Manchester City v Arsenal Women : What Does A Response Look Like?

On Wednesday night, Arsenal were 2-0 up and somehow came home from Paris with a point. On Thursday night, Manchester City were 1-0 down against Real Madrid and somehow came away with one as well. However, their route to that result was different, because Madrid will probably still be wondering how they didn’t win it, especially after having that late goal disallowed.

So we’ve got two teams coming into Sunday having had difficult nights in Europe, two teams who found themselves in very different situations during those games and two teams who’ll probably feel they have something to prove at the Etihad. But for Arsenal this feels bigger, because we’ve spent the last few weeks trying to understand what’s happening to this team. We went into Paris asking what an answer might look like, and for about an hour I thought we were watching one, before Arsenal somehow let a 2-0 lead disappear and we came away with even more questions than before.

Renée Slegers says what she’s seen from her players since then is something she hasn’t seen from this group before. She says they’re together, they’re angry, they’re taking responsibility, and they’re going to Manchester for three points.

So I think there’s really only one question we need to ask today.

What does all of that look like when the whistle goes on Sunday?

Renée is back, and she answered some of our questions

First things first: Renée is back. She sat down in front of the media at Sobha Realty Training Centre. She answered pretty much every question that had been swirling around since Paris, including the obvious one about why she hadn’t appeared for the press conference after the game.

I think it’s important that we listen to what she said because yesterday I was very careful not to fill that silence with things we didn’t know, and now we do know, at least from Renée’s perspective, what happened. She said there was emotion after the game; she controlled it quickly and then made a conscious decision that, rather than going out to speak to the media, she needed to stay with her players. She acknowledged that speaking to the media is part of her job; she apologised to the journalists who had travelled to Paris and said she’ll be there next time, but in that particular moment she felt being with the team was more important.

And having now heard the rest of what she said, I think I understand that decision rather better than I did yesterday, because she wasn’t describing a dressing room where everybody disappeared into their own little corners after another bad result. She talked about the players connecting, looking at what they could have done differently and trying to find solutions. She was particularly effusive about the captains, describing their leadership as the strongest she’s seen during her time working in football. Calm, composed, solution-oriented and, one of Renée’s favourite phrases at the moment, laser-focused.

Now, obviously, we have to remember who is telling us this. Renée is the manager, and none of us was inside that dressing room, so I’m not going to take a manager telling us her group is together and somehow turn that into definitive proof that absolutely everything behind the scenes is wonderful. But equally, if we’re going to be responsible about this, we can’t ignore what she’s telling us because it doesn’t fit the more dramatic version of events some people have already decided must be happening.

Yesterday I said we had no evidence that Renée had lost the dressing room, that the players had stopped believing in her, or that some enormous fracture was developing inside Arsenal. Today we’ve got a little more information. Renée says the response she’s seen from the players has been exceptional: people are taking responsibility, the captains have stepped forward, and she feels the group is very much together. She also confirmed that she’s been in regular contact with Jodie Taylor, Claire Wheatley, Rich Garlick and James King and says she feels the full support of the club’s leadership.

So for those of you who were really worried after Paris, particularly some of our younger listeners who I know were upset by what happened, that’s the information we have. You don’t have to turn it into “everything’s fine” because clearly everything isn’t fine on the pitch at the moment, but equally there’s nothing in what we’ve learned since Wednesday night that supports the idea that everything is collapsing behind the scenes.

What I found much more interesting was the way Renée talked about her own responsibility in all of this, because when she was asked whether she feels under pressure, she didn’t pretend she doesn’t. She said she always does; a lot of it comes from herself because she wants to be a good leader and get the best out of this group. Still, she also understands that she’s the manager of Arsenal, the club has ambitions for this season, and so far they haven’t executed what they wanted to execute. Her words. “I understand that’s part of the role, and I have to take it.”

And I think that’s probably where I am with her at the moment as well. I’m not particularly interested in trying to work out whether Renée should be sacked after every disappointing result. Still, I am increasingly interested in whether she’s going to find the solutions because this squad is far too good for us to keep having the same conversations after every game.

