Arsenal do bare minimum because that’s all Aston Villa require right now
Arsenal were miles off it against Aston Villa on Monday night, but their opponents are in such a state that it didn’t really matter.
Aston Villa were shambolic in their Premier League opener at Brighton last week, going four goals and a man down before half-time.
There was a marked improvement when the champions came to Villa Park and its three stands, with the club in a much better place only eight days after that 4-0 thumping on the south coast.
There is more clarity with Ollie Watkins out of the door, and more bodies through it, with Nicolas Jackson thrown into the starting XI on Monday evening and Ibrahim Mbaye and Leon Goretzka, as well as Johan Manzambi, all in attendance to watch from the stands.
Despite the flurry of transfer activity over the last week, many expected this to be a walkover after Arsenal were so convincing against Coventry City, even without marquee summer signing Bruno Guimaraes, who was back on the bench against Unai Emery’s men.
And despite the new signings and brilliant money made from Watkins, the outlook for Villa’s season is still rather bleak, with their only ray of hope being that Emery is still at the helm. He is at worst the second-best manager in the Premier League.
The top two were in opposing dugouts as Mikel Arteta once again faced the man he replaced at the Emirates back in 2019.
Arsenal’s transformation in that time has been remarkable, but so has Villa’s since Emery replaced Steven Gerrard all the way back in October 2022.
Arteta and Emery were facing off for the eighth time at their respective clubs and, despite Villa’s incredible growth and fourth-place finish last season, the gap between the two clubs has probably never been bigger.
That comes down to a number of factors, the biggest of which is the Premier League’s Profit and Sustainability Rules, which have been hindering Villa for quite some time and are the main reason so many of their key players have moved on this summer.
Although the patterns of play in Monday night’s game hinted that Arsenal are significantly stronger than Villa, the visitors did not look especially impressive and certainly not like the purring champions going up against a beleaguered, miserable team.
Unsurprisingly, Arsenal dominated possession as Villa looked to hit them on the counter-attack, and Villa’s plan worked to an extent as the pitch looked awfully small whenever they were out of possession but absolutely massive when they had the ball. Defensively, it was more or less fine. Offensively, they looked dangerous at times as Arsenal looked unusually open, but David Raya was very rarely tested.
The only time Raya was in any way worried was when Emi Buendia smashed his crossbar in the first half, though had the ball rippled the net, the goal likely would have been disallowed for a foul on Riccardo Calafiori.
Nicolas Jackson did look very sharp in transition and feels like a great fit, especially as someone Emery loved at Villarreal, but there just wasn’t enough in the Villa attack, which does not come as a surprise given the current state of affairs.
As for Arsenal and their new signings, Christos Tzolis looked beyond lost and might have been sent off in the first half for a second bookable offence. He was clearly rattled by Matty Cash, who was a man possessed as he now contends with some stern right-back competition from Aaron Wan-Bissaka.
Tzolis was hooked at the break for Ebere Eze, who played a big part in Arsenal’s winning goal, scored by Bukayo Saka and assisted by Calafiori in a very slick move and clever finish and movement from Saka.
It always felt like it was going to be one-nil to the Arsenal in a very slow, scrappy, underwhelming game of football.
It wasn’t a great performance by any means, but thankfully that didn’t really matter against a Villa team with a lot of problems to solve if this is going to be another prosperous season.
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