Inter 1-0 Arsenal: Better, but not enough

Match report – Player ratings – Arteta reaction – Video

Well, this November is turning out to be a classic of the Arsenal genre, as we suffered another defeat, going down 1-0 to Inter last night.

We started the game in shaky fashion. Denzel Dumfries absolutely rattled the bar with a shot, before they fizzed another one wide in the opening 4 minutes. Things settled down a bit then, even if some of our defensive decision making was uncharacteristic. You rarely see William Saliba and Gabriel go for the same ball, but on one occasion they did, only for the home side not to make the most of the opportunity.

There wasn’t a great deal of threat from our first half performance, it felt like more of the same after Newcastle on Saturday, although there was a shout for a penalty when Mikel Merino was clearly caught in the face by Yann Sommer who didn’t appear to get any of the ball. VAR checked, VAR moved on very quickly, and I think Inter got a bit lucky there.

Luck is something that is short supply for us right now – and I know, you make your own luck etc etc, but it felt typical that just before the break Inter got a penalty for handball against Merino. You see these given in Europe on a consistent basis, but I just don’t see how that should be a penalty. The ball deflects onto his arm from ridiculously close range – what is he supposed to do? It’s not even as if he’s blocking a shot, but the referee pointed to the spot, and Turkish Bruno Fernandes put them 1-0 up.

Mikel Arteta wasn’t happy about either decision, saying afterwards:

if you’re going to give a penalty in the other box, obviously that one has to be because he punches him in the head.

Regardless of how you might feel about our performance, I can understand that frustration. There was a half-time change, Gabriel Jesus coming on for Merino, and I think we were quite a bit better in the second 45. I’m not a fan of TNT Sport commentary at the best of times, especially that zany gimp Fletch who makes it all about the ‘bantz’ with the ex-players he was alongside him, but I didn’t really agree with their contention we were terrible in the second half.

Again, I don’t think we were brilliant, or near our best, but we were certainly a lot better than we were against Newcastle, and we dominated proceedings for the most part. Game-state may have played a part as Inter were happy to defend, but we had all the ball and all the chances. Yes, Inter rested some of their key players from the start, but brought pretty much all of them on in the second half and it didn’t change a thing.

Arsenal had 13 shots to Inter’s 1 after the break, creating 1.3xG to their 0.05xG (if you’re into that sort of thing), and we did have chances. Gabriel flicked a Bukayo Saka header goalwards only to see it cleared off the line; Kai Havertz – our best player on the night in my opinion – forced Yann Sommer into a great save after he curled a good shot towards the top corner; and Havertz again was denied by a brilliant block when he turned and shot from close range. The ball deflected just wide, which is kinda typical of the way things are going for us right now. Another night it goes the other side of the post, and we’re talking about a decent point away from home against a very good team.

So, we were definitely improved, but ultimately not good enough to get the goal I think we deserved. You couldn’t help feel that despite the dominance too much was missing. Gabriel Jesus was lively but offered no goal threat, Leandro Trossard had another one of those performances where he was well below his best, and it fell to Bukayo Saka and Gabriel Martinelli to fire in crosses from wide areas which Inter dealt for the most part. Their centre-halves and wing-backs made a total of 38 clearances on the night.

We had dominance, but not enough craft or creativity. I think you have to acknowledge it’s very hard to break down an Italian side at home, and this Inter side are Italian champions who have yet to concede a goal in Europe this season. I also think the way they celebrated at the end was instructive, because they knew they were under the cosh – at very least in terms of territory. They could barely get out of their own half.

Nevertheless, it doesn’t alter our need to do more when we have that much possession. Ethan Nwaneri came on with about 10 minutes to go, and had one excellent turn and shot from the edge of the area, but again you were wondering what might have been with a bit more time from him. People have talked about how he hasn’t played as much as they would have liked in the absence of Martin Odegaard. The skipper made a brief cameo last night, and it was good to see him back, but there’s a big part of me that wonders what Nwaneri and Odegaard operating in tandem looks like. When you’ve tried other players, and alternative systems, and they haven’t really worked, what else is there?

Again, Raheem Sterling didn’t get off the bench, and you don’t need a PHD in Mikel Arteta to read between the lines there. The last few games have told us what the manager thinks of him right now, and it’s an issue we have to think strongly about addressing in early, early January.

Afterwards, Arteta spoke positively of how his team performed, but said:

The reality is the result and we participated in that because we had many situations that we can resolve much better in front of goal and score at least two goals, and then extremely frustrated as well because there are two decisions that at the end marks the result and the course of the game.

So, you can be happy enough with the dominance – and perhaps frustrated by the referee’s decisions – but if you can’t convert that into goals, you have a fairly significant problem. It’s one we’ve got to fix quickly, because Chelsea on Sunday will be another tough away game, and the last thing we need is two weeks of introspection as we go into the final Interlull of 2024.

The glass half-full outlook this morning is that we were improved on how we played against Newcastle, but that was a very low bar. The team feels like it is playing, to use an old favourite, with the handbrake on a bit, and Arteta has to find a way to release that ahead of Sunday.

Right, I’ll leave it there. We’ll talk about the game in a bit more detail in an Arsecast which will be coming up for you a bit later on this morning, so stick with us for that.

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