Bloodbather
Established Member
Country: Turkey
This Bellerin criticism is just absurd. Clearly it takes a while to get back to 100% after a big ACL injury, but regardless of the injury, he's not attacking that much due to Arteta's tactics. And he is clearly doing exactly what Arteta wants him to do.
Arteta is trying to spread the pitch, and based on our personnel that means that Xhaka is initially dropping deep into being essentially at LCB in a pseudo-back three when we have possession before moving back into midfield, and Saka is pushing up into being practically a LW.
When Saka becomes a LW, Auba becomes a second striker, and now we are playing with a front four of Saka, Auba, Nketiah/Laca, and Pepe. Özil also joins in to make it almost a front 5, and now Xhaka, Ceballos, and Hector function as midfielders with Luiz and Mustafi behind them. Xhaka is covering for Saka defensively, and Hector is doing the same for Pepe. This helps keep possession and defend against counter-attacks.
Comparing Hector to Saka just doesn't make any sense because under Arteta they have completely different roles in our system. Hector's job when we have possession is to help us retain possession and to defend against the counter. Saka is trying to get in the final third and create chances.
Additionally against Newcastle, Hector also had to defend Newcastle's best player. Sure it would be great if Hector was big enough to physically dominate Saint Maximin, but he isn't, so Hector spent a day committing tactical fouls and slowing Saint Maximin down until the double team could arrive. Pepe did a great job defensively.
Also, since Arteta has been back there has been one match where Hector was supposed to contribute in the final third, and that was Chelsea after the red card. And in that match, he scored the game-tying goal.
Hector is doing exactly what Arteta wants and we have gotten much better defensively, and based on yesterday our attack has gotten much better too.
The only way Hector will start bombing down the wing and contributing to the attack is if Mari becomes a starter and this results in Arteta changing our tactics, or we're down to ten men and need him to start attacking.
If Mari starts, I suspect that Xhaka won't drop back into defense and become practically a LCB. Instead he'll stay in the middle, but drop a little deeper, and our CBs will move out wide, making a quasi-back three. Ceballos and Özil will remain in the center, but ahead of Xhaka, and both or our fullbacks will have license to move into the attack. We'll play a high line defensively, and our CBs will be charged with stopping the counter-attack. Man City does this all the time when Laporte plays.
Excellent breakdown mate. Felt a like didn't do it enough justice.