Spurs vs Arsenal: Set Piece rhetoric detracts from more relevant questions
It was a difficult game for Spurs fans. The opening four games of this season, other than a comprehensive win against Everton, have not been what many had hoped for going into this season. After a particularly frustrating loss to Newcastle before the international break, an attitude had developed and festered over the two week break that 'things are not great, but win against Arsenal and everything will be ok'.
The North London Derby is a game which is often difficult to rationally analyse when you are on the losing (or perhaps unsatisfying draw) side. The emotions of the game tend to tilt reactions, quite reasonably, towards the negative.
I appreciate that one form of analysis is going to be looking at performances and considering them through the lens of squad depth and first XI quality/profile fit. I think this is totally valid, however, I would rather look forward than spend too much time commenting on how the past transfer window could have been better/different. Especially when transfers and financial dealings are an area full of misinformation for the majority of fans.
I think there has been an improvement in certain areas of Tottenham’s game from last year, in part thanks to incomings and players changing positions. However, the lack of results continuing from the end of last season into this one is allowing tactical narratives to drift over. Combined with an emotional reaction to a derby loss, I feel the depth of issues being highlighted post games is being slightly exacerbated.
I am referring mainly in this instance to defending set pieces. First of all, I will admit I did not engage with any post-match analysis from Sky or BBC. I did not feel too bad in an emotional sense after the game, but knew that would not remain the case if I listened to pundits engage in what I would feel was bad faith rhetoric around Spurs.
I did however, catch the comment (and Ange’s response) regarding set pieces. Disregarding the emotions behind Ange’s response, I think the nature of the defeat, in combination with the home defeat last season, brought set pieces back under the microscope in a manner which I feel was not fully representative of how the game played out yesterday. Considering Arsenal are one of the best set piece teams in European football at the moment, I thought Tottenham handled the variety of their set pieces generally well, up until the goal, after which no more set pieces were conceded.
I appreciate this sounds naive when Tottenham lost because of a set piece goal, but I think there is a more pertinent question around Tottenham which I will get to after going through the corners, how Tottenham defended them how Arsenal adapted during the game to present more challenges and what this means going forwards.
The Extra Inch did a video on Spurs change to set piece defence recently, highlighting the adjustment moving more players and different 1st XI players away from zonal marking to man marking.
Watch the video here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9fpPHmqFPjo
CORNER ONE
In yesterday’s game, this was how Tottenham set up at corners. In terms of personnel, Porro was on the front post next to Solanke who went closer to the near corner of the 6 yard box. Bentancur takes up a central zonal position while Udogie handles the back post. The man-marking was
- Maddison on White
- Van de Ven on Saliba
- Johnson on Havertz
- Kulusevski on Partey
- Romero on Gabriel
Saliba's positioning brought Van de Ven in towards the six yard box due to him being put on one of the two most prominent attacking threats. Maddison's role is to pick up who they believe is going to try and disrupt Vicario.
Arsenal’s approach involves White and Saliba’s starting position being around the back post and they push towards the centre of the goal. From here they can aim for a flick from such close range it will be very hard to stop as well as inhibiting Vicario’s movement to come and claim and crosses. Havertz, Gabriel and Partey start further back to try and get a blind side run on the zonal marking players. The first Arsenal corner of the match comes in, the Arsenal players make runs to the near post and 6 yard box. The man marking makes their runs harder to achieve and Porro is able to clear at the near post.
Some additional elements of Arsenal’s set up include Martinelli being part of the group of Havertz, Partey and Gabriel running from deep. He remained unmarked at every corner of the match. Trossard and Jorginho were on the edge of the box being monitored by Son.
CORNER TWO
Corner two comes around 22 minutes in and the set up is the same. Saliba and White pressure in to disrupt Vicario, but Van de Ven and Maddison stay in the way with Vicario also pushing players clear.
The ball comes in after the player runs have been made. Maddison and Van de Ven shielding for Vicario allows him to punch. The ball doesn’t go too far and Trossard gets a free shot, but it’s a low xG chance. Arsenal get another ball in which ends with a contested Havertz header which is easily saved.
CORNER THREE
However, it was Saliba overpowering Van de Ven just enough to disturb Vicario’s space which may possibly have affected him enough to miss proper connection on the cross and concede corner four. I personally think Vicario should do better here, but he does make some contact to shift the ball away from Timber arriving at the back post.
