Arsenal 0-0 Man United: Gunners title bid veers off track as draw leaves them stranded in second The biggest cheer of the night came with the news that trains north from Euston were cancelled due to the bad weather; but it is Arsenal who are stuck where they don’t want to be. Second. This was an opportunity lost, and they knew it. Time was a goalless draw against Manchester United, in just about any circumstances, might have been considered a job well done. Not these days. This is the team that was hit for four by Manchester City at the Etihad, and conceded three against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge. They are not the force of old, but an aging, wounded pack leader, once proud and virile, now there for the taking. Arsenal weren’t up to it. Needing a win to go top, they had the best of the chances, but not the best chance; they had the bulk of the possession but not the most incisive moves. David Moyes will be pleased with his away point, even if a passage of play in injury time in which the team went backwards despite having the ball in Arsenal’s half, drew frustration and fury from the away end that suggested the honeymoon is over. You don’t get stranded in London overnight to watch Manchester United settle. They could have nicked it near the end, too, 10 minutes left when Michael Carrick mopped up and found Robin van Persie, his break feeding Wayne Rooney, who returned the favour with a sweet chip. Van Persie threw himself at the header but Wojciech Szczesny in Arsenal’s goal was equal to it, tipping the ball against the bar. There was tension, but not much action, both teams fearing failure after poor results at the weekend. It made for a tame contest compared to meetings past. There was an advertising slogan on the perimeter of the pitch. ‘Great sport happens here,’ it read. Well, it used to. Sir Alex Ferguson, up in the directors box, could have been forgiven for letting his mind wander back to the battles he has seen between these teams in north London. Not at the Emirates so often. Arsenal haven’t been the force of old since they moved here and the titanic battles – the one preceded by Roy Keane’s exchange with Patrick Vieira in the tunnel for instance – took place up the road at Highbury. Another time, another time, as Harold Pinter wrote of watching Sir Len Hutton in his youth. It wasn’t the ghosts that were so troubling here, but the shadows. Players that are a pale comparison to their predecessors, some that now bear little comparison to their younger selves. Arsenal are the better team this season and should have won, yet their superiority wasn’t emphatic. Any pleasure the travelling support will have felt at the final whistle will be tempered by the thought that they did not used to be euphoric about stalemate with Arsenal. Chelsea versus Manchester City is the fixture now, it would seem. It has the old crackle of the old Arsenal-Manchester United games, the pre-match, post-match, verbal sparring between the managers, the thought that the title will be decided right here, tonight. Nobody bothers to pick a fight with Moyes. They probably feel sorry for him. All that time building a reputation and then in one season, going, going… Well, not yet gone, but teetering. Having spent £37.1m on Juan Mata, to keep starting him wide is peculiar. Here, Mata was deployed on the left of what often ended up a midfield four, a puzzling decision considering Jose Mourinho claimed he had left Chelsea to play for United in his favourite position. It is unlikely he had the Nani role in mind when that conversation took place. Rooney didn’t appear exactly delighted with covering Bacary Sagna on the occasions Mata had something better to do, either. It looked very much a work in progress. Equally, why Adnan Januzaj has fallen to the substitutes’ bench remains a mystery. He was the one little gem mined from Moyes first season at Old Trafford, considering the transfer of Mata is yet to deliver more than a PR splash. Januzaj kept United going as senior players sank from view mid-season and his reward is to be treated as if he was the problem, replaced by the transfer window’s marquee name. It is not as if United look better without him. There were too many mistakes. Passes went astray, moves built urgently but just as quickly fizzled out. Arsenal were equally culpable. They lacked penetration, pace, a sense of purpose. Moves were strung out square, the football played in front of United’s banked defences. Arsenal did not get in behind United often, and their best chances were misdirected headers from Olivier Giroud. After three minutes, Jack Wilshere hustled his way past Nemanja Vidic, whose performances must improve if he is to increase his summer options having given up on United, and the ball was blocked by Chris Smalling for a corner. Curled in by Santi Cazorla, it was met by Giroud in a ridiculous amount of space considering Moyes’s reputation for stout defence, the Frenchman steering a free header wide. The same happened after 64 minutes following a cross from Kieran Gibbs. The best Arsenal chance had come two minutes earlier when another Cazorla corner found Laurent Koscielny and looked goalbound, until Antonio Valencia rose to keep out the header with one of his own. David de Gea saved twice from Cazorla late on, and again from Tomas Rosicky shot deflected by Vidic but considering the invitation afforded by Chelsea’s draw at West Bromwich Albion, this was ordinary stuff. Still, it could have been worse. In the second minute Mikel Arteta almost set Van Persie up for an opening goal, caught in possession after a ball out from Szczesny. Van Persie sprung on him like a big cat and chased through one on one, with Arsenal supporters fearing the worst, having seen the man finish from a similar position so many times in their own red shirt. But Manchester United’s key players have lost much of the old certainty since Sir Alex Ferguson stepped down, his last big signing among them. Van Persie shot low, but too near Szczesny who smothered his attempt, comfortably. In another era, that would have gone in, and maybe a few more at each end, too; but it is a long way back from here, and not just due to storm delays at Euston, either.
Posted on: Thu, 13 Feb 2014 01:22:31 +0000
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