Perhaps the most revealing thing she said about Paris was that her anger afterwards was never directed at the players. She was angry about the situation Arsenal have found themselves in and particularly the fact that, just when it looked as though they were finally getting somewhere, they’d scored two really good goals, they’d put themselves into a winning position, and then they allowed it to slip through their hands again. She didn’t blame the referee for the penalty either. In fact, she said if the referee wants to make that call then it’s fair because it’s within the laws of the game, and she went straight back to what Arsenal could control and what they should have done differently to stop Paris getting back into the match.

That matters to me because it means we’re not spending this preview arguing about Wednesday anymore. Renée knows Arsenal should have won that game, the players know it, we know it, and everybody appears to agree the answer has to come from Arsenal rather than looking for somebody outside the club to blame.

She told the players afterwards that she was angry, told them to use those emotions and let them fuel what comes next, and apparently the first training session since Paris was really, really good.

Well, good.

Because what comes next is Manchester City away.

And if Arsenal are looking for somewhere to turn all that anger into something useful, Sunday would be a very good place to start.

Particularly because, having watched what Real Madrid did to City on Thursday night, I don’t think Arsenal should be travelling to Manchester frightened of them.

Manchester City are top, but Real Madrid showed us something

And I want to be careful with that because I’m not suddenly going to tell you Manchester City aren’t very good because Real Madrid caused them problems on Thursday night. They are very good, they’ve started the WSL season extremely well, and they’ve got enough individual quality that you can be completely on top of a game against them and still find yourself punished if you switch off for a moment, which is perhaps not the most comforting thing to say about them after we’ve just watched Arsenal give Paris exactly that sort of opportunity. But I watched that Madrid game, and I came away from it thinking there are absolutely things there for Arsenal to attack on Sunday. Clearly, Renée did too, because when she was asked whether she’d seen areas where City can be beaten, she immediately talked about how impressed she’d been by Real Madrid and, in particular, how difficult they made things for City in the first half.

Madrid were excellent for periods of that game, and Linda Caicedo gave City all sorts of problems, scoring the opening goal and carrying the sort of threat in transition that Arsenal themselves should be capable of producing with the players they’ve got. Madrid weren’t just sitting back and hoping something happened either; they were brave when they had chances to go forward, and there were moments when City looked really uncomfortable trying to deal with them. They eventually found their equaliser through Bunny Shaw and, as Renée pointed out, that’s something City have shown already this season: they stay in games and have the quality to find something late, even when things aren’t necessarily going their way.

But Madrid very nearly won it anyway, and this is where it gets slightly ridiculous because Sílvia Cristóbal put the ball in the net in the 89th minute only for it not to count. After all, the referee had collided with Beth Mead and stopped play before the shot. So City escaped that moment, Madrid came away with a point, and I suspect they’ll feel they could quite easily have left Manchester with all three, because they had created enough over the course of the game to deserve that opportunity.

And I think that’s useful for us going into Sunday because City being top of the WSL and winning all of their league games so far can make this fixture feel a bit more frightening than it perhaps needs to. I’m not underestimating them, and I’m certainly not predicting that Arsenal are going to turn up at the Etihad and suddenly everything we’ve been worrying about disappears. Still, Real Madrid have just given Arsenal a very recent example of how you can make City uncomfortable, and conveniently Arsenal have players who should be capable of causing some of the same problems.

That’s why I keep coming back to the squad Renée has available to her and the choices she makes with it, because if there are spaces to attack quickly when City lose the ball, I don’t want Arsenal receiving it, taking another touch, turning back and allowing City to reset. We’ve spent weeks talking about that now. I want somebody looking forward immediately, I want runners prepared to go beyond the ball, and I want Arsenal to be brave enough to use the pace and directness they spent the summer adding to this squad.

Which, yes, brings me straight back to Selina Cerci.

