Arteta picked the team and refused to make changes until his usual 65th minute
In theory? Yes it's easier to win, in practice? No.
Nwaneri isn't going to get good from the bench especially when he's the closest thing we've had to what we're missing in the absence of Ødegaard. Okay, he never had a good game today, but who did?
Of course not. But we're not gonna win the Champions League
Trosaard has been shite for weeks. So many moves break down because of him. He offers goals, but we lose so much more. With Nwaneri, it's a kid that came on and didn't even receive the ball for the first few minutes he came on. Comparing the two seems harsh to me.
It took him some time to get into the match. Given that the passing was pedestrian and conservative, there wasn't much he could do. He was in pockets of space and our players weren't even attempting to find him. Don't get me wrong, he misplaced some passes, but I'd argue bringing him in earlier would've been more beneficial to both him and the team.
Where to start? I'm so annoyed.
Arteta has had a stinker of megalithic proportions.
He's just not offering much when he gets some minutes
Zinchenko and Nwaneri coming on
We could've had prime Messi out there today and it wouldn't have made a difference. Arteta had us set up incredibly brokenly. Havertz was playing in the Ødegaard spaces and Trosaard was floating around doing a whole lot of nothing. There was no urgency or impetus in our play and so there was no way to drag Newcastle around or break the lines. If Nwaneri had even half the minutes that Trosaard has wasted over the past few weeks, by all means write him off and say we rushed him in. But he essentially came into a terrible, unorganised and unbalanced team and failed to carry it in the half hour he got. Hardly a damning indictment on him or his advocates like me. It's also important to note, I was advocating for him based on his profile. If Arteta had bought cover for Ødegaard, it would be a moot point.