed no fouls. It was a very encouraging performance from the right back.

Myles Lewis-Skelly

It wasn’t his best game, but it was another good performance in a difficult setting. Matched up against Mohamed Salah, almost certainly the best player in the Premier League this season, the young Englishman managed to keep him mostly quiet. It is an especially impressive feat considering Lewis-Skelly spent much of the match on a yellow card. The Egyptian came away with no goals or assists on the day, although he did play a role in Diaz’s goal. Additionally, Lewis-Skelly’s return to tucking into midfield from the left back position played a role in Arsenal gaining enough control in the match to even the score. His trademark method of carrying the ball once again proved difficult for opponents to deal with; Lewis-Skelly finished the match as its most-fouled player. All in all, it was pretty solid bounce-back performance after a tough night in Paris.

Mikel Arteta

The Spaniard had his work cut out for him in that dressing room at halftime. To many, myself included, a lot of those players had spent the opening 45 minutes looking like they didn’t want to be there. Arteta was tasked with getting those players to react, to claw their way back into a match in which they were down 2-0 away to the new Premier League champions. And, well, he did it. He got his players to buy back in, to remember the standards they were obligated to uphold, to play with some pride in a match that probably felt like a big old nothing burger. I think that speaks to Arteta’s elite ability to motivate and energize his players, to extract performances from them when he needs to. At a time when mainstream football media seems dedicated to putting him down, and a time when people inside and outside the Arsenal fanbase are asking why he should remain in charge after five years with no trophy, it was a welcome display from the manager.

Fallers

Thomas Partey

He got better in the second period, but Partey was one of the most casual players on the pitch during the first half of the match. Whenever Liverpool stormed down the pitch toward Arsenal’s end, the Ghanaian was almost sure to be jogging behind them with the same urgency you’d see at a local 5k run for charity. This is especially true of the hosts’ second goal — I really try not to say this kind of thing about players, but Partey in that sequence gives off big “giving up on the play” energy. A big factor in why Partey ended up so far up the pitch to begin with for these moves is a rather annoying tendency to vacate his place in front of the back four and chase individual duels up the pitch. Maybe that’s coached, in which my questions on that matter are for Arteta. But I’m just not seeing a footballer whom Arsenal should consider irreplaceable.

Mikel Merino

For the goal, Merino showed great instincts and executed very well. But outside of that, I think he had a rather poor match. In midfield he, like Partey, was regularly out of position when Liverpool countered, allowing the hosts to stampede through open space. The Spaniard also held onto the ball too long and was generally too slow, both in his play and his coverage of the pitch. He made four of five tackles and won the most duels in the match (although he also lost the most duels in the match as well), but it was an unconvincing performance in midfield. And to top it off, his silly tackle in the second half means Arsenal will be without him when they face Newcastle, a team who have had the Gunners’ number all season. It was a performance to forget.

Liverpool fans

I think Liverpool fans were disgraceful today, to be honest. First, they blatantly lied about Lewis-Skelly not applauding during the guard of honor and proceeded to abuse him, referring to him as “arrogant” and needing to his place and other familiar dog whistles, for something the Englishman did not do. Then, they produce a banner depicting Arteta in a dress with the words “ALWAYS THE BRIDESMAID, NEVER THE BRIDE”, which is probably one of the most disrespectful banners I’ve ever seen allowed into a professional football ground and dripping with the weird, “too online” attitude that has slowly crept into real life recently. And the piece de resistance: the whole of Anfield proceeded to boo Trent Alexander-Arnold, a homegrown player who helped the club win a Champions League and two Premier League titles, because he decided he wanted to move on to another challenge. The mask slipped pretty tellingly for a lot of the Liverpool faithful on Sunday. And frankly, it’s a little sad that in a season in which their team won the league, Liverpool fans have revealed themselves to be some of the biggest losers in English football.

English football media

This is something I plan to expand on later on this week, but a quick comment on it now: the biggest pundits in the sport have spent the last week seizing on Arteta’s comments in recent pressers, to the point of obsession. It continued again today, with Gary Neville’s passive-aggressive comment about how great it was that the Arsenal manager could keep his job without any pressure on him after five years of going trophyless. Jamie Carragher followed that up by insinuating that Declan Rice will begin to feel he won’t feel trophies at Arsenal, willing the Englishman to follow in the footsteps of Cesc Fabregas and Robin van Persie on national television. Peter Schmeichel went on a rather strange rant about how Arteta is a control freak who is frantically playing the game for his players on the touchline and should be more relaxed like Arne Slot, who apparently lets his players run free. It’s basement-level punditry but more concerningly, it feels like a conscious effort to turn the footballing world against Arteta — despite an objectively great job keeping his team operating at a high standard throughout a season of bad breaks and misfortune — and to instill hopelessness in fans and players alike. I hope that seeing the Gunners save face at Anfield on Sunday, seeing Arteta rally the troops and his players respond to his halftime team talk the way they did, made all of them feel absolutely foolish.

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