Because if you’re going away to Manchester City and you’ve just watched Caicedo hurt them by being direct and attacking space, I find it very difficult to look at Cerci and not think there might be a role for her in this game. I’m not saying she has to start simply because Real Madrid had success with a quick player on Thursday night; football obviously isn’t that simple, but we’ve already seen Cerci come into an Arsenal game and immediately make something happen by running at people, and those qualities feel particularly relevant to what City have just struggled against.

The same applies in a different way to Géraldine Reuteler, because one of the things Madrid did well was recognise where the next space was going to appear rather than simply reacting once it had appeared, and that’s a huge part of Géraldine’s game. We established yesterday that fitness isn’t the reason we’re not seeing her, so I’m not going to go through all of that again. Still, Sunday gives Renée another decision to make about whether the different qualities she brought into this squad are going to become part of the solution she’s talking about.

There is another side to all of this, though, because watching City struggle against Madrid also reminded me of something Arsenal absolutely cannot afford to get wrong. City stayed in the game. They didn’t play particularly well for periods; they fell behind, Madrid kept threatening, and yet they stayed close enough that, when their opportunity came, they found the equaliser. Renée specifically mentioned that when she spoke on Friday, she said City have shown that late in games they stay in it and come back, and after what happened in Paris that should be flashing in enormous letters in Arsenal’s heads.

If Arsenal get themselves ahead on Sunday, that isn’t the end of the job.

We learned that the hard way on Wednesday.

And this is where I think the two European games give us such an interesting contrast going into Sunday, because Arsenal found themselves 2-0 ahead and couldn’t manage what happened next. In contrast, City found themselves behind and kept going until they changed the result. That doesn’t tell us who is going to win at the Etihad and I’m not interested in pretending it does, but it does tell us something about the challenge Arsenal are walking into. They may have periods where they’re on top, they may find the spaces Madrid found, and they may even get themselves into a winning position, but City aren’t going to disappear simply because Arsenal are playing well.

So when Renée talks about needing to be at their very, very best, I don’t think that means producing twenty or thirty minutes of the Arsenal we know is in there. We’ve seen those periods already this season. We saw them against Chelsea, we saw them again in Paris, and that’s partly why this run has been so frustrating, because we’re not watching a team that looks incapable of playing good football. We’re watching a team that keeps showing us enough to make us think it’s about to click and then, for one reason or another, loses control of what it was doing.

Sunday has to be about sustaining it.

And to do that, Renée has some pretty big decisions to make about who she trusts to start this game and, perhaps even more importantly given what we’ve seen recently, who she trusts when she needs to change it.

So what does Renée change?

Which brings us to Renée’s team, and I think this is where Sunday becomes particularly interesting because I don’t really want to spend another preview going through the squad and asking for change simply for the sake of seeing different names. We’ve done enough of that now and, after what Renée said on Friday, I’m much more interested in whether the team she picks reflects what Arsenal have learned from the last few games and what they’ve just watched Real Madrid do to City.

We know Chloe Kelly won’t be involved. Renée confirmed she’s been managing a hamstring problem and doesn’t feel physically able to perform for the team at the moment, with no timeline yet for her return. Steph Catley is further along because she was back on the training pitch on Friday and completed what had been planned for her, although Renée stopped short of saying that means she’ll be available on Sunday. So we still don't know a couple of things, but otherwise Renée has choices, and after Paris I think the important thing is what she does with them.

Goalkeeper is one of them, because Renée was specifically asked whether rotating between Anneke Borbe and Misa Rodríguez might have contributed to the confusion that led to the penalty in Paris. She said no, and I don’t think we can say that it did either. Still, I thought the second half of her answer was more interesting because she acknowledged that if Arsenal are going to choose different goalkeepers for different games according to what they need, then everybody has to be very clear, aligned and communicating properly when the personnel changes. That’s fair enough, but it also means I’m interested to see what she decides she needs against City. If this really is going to be a horses-for-courses approach rather than somebody eventually becoming the established number one, Sunday should tell us something about what Renée believes each goalkeeper gives her.

