Neither Koscielny or Kieran Gibbs were goal side of the defender, had they been then a block could have taken place. Manchester United’s early second half goal was a killer to our side. Typically we should have scored only a few minutes earlier. Koscielny had his curling shot well saved fro man

I had missed the game at Old Trafford thanks to family commitments. A mixture of text messages, twitter and twenty minutes of ITV coverage was just about all I had to chew on until 11pm last night where I connected to Arsenal TV Online and watched the full match.

I had caught up a little with the disgruntled Gooners in the blog world and Twitter. Judging by the reaction I feared the worst. Losing to Barcelona and Birmingham a few weeks ago may well have destroyed us. I was not at all looking forward to watching a game that I know the outcome. By the full time whistle on my laptop, I ended up feeling somewhat more comforted than I did on Saturday evening.

That is not to say that everything is hunky dory or all the blame can be pointed elsewhere. We were the making of our own problems as is often the case. Manchester United shouldn’t have had a sniff of the game, they put out a defensive and patched up looking team that could not string a few passes together without lumping it forward aimlessly. Yet they must be congratulated for sticking to their jobs and being clinical at the right time.

We actually played pretty well for most of the game, we moved the ball around very well even against the closing down and pressuring of the Manchester United team who fought to win it back in midfield but often chased shadows. But at both ends of the pitch we let ourselves down at crucial times.

Since we last lost at Old Trafford, the team has more than not kept a good defensive shape. We have not been as susceptible to the counter attack but on Saturday evening we were. Perhaps our total dominance meant that the players did not concentrate as much on our goal as we had the top of the table side penned back inside their penalty area until a quick break saw Fabio slide in to score at the far post following a good Almunia save from an Hernandez header.

Neither Koscielny or Kieran Gibbs were goal side of the defender, had they been then a block could have taken place. Manchester United’s early second half goal was a killer to our side. Typically we should have scored only a few minutes earlier. Koscielny had his curling shot well saved from man of the match Edwin van Der Sar then moments later Rooney headed in a deflected Hernandez shot.

Questions are being asked about our defending, and I understand those questions. At one goal down, do we need Koscielny getting beyond the strikers? After allowing Fabio his goal by not getting goal side, did we correct it when Rooney headed in almost unopposed?

Fair questions indeed and one the manager will hopefully get through to the players as he did post Manchester United in December.

Once you wipe away all the tears of being dumped out of three competitions in a short space of time, I have to say that we showed many signs of being close to our best. I would have pretty must lost all hope of the league title had we put in a performance similar to the one displayed at Portman Road earlier in our Carling cup run. I would have waved the white flag if we saw something that resembled our narrow victory against Huddersfield in the FA Cup.

I have always judged our form not by our results but by our performances. I have always thought that the way we pass and move is more of a reflection of the state of the Arsenal engine. We need our build up play to be right if we are to win games. It was good on the day. We looked a few percent away from our peak form this season.

I remember not feeling 100% right about our victory against Stoke after Cesc limped off with his customary hamstring strain. We won but we did not look overly convincing in the second half. It worried me and it was the start of a negative run.

Clearly, in the words of our manager, we lacked a little bit sharpness on Saturday. We failed to convert our domination into goals but we did not fail to convert of domination into chances. We had chances but we did not take them. Manchester United had extra defenders in their line up to contain us and as I said, give them credit for pulling it off. They were well organised, solid and effective at the back.

Personally I believe we are missing off the ball runners. Samir Nasri got many of his early goals by making runs away from the ball. He hasn’t really done that since returning back from injury. You can see that when Sagna has the ball on the right, Nasri will go to meet him and take over instead of pointing to an area and darting in that space in the hope that his international team mate will make the pass. Without Theo Walcott we lack that outlet and when you are up against a good defence then it becomes very difficult.

We seem to end up playing the ball to our full backs and swing in crosses into the box. Although this is not our greatest strength we still created at least two clear cut goalscoring chances from it. Chamakh who replaced Denilson in the second half really should have scored but didn’t generate sufficient power or direction on his close range header. Tomas Rosicky also a second half substitute missed the ball after being picked out by Sagna in the second half.

Another reason why I feel we find it difficult to break down the opposition is because we do not commit the defenders inside the penalty box enough. I hate to use them as an example but Barcelona beat packed defences by combining dribbling with quick one-two’s. It is easy to use Messi as a perfect example but they also use the likes of Pedro, Iniesta and even right back Alves to dribble past one or two defenders before exchanging the quick pass. Relying on interceptions and headers out of the box would no longer be the only answer.

I would like to see more in this department from Samir Nasri, a player fully capable of doing this, evidenced in goals against Porto and Fulham in the not so distant past. Jack Wilshere is currently the player who does this the best for Arsenal and his surges forward towards the penalty area usually causes havoc for the opposition. As a second shield for the defence we cannot see this happen as often as perhaps it should.

Conclusion

The worst thing about the game was not the defeat but the injury to Johan Djourou. The dislocation of his shoulder will put him out for the season and the next time we see him on the pitch could well be in pre season along with Thomas Vermaelen. The footballing gods have rolled the dice and we have to continue to play on.

The players have a choice, wallow in self pity, hold up the white flag and quit with ten games to go. Or they can think to themselves how they managed to get to ten games left with the title in our own destiny. After reading around the blogs, it would be easy to think we are fighting to stay up, we are actually in a straight title race.

Much has gone against us and we could lose all ten on the bounce. It is possible. We have lost our first two goalkeepers, we are short on defensive cover. Cesc’s hamstrings are fragile and Theo and Song need to hit the ground running on their return. If that is your only way of thinking then why not throw in the towel and spend Saturday afternoon’s visiting museums and saving the I told you so’s until May.

In the meantime I hope the players do not let recent results destroy seven months of this season. It may well be cliche but our remaining games are now all cup finals. Even if we just had our reserves to rely upon I am going to hope until the maths tell me otherwise.

Before we travel to West Brom we are three points behind top spot with a game in hand. The squad now have mostly seven days before each game, a luxury that the team have not experienced for some time now. Wenger needs to refocus his players and do what they can to save our season.

Almunia (8)
Sagna (7)
Koscielny (5)
Djourou (6)
Gibbs (4.5)
Denilson (6)
Wilshere (7)
Diaby (5.5)
Nasri (6)
Van Persie (6)
Arshavin (5.5)

Please note that ratings are only my interpretations of the game and that others will have differing opinions