The Chris Wheatley Show is a brand new weekly series talking all things Arsenal and the Premier League. This week, Jason Jones and special guest Matthew Gregory discuss Arsenal's clash with Manchester Utd and the Gunners' hopes for the season.
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00:00 Hello, welcome to another episode of the Chris Wheatley Show, National World's one-stop
00:07 shop to keep you in the know on all things Arsenal. I'm your host, Jason Jones. No Chris
00:11 this week, so I'm joined by three-headed minutes, Matt Gregory. This week we'll be discussing
00:16 Arsenal's win over Manchester United at the weekend, as well as looking at the rest of
00:19 this year's Premier League title challenges so far this season. So without further ado,
00:23 Matt, bit of a strange game, I think it's fair to say, at the Emirates on Sunday afternoon,
00:27 that obviously ended up in a 3-1 win for Arsenal, but probably could have gone either way given
00:33 some of the incidents that we saw, especially towards the latter part of the game. I mean,
00:38 what did you make of it all? Yeah, I mean, it was, as you say, it was a strange game.
00:41 It was very scrappy at times and very good at times as well. It was a really sort of
00:45 engaging game. Arsenal definitely deserved the win. I don't think there's any real arguments
00:49 about that. They were, you know, created the best chances. They played the better football
00:54 overall. They were certainly less frantic at the back. Man, you look really out of place
00:58 and out of sorts at times. They maybe got the rub of the green a little bit with decisions,
01:03 although, you know, no matter how much Eric Tanharg wants to look at different angles
01:07 of an offside, it was offside. It might be offside by a millimetre. It might be a very
01:12 modern VAR offside and something that, you know, the older heads among us are used to
01:16 seeing as being in line, but Garnaccio was offside. It's no goal. Arsenal took full advantage.
01:21 They maybe could have had a penalty as well. So, you know, it could have gone either way.
01:25 I think it would have been very harsh if Arsenal didn't win, though. They were definitely the
01:28 better team and definitely have been the better team than Man United so far this season. So,
01:34 yeah, I think it was strange. You know, Man U going up in the first place was very much
01:38 against the run of play. They didn't look like scoring until, you know, it was obviously
01:41 a brilliant through ball by Eriksen, great finish by Rashford. I don't think you can
01:45 take too much away from Arsenal there. I don't think there's any sort of room for criticism.
01:49 They played well. They just got a little unlucky and obviously the response was brilliant as
01:52 well. You know, it's a fabulous goal for Odegaard. Some pretty weak defending, to be honest, but
01:57 generally speaking, Arsenal looked dangerous going forward. They might have had to wait
02:00 until very late on to get the reward for the general play. But yeah, I think it was a pretty
02:04 fair reflection. And yeah, I thought Arsenal is sort of, they feel like they haven't quite
02:10 got into their stride yet. There's a bit of rhythm missing. They're still like, you know,
02:14 chopping and changing the tactics a little bit. The personnel are changing. There's a
02:17 few players who have yet to kind of hit their straps with Arsenal. You look at Kai Havertz.
02:21 So, but despite the fact they're not at their very best, they're not playing quite as well
02:26 as they did, you know, during the really good periods last season when they were putting
02:29 together a title challenge, they're still winning games. They're still looking like
02:33 a good team and they're still looking like a better team than Manchester United. I don't
02:36 know. Maybe that's not the highest bar right now to clear because Man United don't look
02:39 very good at all, but they're doing what you need to do to set up a title challenge. And
02:43 you know, I don't know if that's how you saw the game as well, but I thought Arsenal played
02:47 pretty well.
02:48 Yeah. I mean, we'll sort of discuss Manchester United in a little bit more depth later on.
02:53 I think it's right what you're saying about Arsenal. It's a real cliche, isn't it? But
02:56 I think sometimes cliches are cliches for a reason, but if you can play badly and still
03:01 win games, it's never a bad thing, is it? You know what I mean? I do think you're right.
03:04 I think that Arsenal, this is not the sort of finished article this season with them,
03:11 in my opinion, at least. I think you're absolutely right to pick out Kai Havertz. He's obviously
03:15 £65 million signing from Chelsea. I don't think anyone would suggest that we've seen
03:20 the best of him yet in an Arsenal shirt. I mean, there was that really quite horrendous
03:26 left-footed air swing when he looked as if he should be bulging the back of the net and
03:30 he barely made contact with the ball whatsoever. But even more generally, I think that he's
03:34 a player who, you know, he's sort of coming in, he's probably been asked to play a slightly
03:39 different role than the one that he was at Chelsea. And I think that it's going to take
03:42 him a little bit of time to adapt, especially compared to someone like Declan Rice, who
03:47 I think is starting to look more and more like a really integral presence for Arsenal
03:53 and in that midfield. Obviously, he got the goal, you know, Jesus got the third and sort
03:58 of finished it off on Sunday. But, you know, Declan Rice got to all intents and purposes
04:01 what was the winner on Sunday afternoon. But apart from that as well, it's something that
04:05 we've discussed, me and Chris, on the show before. I think it's really interesting to
04:07 see him step into that slightly more advanced role. It was something that we sort of hinted
04:13 towards during his time at West Ham that he could be this box to box presence, but it
04:17 really feels as if Mikel Arteta is wanting to embrace that a little bit more. And I think
04:22 it's going to be, you know, hugely beneficial to Arsenal and to be honest as well to England,
04:27 I think more broadly speaking to bring that side of his game out. But yeah, so I completely
04:33 agree. I think that Arsenal still have gears to shift into, but the fact that they're still
04:39 able to pick up such a good result and put in a relatively commanding performance against
04:44 a team like Manchester United this early stage of the season is really promising. Obviously,
04:49 you mentioned the VAR as well and the offside was one call, but there was the potential
04:56 penalty shot on Rasmus Hoyland. It was Gabriel sort of lent across him, got the arm across
05:02 and brought him down. I mean, just sort of interested to see what your view on that incident
05:06 was because for me, I think if it was given it, it's one of those that you can't really
05:11 have too many complaints about.