Further forward, I think I’d be looking at the midfield before I did anything dramatic to the defence, because Arsenal need enough control to stop City turning this into an end-to-end game while still having somebody prepared to move the ball forward when the opportunity appears. I liked what Kyra Cooney-Cross gave us at Chelsea because she was looking forward and finding space, and I still don’t think we’ve seen enough of that since. Kim Little’s leadership feels particularly valuable in a game like this as well, especially after everything Renée has just said about the role the captains have played this week, so there is a balance to find there rather than simply squeezing all of Arsenal’s most familiar midfielders onto the pitch because this is a big game.

Then we get to the front line, where I think Renée has to decide what sort of game she believes Arsenal will play, rather than simply selecting the players highest in whatever hierarchy currently exists. We’ve already talked about Cerci and Reuteler, so I’m not going to repeat yesterday’s argument or what I’ve just said about the spaces City can leave. Still, if Renée believes those qualities are useful on Sunday, then I’d like to see her use them while the game is still there to be influenced. That doesn’t necessarily mean both have to start. It does mean I don’t want to get to the 85th minute with Arsenal needing something different and find ourselves wondering again why the players brought in to give Arsenal something different are still sitting next to Renée.

Russo, for me, stays through the middle. Wednesday’s goal matters because we’ve been waiting for her to get one, and I don’t see any reason to interrupt that now she’s finally got it. What I’d like around her is enough movement and pace to stop City becoming comfortable, because if Russo is constantly receiving with defenders set in front of her and Arsenal are slowly building around the outside, we’re making the afternoon much easier for them than it needs to be.

But perhaps the biggest change I’m looking for isn’t one we’ll see when the team sheet appears. I want to see those defensive relationships working properly again, because City have far too much quality for Arsenal to leave the sort of spaces Paris were given on Wednesday. If Ona Batlle or Emily Fox goes, somebody has to recognise what's opened up behind them. If Arsenal lose the ball, the first reaction has to be to protect that space rather than discovering it’s there once City are already running into it. That’s not me asking Arsenal to become cautious, because I don’t think going to the Etihad frightened of losing is going to help anybody. It’s asking them to build the structure behind their attacks that lets them be brave without becoming reckless.

And maybe that’s what I’m really looking for from Renée’s selection on Sunday. Not five changes to prove she’s doing something, and not the same familiar names simply because this is Manchester City and they’re trusted. Pick the team for the game Arsenal expect to face, make sure everybody understands exactly what their job is within it and then, if the game changes, respond to the game that’s in front of you rather than reaching automatically for the same solution.

Because we’ve spent a lot of time discussing Renée’s choices recently, Sunday allows us to judge something slightly different.

Whether those choices make sense together.

What would an answer look like on Sunday?

So after all of that, what am I looking for on Sunday? Because I don’t think the answer can be three points. Of course I want Arsenal to win, and Renée has made it very clear that’s what they’re going to Manchester to do. Still, we’re at the point now where I want to understand whether the things we’re seeing are beginning to change, because you can win a football match without solving the problems that got you into trouble in the first place. You can also play very well against a team as good as Manchester City and not necessarily come home with the result you deserved.

For me, the first indication will probably come quite early. Does Arsenal look like a team that knows what it wants to do with the ball? Not whether we have loads of possession or complete hundreds of passes, but whether the next action looks clear. When somebody receives the ball, and there’s an opportunity to go forward, do we take it? When Russo moves, does somebody see her? When a winger has space ahead of her, does she attack it? And when City do force Arsenal backwards, can we recycle the ball and start again without that becoming the default every time? That’s the bit I’ve found so frustrating recently, because I don’t think we’re miles away from creating the situations we want; we’re getting into them and then too often allowing the moment to disappear before we use it.

Then I want to see what happens when something goes wrong, because it will. This is Manchester City away, and there will be periods where City have the ball, periods where Arsenal are pushed backwards and almost certainly moments where somebody makes a mistake. What matters to me now is what happens immediately afterwards. Does the team remain organised? Do the players solve the problem together? If City score first, does Arsenal stay calm enough to keep playing? If Arsenal score first, can they manage the next ten minutes without either retreating completely or becoming so desperate for another goal that they leave the back door open? Renée has spent the last couple of days talking about the calmness and leadership she’s seen from this group away from the pitch, and Sunday is where I’d like to see that translate into the football.

