Manchester City Women v Arsenal Preview

THE LOWDOWN
Arsenal travel to Manchester City on Saturday lunchtime in what has already become a crunch game for Arsenal’s title ambitions. A draw away at Manchester United a fortnight ago was understandable, if not totally desirable, a poor second half display at home to Aston Villa which yielded a stoppage time equaliser for the visitors was a bigger cause for concern.

Villa’s press smothered Arsenal in the second half last weekend and with Leah Williamson missing and Katie Reid preferred to Lotte Wubben-Moy, Arsenal have lacked the option to skip out the opposition press with long or diagonal passes from the back. It will be interesting to see whether Slegers adopts a personnel fix for this issue against City.

Dropping four points with four games against City and Chelsea still to come has placed additional pressure on this result, as Slegers herself admitted in her post Aston Villa press conference. ‘Yes, there is pressure because, now we’ve lost four points and that’s not what we wanted. But the only thing we can do is learn now from this and learn very fast because the next game is going to be very important for us.’

Arsenal didn’t win at the Joie Stadium between 2017 and 2024 but have now won on their last two visits there. However, City are a different prospect under Andree Jeglertz compared to Gareth Taylor and it will be a different challenge compared to the very open, basketball style game we saw in February.

TEAM NEWS
Leah Williamson will miss out for Arsenal after undergoing surgery on her knee over the summer.

Available squad
Goalkeepers: 1.Zinsberger 14.van Domselaar 28.Borbe
Defenders: 2.Fox 3.Wubben-Moy 5.L.Codina 7.Catley 11.McCabe 22.Nighswonger 24.Hinds 26.Reid
Midfielders: 8.Mariona 10.Little(c) 12.L.Maanum 21.Pelova 32.Cooney-Cross
Forwards: 9.Mead 15.Smith 18.Kelly 19.Foord 23.Russo 25.Blackstenius

A WORD FROM THE BOSS
‘We were very disappointed with the points we lost the last two games, we are not happy with that but now we look forward. When you represent Arsenal you have to win every game, that is reality. So nothing really changes for us and one of the good things about this group is how we came together, how we were honest and how we are constructive moving forward.

‘We have to stay in the present, the here and now and look at the key details and I feel like we have had a good week with the players. Every game is important in the league because every opposition delivers different problems for us and we have to deliver consistently. We have been in good positions and scored a lot of goals over a long period of time, that quality is still there, it is about finding those small details again.

‘The belief hasn’t gone, we have the same players with quality and we believe in ourselves but we also understand that we have to work really hard to get those details right. I am happy we are back into the short turnarounds and competing in a lot of competitions, we are happy it is coming thick and fast again because that is where we want to be.’

THE OPPOSITION

Manchester City decided to make a managerial change in the spring with Gareth Taylor departing, his predecessor Nick Cushing took the role on an interim basis until the end of the season. During the summer they appointed experienced Swedish coach Andree Jeglertz who coached Umea when Arsenal defeated them in the 2007 Champions League Final.

Jeglertz has also coached Finland, Linkopings and Denmark. Under his stewardship, City have moved more towards a 4231 formation with Sydney Lohmann and Yui Hasegawa forming more of a double pivot at the base of the midfield. They have also moved more towards a high press and away from Gareth Taylor’s 433 possession football.

In short, their transition looks reasonably similar to when Arsenal hired Jonas Eidevall to succeed Joe Montemurro. Arsenal will be very familiar with their former striker Vivianne Miedema, there is a question over whether she will play behind Bunny Shaw or whether, with Lohmann fit again, whether someone like Grace Clinton or Laura Blinkilde Brown might play.

PLAYER TO WATCH

City have choices to make in midfield, will they play Miedema as a 10 with a double pivot behind of Hasegawa plus one of Blinkilde Brown, Clinton or Coombs? Or do they decide Arsenal are vulnerable to the sort of intense pressure the Villa midfield three put on Arsenal last weekend and leave Miedema on the bench in favour of a trio like Hasegawa, Lohmann and Blinkilde Brown?

What both teams do with their midfields will say a lot about how they see one another. The lack of a long or diagonal passer at the base of the team has made Arsenal more vulnerable to the press recently. They could go some way to fixing this by selecting Lotte Wubben-Moy at centre-half or Kyra Cooney-Cross in midfield to give their passing greater variety and directness when needed.

Most supporters feel Mariona has not been at her best so far this season. The data shows she is progressing the ball and creating chances at an elite level still, but she is getting caught on the ball more often because Arsenal have too many other short passers around her and the blend has been wrong. Whether Arsenal fix this through personnel or by other teams will be intriguing to see. How Jeglertz selects his midfield will say a lot about how he predicts that Arsenal will shape up.

MY PREDICTED LINE UP

Subs: 1.Zinsberger 3.Wubben-Moy 5.L.Codina 9.Mead 12.L.Maanum 19.Foord 21.Pelova 24.Hinds 32.Cooney-Cross

HOW TO CATCH THE GAME
The game kicks off at 12noon at the Joie Stadium and will be broadcast live on Sky Sports in the UK. Information on how to watch around the world is available here.

COMING UP
We will have the usual on the whistle match report from Aidan Gibson, as well as post-match quotes from Renee Slegers on the site around an hour after the final whistle. The tactical analysis piece will go live on Monday and Jamie and I will record a podcast for you on Monday too. Don’t forget to sign up to our free Arsenal Women Weekly newsletter here.

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