After a four-match run without a shut-out, Arsenal got back on the clean sheet trail on Tuesday night.
The Gunners’ 1-0 win over Brighton and Hove Albion, which extended their lead at the top of the Premier League table, saw them bank their 14th clean sheet of the season.
That’s already one more than they registered in the whole of 2024/25.
Here’s what we saw at the Amex.
SALIBA INJURY UPDATE
One Arsenal regular who unexpectedly missed out on the south coast was William Saliba (£6.1m).
An ankle injury put paid to his involvement, although it doesn’t sound very serious.
“He turned his ankle against Chelsea and he managed to finish the game somehow and he was too sore to play today.” – Mikel Arteta on William Saliba
His omission was reported as “precautionary”, so there’s every chance we see him back in Gameweek 30 given that it’s a week and a half away.
Cristhian Mosquera (£5.3m) lined up at centre-half in Saliba’s stead but was the one weak link in the Arsenal backline. Piero Hincapie (£5.1m), having started at left-back, moved over to centre-back later in the game.
BORING, ISN’T IT, JUST DEFENDING WITH YOUR LIVES? NOT FOR ME, I LIKE IT
Wednesday’s match was a grim spectacle, devoid of many highlights. If it wasn’t for the title race implications, it was ‘last on Match of the Day’ material.
“I’m sure you don’t want to watch these kinds of football games.” – Fabian Hurzeler
The finger of blame, particularly from Fabian Hurzeler, pointed at Arsenal. The Gunners grabbed a fortuitous early goal when Bukayo Saka‘s (£9.8m) optimistic strike went clean through Bart Verbruggen (£4.5m), then did what they do best: defend, waste time and pick up ‘injuries’.
Saka’s 0.01 xG effort was the Gunners’ only shot of the first 55 minutes. Viktor Gyokeres (£8.8m) was anonymous, unable to make the ball stick, and came off before the hour. While there were some half-decent late chances for substitutes Kai Havertz (£7.3m) and Leandro Trossard (£6.7m), it was all about the rearguard effort once it was 0-1.
While the external criticism over Arsenal’s style of football mounts, this is exactly what you want to see if you’re a Fantasy manager heavily invested in the Gunners’ defence. Gabriel Magalhaes (£7.2m) and Hincapie in particular were imperious, blocking and intercepting everything. Those two and Jurrien Timber (£6.3m) picked up DefCon points, as well as bonus.
David Raya (£6.0m) got in on the bonus action, too, but such were the efforts of the players in front of him that he only had two efforts to save: a bobbling shot from Georiginio Rutter (£5.6m) from the edge of the box and a tame header from Mats Wieffer (£4.9m) that the Dutchman should have done better with.
Other than those chances, the closest Brighton came with their 59% possession was when Raya committed an act of self-sabotage. The Arsenal ‘keeper vacated his goal and presented Carlos Baleba (£4.5m) with the ball, 35 yards out, but the midfielder’s chip was nodded away by a backpedalling Gabriel.
So, then, with the title race entering ‘squeaky bum time’, is this the type of display we’ll come to expect from Arsenal? Quite possibly: the Gunners’ six-match rolling xG average (see below) is now at its lowest since August.
The old adage goes that “defences win titles”. The typically cautious Arteta seems to be increasingly leaning towards the low-risk, defence-first, ‘housery’-heavy approach.
RICE FALLS JUST SHORT OF DEFCON
Not a good advert for the Arsenal attack, then. Most of their performances ranged from tired-looking to ineffective, and even Saka was fortunate to bag a return from his deflected goal.
There were no extras for Declan Rice (£7.5m), either. He briefly inched over the defensive contribution threshold but an Opta recount had him finishing on 11.
That was his first blank (if we’re including DefCon) since Gameweek 24.
MITOMA INJURY
There are a few injury concerns to report from the Brighton camp.
Kaoru Mitoma (£6.1m) came off at half-time thanks to an ankle issue.
“He couldn’t continue the game. So, that was disappointing for us because I think he showed a good performance in the first half and now we have to wait for the scan and then we can say more but we don’t think that it’s a big injury.” – Fabian Hurzeler on Kaoru Mitoma
Solly March (£5.8m) and Lewis Dunk (£4.5m) missed out altogether, meanwhile. March had a “minor issue” and “will be back in the next game”, while Dunk’s ongoing knee niggles saw him rested as a precaution.