They do not bother to pressure Vicario at all.
Gabriel, Martinelli and Partey run to the back post, but noticeably Trossard sprints to the penalty spot. I believe the idea is for the front post players to flick a low pass to the centre of the box to create a more open shot for Trossard. Saka misplays the pass and the ball is cleared. I don’t think Spurs were particularly ready for the runs Saliba, White and Havertz made, but it appears to be a more precise routine for Arsenal to pull off.
Corner Five
Corner five reverts to a similar set up to corners one to three. White and Saliba revert to pushing in towards Vicario. All the man markers move towards the six yard box then ball goes long to Martinelli who stays deep at the back post.
This was an interesting change possibly as a reaction to Martinelli being left free at all the corners so far. He brings the ball down nearly plays through a couple of challenges with very tight control. The corner finding the free man initially appears concerning, but with Martinelli needing to find space towards the back of the box, the ball across needs more air. The time it takes for the ball to reach Martinelli and for him to bring it down allows Tottenham to adjust and pressure him. Nearly managing to bypass two challenges is very good skill and I do not believe an indictment on Tottenham’s defensive structure.
Corner Six
Lastly we have corner six from which Arsenal scored. This came in the second half shortly after both Romero and Porro had moments where the game was paused for them (small knocks / fatigue). The significant change to this corner was Gabriel, who Romero was man - marking, took up a completely different position. Rather than as part of a bundle towards the back of the box, Gabriel’s starting position was central at the edge of the box and Romero followed.
Gabriel then gets an uncontested header from close range and heads in.
In addition to all of this, White once again uses Saliba as a shield so they, Maddison and Van de Ven are in Vicario’s space by the time the ball comes in. In spite of the fact Gabriel’s header was too close and powerful for a keeper to reasonably save, you can see Vicario was not set to react because about one second before Gabriel meets the ball, Vicario is shoving Van de Ven in the back to clear space and moving around White and Maddison before he see’s Gabriel is about to head the ball.
Conclusions?
So we have six corners from this game. Four of which were dealt with relatively comfortably even though there was an element of variation to each one. This ability to react and handle slightly different set ups, personally, gives me a lot of confidence that set pieces will not be as significant an issue for Tottenham this season. However, it does raise some other questions.
If we take this goal conceded as a momentary lapse from Romero, we find ourselves with broader questions about Spurs. Postecoglou referred to lapses in concentration against Newcastle as well. If there are consistent ‘lapses’ which lead to goals conceded, are we talking about a mental issue or a systematic one?
I feel we cannot look at Romero and any potential lapses without considering that he was the Spurs player with the shortest pre-season due to playing in the Copa America and over the last year has been the most travelled footballer consistently travelling back and forth between England and Argentina for international duty. Fatigue and schedule are areas where I have some sympathy for footballers so if there is an element of Romero needing some rest and recovery, so be it.
I am not fond of conversations around mentality as it is an argument most often used against Tottenham regardless of context or relevance. I do however think there is something to be said about players needing moments of rest during a game. Periods of settled possession where some of the minutes can go by without all outfield players needing to be sprinting into or back towards the box. I think for Tottenham at the moment though, it is less about settled control and more about ascendancy and shift in game state.
Everyone can see the attack is not fully clicking at the moment. For two games, Tottenham were without any senior striker, having to resort to Son and Kulusevski up front. However, even with Solanke available, Tottenham have been unable to turn threatening possession into high (or even average) value chances. There were countless situations during the match against Arsenal (which I intend to go through in another post) where key decisions closed off attacking opportunities. Specifically yesterday, I did not think there was an issue around maintaining possession in the final third. Arsenal gave up possession in favour of maintaining their low block and so Tottenham often shifted the ball enough to generate a cross or shot. The issue was these could have been better quality chances that were not as easy for Raya to claim or a defender to clear away.
The current question for Tottenham is can they get their attack flowing and furthermore, will being able to establish early leads by more than one goal create game state shifts which allow Tottenham to control games more effectively? Obviously this project will not go far if that cannot happen, but I think there is a hesitancy and lack of familiarity around Tottenham's attacking play which was not present during the first half (or even some of the latter half) of last season. It seems to be a lack of belief which, taking an optimistic view, should pass if they can get a run of a few wins. I feel things can change very quickly and of course personally hope they will.