I’m also going to be watching Renée herself more closely than I probably would have a few weeks ago, and I don’t mean watching her on the touchline waiting for some dramatic reaction every time something happens. I mean how she reads the game. If her original plan is working, stick with it. If City change something and Arsenal begin to lose control, recognise it. And if we need a different type of player, use one. I don’t want substitutions made because we’ve reached the point on the clock when substitutions normally happen, and I don’t want change for the sake of looking proactive either. I want to be able to look at what Arsenal need at that particular moment and understand why the player coming onto the pitch might help provide it.

Maybe that’s why I don’t see Sunday as some enormous final judgement on Renée, because I don’t think one afternoon in October can tell us everything about where this season is going. She was right about that in the press conference. It is still October; there is still a lot of football left to play, and Arsenal have come through difficult periods before. But I do think we’ve reached the point where simply telling us they’re close isn’t quite enough anymore. We’ve heard they’re working on things, we’ve heard the group believes, we’ve heard the players are together, and now we’ve heard the response since Paris has been exceptional. None of that is meaningless, and I’d much rather hear it than the alternative, but eventually those things have to become visible when Arsenal play.

And I suppose that’s why, strangely enough, I’m looking forward to this one more than I thought I would be when the final whistle went in Paris. I was dreading Manchester City at that point because I could already imagine us turning up, seeing the same team, watching the same patterns and having the same conversation again afterwards. Having listened to Renée on Friday and then looked properly at what Real Madrid were able to do to City, I don’t feel quite like that now. I’m still concerned about Arsenal, and one press conference hasn’t changed the questions I’ve been asking about some of Renée’s decisions, but I can see a route into this game for them.

Real Madrid have shown that City can be made uncomfortable. Renée believes she’s got a group that has come closer together during the most difficult period they’ve had under her. Arsenal have enough quality in this squad to cause City problems if they use it properly. We don’t need perfection on Sunday, and I don’t think we need some grand statement about the title race either.

I want to see whether all of that looks as convincing on the grass as it sounded in the room on Friday.

So what am I expecting?

And I suppose I can’t get all the way through a preview without telling you what I think is going to happen, although this might be one of the harder predictions we’ve had to make because I’m not entirely sure which Arsenal is going to turn up. If it’s the Arsenal we saw for periods against Chelsea and for the first hour in Paris, but this time with the concentration and game management to go with it, I think we can absolutely get something from Manchester City. If we give City the sort of spaces we gave Paris, or spend too long hesitating when opportunities appear at the other end, then this is a team with far more quality than Paris had to punish us for it.

And perhaps that’s why I’m not going into Sunday expecting Arsenal to lose in the way I probably was on Wednesday night, because the more I’ve looked at the game, the more I think there is something here for us. Madrid showed that on Thursday, but Arsenal also showed enough in Paris before everything unravelled to remind us that the football hasn’t completely disappeared. Russo has finally got her goal, Stanway has got hers, and maybe that releases something in both of them because sometimes players need the ball to hit the back of the net and all the noise around not scoring can disappear.

I’m going with 1-3. I think City will score because I’m not convinced enough yet by what Arsenal are doing defensively to predict a clean sheet at the Etihad. Still, I also think Arsenal will score because there are opportunities there if we’re brave enough and quick enough to take them. And if you’re now shouting at your phone because you think I’m completely deluded after what you’ve watched over the last few weeks, that’s fine. Please tell me what you think is going to happen because I’m particularly interested this week in what you’re looking for beyond the scoreline. What would make you come away from Sunday feeling that Arsenal are beginning to find their way again?

Whatever happens on Sunday, I’ll be back afterwards, and we’ll work through it together, and hopefully, for the first time in a little while, I’ll be sitting down to write a match review with a very different set of things to talk about.