Alexis Back To His Devastating Best

Match Review: Leicester City 2 Arsenal 5 - Premier League 26.09.15

This Premier League season is shaping up to be all sorts of crazy. Two weeks ago, City looked set to race away at the top and the obligatory ‘can they go unbeaten?’ tweets were starting to appear. Fast forward a fortnight and City are rocking after two defeats in a row, the latest a 4-1 capitulation at Tottenham. Chelsea continue to play poorly, dropping more points at Newcastle and Liverpool were run close by Aston Villa. Despite the 5-2 scoreline, our game was far from straight forward. The quality across the board in the Premier League has greatly increased and I think we’ll see one of the lowest points totals for the Champions in a long time.

As expected, Wenger reverted the team back to the main XI, with the exception of Flamini keeping his place over the injured Coquelin. This is one of our big worries for this season, as Flamini is not the solid and disciplined player that Coquelin is and Arteta’s ageing body will not allow him to be starting game after game. Thankfully Coquelin seems to be available for the next game against Olympiakos, but a long term lay off would give us a lot of problems.

Leicester started the game very well and were probably the better side for the first twenty minutes or so. The movement and pace of Vardy, Schlupp and Mahrez gave us a lot to think about down the flanks, whereas our movement was poor to begin with. We have a tendency to become very static when we have possession, with players seemingly unwilling to move for the man with the ball. Not only does it slow the pace of our game down, but it makes us very easy to press, with teams cutting off our passing lanes and forcing our man to make a quick decision with very few options, particularly going forward. Another thing we are guilty of time and again is over committing to our attacks and it bit us early on this time.

Ramsey dallied on a shot in the area and allowed the defender to poke the ball away, giving Leicester the chance to fire the ball forward quickly to Vardy. With Bellerin out of the picture, Vardy was free to run by Mertesacker and from a tight angle he curled the ball beyond Cech and into the far corner. From Leicester’s point of view, an excellent goal and the finish by Vardy was sublime, but we have to look at ourselves. Leicester are a very good team and considering the pace and skill they exhibited early on, we were naive to leave ourselves so exposed. Every team in the league now has a lot of attacking talent capable of hurting us, so we cannot afford to leave ourselves that open.

Leicester could have had an even greater lead too, as they hit the bar from Vardy again. I thought we might be in trouble and get overrun, but fortunately Leicester got slightly carried away with their good start. After Vardy’s effort had come back off the bar, we won the ball from Mahrez and Özil held the ball up well before finding Alexis on the wing. Leicester were over committed and Alexis threaded a ball through to Cazorla, who in turn slid Walcott in behind. Theo showed great composure and slotted the ball in off the post to equalise and calm our jittery nerves. Shortly after, we lost Flamini to injury, meaning Arteta was called into action after playing 90 minutes in the week.

The goal definitely steadied us and it became a more even contest. It’s amazing how getting a goal seems to galvanise the team when they’ve previously looked sluggish and slow. Suddenly the passing zips a bit more, there are options for the man in possession and we play the type of football that lead to our second goal.

Leicester felt aggrieved that an off the ball collision between Okazaki and Arteta wasn’t punished, but the replays clearly show that it was accidental and the referee called it right. We played out from the back, moving the ball down the right and some lovely passing and movement was capped by Özil’s excellent flick in behind for Bellerin. The full back pulled the ball back across goal and Alexis had all the time in the world to finish, thanks to Walcott’s near post run dragging the defenders away from the middle.

You could see the confidence flowing back into the Chilean, he really needed that goal. When he’s in a slight lull he’s the sort of player that tries extra hard and that can adversely affect his game. When he’s happy and on form, he’s one of the most devastating players in the league and that’s the Alexis we need for a title tilt.

We were the better team once we settled down and although Cech had to make a decent save early in the second half, we always looked more dangerous and deserved to extend our lead. The football leading up to it was excellent again, taking advantage of the space Leicester were leaving us and it culminated with our two best players linking superbly. Özil’s assist was perfection, teasing the ball over the top of the defence, placed just, just right force the keeper to come out, but curling away from him to make Alexis favourite. The Chilean rose like the proverbial salmon and glanced the ball into the net for his second of the game and he wasn’t done there.

His hat-trick goal was all about individual brilliance. Receiving a throw in he made a fool of Kante, took a touch and then fired into the bottom corner from 25 yards out. Morgan chose to stand off him, allowing him the space and time to line up the shot and kill the game. It’s the sort of goal out of nothing that can win a tight game and the perfect way to sign off a hat-trick and silence the critics. In the last few minutes, there was just enough time for us to concede a stupid goal, with Vardy firing in again after we allowed Kramaric a free header and then for Giroud to make it 5-2. Giroud has lost his place to Walcott and has been short on confidence recently, but he finished his chance clinically, sweeping home Monreal’s cut back.

Aside from the first twenty minutes and a little wobble at the end, it was a good performance. Leicester looked a very good side at times and I think they’ll take some points off the big teams home and away. We definitely could have started better, but we should also give credit to our opponents. If we attack the way we’re capable of attacking we’ll have a great shot at winning this league. It’s wide open and we have a chance to impose ourselves at the top next weekend against Man Utd. The game against Olympiakos needs our full attention though, it’s a must win and any slip up could be a disaster for our Champions League campaign.

Teams

Leicester (4-4-2)
Schmeichel, de Laet, Huth, Morgan, Schlupp, Mahrez, Kanté, Drinkwater (Y) (Kramaric 78’) Albrighton (Ulloa 64’), Okazaki (King 45’), Vardy
Subs
Schwarzer, Dodoo, Kramaric, Ulloa, King, Inler, Simpson

Arsenal (4-2-3-1)
Cech, Bellerin, Mertesacker, Koscielny, Monreal, Flamini (Arteta (Y) 21’), Cazorla, Alexis, Özil, Ramsey (Chamberlain 77’), Walcott (Giroud 80’)
Subs
Ospina, Gibbs, Debuchy, Chambers, Arteta, Chamberlain, Giroud

Player Ratings

Cech - 7/10 - Made some very good saves and had little chance with either goal
Bellerin - 7/10 - Had a difficult start, but lifted his game brilliantly after we scored
Mertesacker - 7/10 - Nice to have him back and coped well with quick attackers
Koscielny - 7/10 - Pretty solid although Vardy got between him and Nacho a few times
Monreal - 8/10 - Excellent, nullified Mahrez and coped well with Schlupp
Flamini - 6/10 - Looked a little over excited before going off injured
Cazorla - 8/10 - Lovely assist and his all round play was very good
Alexis - 9/10 - Hit and miss before he scored, but once he did he was unstoppable
Özil - 8/10 - 91% pass accuracy, 5 chances created, 1 sublime assist, majestic
Ramsey - 7/10 - Started off shaky, but grew into the game
Walcott - 8/10 - Excellent striker’s performance, terrorised their back four
Subs
Arteta - 8/10 - I thought he was excellent, steadied the team and tackled brilliantly
Chamberlain - N/A
Giroud - N/A

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