As I have mentioned many times, the essence of Arsenal number 10 in attacking situations is not any midfielder but Calafiori. Concept is very familiar at the beginning of this season.

Even if on the pitch it’s not Merino but Nwaneri, Odegaard or Eze playing in the middle, theoretically it’s the scheme to affect the development of the ball, very little affecting the creative seam at the end of the 1/3 of the pitch.

So in the situation where Eze has the flu and Saka has not fully recovered, the choice between Trossard and Martinelli is the correct choice. Because Arsenal need 1 LW who can play dynamic between keeping the width and tightening, Martinelli can’t keep the width from the start.

That’s also the reason why Trossard is on the field until 80p, because from the 70th minute, Man City has dropped a low block so there is no space for the striker to play tightly, now the winger has to play better at the boundary and keep the width.

Throwing Martinelli in was basically an all-in gamble as Arteta pulled Timber out and replaced Martinelli in the second 9th. If noticed, when Trossard left the field, Saka switched to left wing to continue keeping left width.

Arsenal’s problem in this match or more specifically in the first half is to develop the ball, not creative stitches. Arteta has his reason for lining up the midfield like that but as I mentioned, it’s a bit full, but in other words it’s acceptable because between Merino’s experience and Nwaneri’s youth at 1 game like that Hey, the majority will choose the wicket 1.

As for the concept of Lb (Calafiori) as the main nuclear, the future is unknown but now it is reasonable. It was August then, no new Lw yet, Eze just arrived at the end of August, if you don’t think of this song, you will be lost.

Must wait for Eze to have more time then can reverse the makeplay role of Lb and Lw but for now Cala will still be the main nucleus and Lw will have to support Cala.

[Off-topic], everyone, please stop cursing the guy below, concept is concept, he still needs a guy who can develop the ball, if you can’t develop the ball, don’t talk about things higher in attacking seam. Without Odegaard, it’s a huge hit.