English Premier League

Arsenal Manager Unai Emery’s debut season is impressive but he needs signings to catch the top 2

Editorial Team 6 years ago

Unai Emery managed clubs such as Sevilla, PSG and Arsenal

Arsenal finished their 2017/18 Premier League campaign with 63 points under legendary manager Arsene Wenger. Under Unai Emery, Arsenal have matched it with 7 games to spare. The former PSG boss had to deal with injury-crisis especially in defense with games coming thick and fast in December and January. Despite the injury issues, the Spaniard has lead Arsenal to victories against Manchester United and Chelsea.

With Manchester City and Liverpool set to take the top 2 spots, the remaining set of fixtures favour Arsenal who should fancy their chances of finishing in a Champions League spot ahead of Chelsea, Man United and Tottenham Hotspur.

Arsenal are almost back to full strength with most of their stars having returned to full-fitness in February. Hector Bellerin, Rob Holding and Danny Welbeck are the only three players sidelined at the time of writing. In the last 5 games, Arsenal have scored the same number of points as Liverpool, winning four games and drawing one. Only Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City have scored more points during the same period.

What’s more impressive is how Arsenal have become defensively solid when their centre-backs are fit. They displayed resilience in their outing against Tottenham Hotspur by holding them to a 1-1 draw and beat Man United 2-0 at home to hand Ole Gunnar Solskjaer his first Premier League defeat as Manager. Liverpool hit Arsenal for 5 at Anfield but that happened at a time when Arsenal’s injury crisis was worse and there was utter chaos at the back. Barring that result, Arsenal have conceded only 34 times in 30 games at an average of 1.13 goals per game which is significantly better than the 1.34 they had last season.

On the attacking front, Arsenal have scored 65 goals in just 31 games scoring at an average of 2.01 goals per game bettering their previous season’s number of 1.94. To put that into perspective, only the usual suspects Manchester City and Liverpool have done better than Arsenal this season in the attacking front. Arsenal have hit purple patch at the right time and could finish the season strongly by solidifying the third spot and extending the gap between them and the rest of the pile aiming for top 4.

Despite the impressive debut season, the Spanish Manager would be wary of the difference in quality between Arsenal and the likes of Manchester City and Liverpool. The defending Premier League champions Man City easily swept aside Arsenal 2-0 and 3-1 this season and despite Arsenal’s woes, the 5-1 battering at the hands of Liverpool should serve as a stern reminder of why Arsenal need to improve their squad depth. Unai Emery needs atleast a couple of signings to compete with the top two clubs of the Premier League next season and Adrien Rabiot who is out of contract in the summer would be an ideal choice to replace midfielder Aaron Ramsey who will be joining Juventus at the end of this season.

Editorial Team

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LosMejor's Editorial Team includes a team of experts who cover the UEFA Champions League, Premier League, FA Cup and the Carabao Cup. The Editorial team is headed by Deepak Selvan.