While I'm watching this game, I just keep thinking about all the players who Arsenal aren't able to call on: Big Gabi, Concerned Gabi, Kai Havertz, Tomiyasu, Calafiori. It's not just who's available today. It's who might have been available during the week so that other players could have a rest.

Everything in this game has been such fine margins. Maybe a slightly better or slightly more rested player would have been enough to make the difference.

OTOH, even without reinforcements, next season should go so much better as long as there isn't another injury crisis. And "so much better" than finishing second (hopefully) and making the CL semifinals... That's promising.

[–] MHPengwingz@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Can't discount the fact that we really need more attacking options, which the board really failed to deliver on in the middle of an injury crisis. I'm not sure if this is because our director of football decided to up and leave in the middle of the season, and we are just waiting for the new guy to come in to implement their plans. Rotation has always been an issue, even if players were healthy...modern day managers including Mikel rely on really the same few players because of such a rigid system they play.

[–] merc@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

In theory, the number of available attackers shouldn't have been a problem. There were 2 good options for LW (Martinelli and Trossard), 2 at CF (Havertz and Gabriel Jesus), 2 at RW (Saka and Sterling) and some youth trying to break into the team (Nwaneri). Maybe there should have been one additional body in the attacking third just in case. But one alternate for every position is normally a decent amount. CL squads are limited to 25 players, and 1 backup at every position brings you to 22 already.

The real issue is that we had a series of injury crises, and that Sterling turned out to be incredibly poor. I think the situation in August was reasonable. But, by January the injury crisis was in full swing and we'd discovered just how poor Sterling was. A signing in January might have made all the difference. Even if it had been a player who was clearly not first choice in any forward position, if it were a player who was good enough to close out a game, or good enough to play against a team facing relegation, it could have been a way to rest other players.

What sucks about this game is that PSG shows that there were options in January. Who would be in the final if Arsenal had signed Kvaratskhelia instead of PSG?

[–] MHPengwingz@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Yeah Krava was a great pick up by them. A gripe is Mikel really wants a really specific player. Not a specific type, a specific player...i mean you gotta work with that we can get sometimes.

I had such hopes for Sterling to turn himself around, but sigh...

[–] merc@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 day ago

Maybe the new Sporting Director will convince Arteta that he can widen his choices a bit. The absolute failure of Sterling should help. I'm sure it was partially Arteta's choice, given that he'd worked with him at Man City, etc. If Arteta's judgment of a player can be so far off that he didn't realize Sterling was completely done, maybe he can put less confidence in his own judgment and trust the scouts and analysts to give him picks that he wouldn't otherwise know about.