05:13 Yeah, I think it would have been soft. I don't think there's a ton of contact. I think Hoyland
05:18 is, you know, making sure he goes down. I think it's one of those. There is contact,
05:22 as you say. I think he would have been a very tough ward. I think it's similar in some ways
05:27 to be honest to the Havertz penalty that was obviously given originally by Anthony Taylor
05:31 and then overturned, which it was perhaps surprised a lot of us that it wasn't sort
05:35 of upheld by VAR, even though you'd see the replays. It would have been a soft penalty.
05:39 I think we all know that isn't some kind of clear cut, absolutely stonewall penalty. There
05:44 was contact between Havertz and Wan-Bissaka. There was contact between Hoyland and Gabriel.
05:50 I think there was one angle, for instance, of the Havertz penalty incident, which suggested
05:54 that Havertz sort of leg had started buckling before the contact, so that he was looking
05:58 for it, basically trying to manufacture it. I'm not 100% confident that's the case, but
06:02 if that is what the referees decided, then they're sticking to the letter of the law
06:05 or at least the refereeing guidelines by overturning the decision. They changed the law at the
06:10 beginning of last season so that if the attacking player is trying to make the contact happen,
06:14 you know, flicking out the leg, starting to go down before they get the player and so
06:18 on, it shouldn't be a penalty. It wasn't quite the same with Hoyland in that I think the
06:23 contact did come first, but he was pretty soft and I think he got himself into a position
06:28 where he'd lost the opportunity and the angle to play the ball across to Rashford, so he
06:32 was just looking for it. He wanted contact, he made the most of it. You've seen them given,
06:38 but it would have been very, very harsh. I'd have been pretty upset if I was an Arsenal
06:41 fan and that was given against me. And to be honest, I'd have been pretty upset if I
06:45 was a Man United fan and the Havertz penalty was given against me as well. So I suspect
06:50 justice was kind of done. The two potential soft penalty awards, neither of them given.
06:55 I think it probably evened out in the end. I think that's consistency, I guess, isn't
06:59 it? That's what we're always asking for from referees and that's kind of what it was. And,
07:04 you know, if you're an Arsenal fan, you can sort of, you know, maybe argue that they're
07:08 a bit unlucky in the overtime. We don't usually see those penalties overturned. Usually if
07:12 there is a soft penalty, the replay shows some kind of contact. We're kind of conditioned
07:16 now for the referee to just let it happen for it to sort of be considered a penalty.
07:21 But, you know, I think it probably worked out for the best this time and Arsenal got
07:25 the win anyway. So, you know, I don't think there's too much to complain about really.
07:29 I think a lot of the VAR controversy kind of wasn't actually that controversial, if
07:33 I'm honest. I think the right decisions ultimately arrived at.
07:36 And just one last quick one, rather. Obviously, we're four games in the season now. You know,
07:42 from what you've seen of this Arsenal squad, are you perhaps a little bit surprised that
07:47 Mikkel Arteta wasn't lured into any deadline day business? Or do you think he's got enough
07:51 there to really mount a serious and sustained title challenge over the remainder of the
07:56 campaign? Or at least until January, I guess?
08:00 I think obviously we'll talk a little bit more about how Arsenal shape up against sort
08:04 of the other traditional title or top four contenders in a minute. I think there's a
08:10 situation where Arsenal basically spent their money. They, you know, after buying in Timber,
08:15 Havertz, Rice, I think it was felt that their spending was done and no new players were
08:19 going to come in. And maybe a little bit surprised that given the injury to Uri and Timber, they
08:24 didn't look at bringing in another defender or at least trying to hold on to one of the
08:28 ones they've got. You obviously saw like some of the backups like Rob Holding and Pablo
08:31 Murray have left. So maybe I'm a bit surprised they didn't try and bring in someone just
08:35 to fill out the squad a little bit there.
08:37 But I think the sense is they're happy with what they've got. There probably wasn't the
08:41 money to make a change, or at least the owners weren't willing to provide the money to make
08:44 a change, even if they weren't happy. But they're in a situation where they've pretty
08:50 much got two decent players for each position if they're all fit. They've got options for
08:55 rotation for rest and backup. There's, you know, decent players who are starting on the
08:59 bench at the minute. You know, whether it's enough strength in depth to sort of mount
09:04 a title challenge, we'll see. But yeah, I'm not too surprised that they didn't make any
09:09 big signings. But yeah, it'll be interesting. I think they've got a very good team. I think
09:15 they're playing like a team that are going to win a lot of games, can beat and take on
09:18 the best teams. Whether, you know, they'll be able to stand up a game match after match
09:23 over the course of the next sort of, you know, few months until we get to the January transfer
09:27 window. We'll find out. But yeah, it'll be interesting. I think it's tough to call at
09:32 this point.
09:33 (upbeat music)