Arsenal profit from Arsène Wenger’s decision to strengthen centre at Spurs

Arsène Wenger is often accused of tactical naivety in big matches – but in Saturday’s north London derby, he got the better of Mauricio Pochettino in the 2-2 draw. Francis Coquelin’s dismissal made life difficult for Arsenal, but the manager will feel his major decisions were all justified.
Wenger made two significant decisions when announcing his starting XI, selecting Danny Welbeck up front in place of Olivier Giroud, and handing a full Premier League debut to the Egyptian midfielder Mohamed Elneny. Both were crucial as Arsenal took a 1-0 lead before half-time.
Wenger clearly remembered how Arsenal were overrun by Tottenham’s energetic midfielders in the reverse fixture, a 1-1 draw, and decided he needed to strengthen the centre of the pitch. It worked effectively. Elneny is not a tough-tackling midfielder in the mould of Coquelin, but he is positionally disciplined and intelligent at regaining possession calmly. Elneny and Coquelin dominated the centre of the pitch in the first half, protecting the centre-backs and ensuring Tottenham struggled to find 
Dele Alli or Christian Eriksen between the lines. It would have been a different story had Aaron Ramsey been fielded in his usual central midfield role – the Welshman loves flying forward into attack, but this tendency means Arsenal often leave too much space in midfield.
Instead, Ramsey played from the right flank with licence to drift infield, and popped up in the penalty box with an outstanding flick to open the scoring. This goal owed much to Wenger’s other key selection, Welbeck, who ran the channels impressively, stretching Tottenham and exploiting the space in behind their high defensive line.
Arsenal repeatedly knocked quick balls in behind and while Welbeck remains frustrating in possession, his vision to pick out the attacking right-back Héctor Bellerín, who subsequently found Ramsey, was truly exceptional. His pace pushed back Spurs as Arsenal made inroads towards the end of the first half and was a logical selection ahead of the comparatively immobile Giroud.
Tottenham started brightly, but struggled to create clear-cut goalscoring opportunities. In the first half their most promising route to goal was down their right flank, pushing Kyle Walker aggressively down the touchline, perhaps to test Alexis Sánchez’s defensive discipline or the left-back Kieran Gibbs, making his first Premier League start of the year.
This was a coordinated plan: Eriksen surprisingly started on the right flank, but drifted inside to drag Gibbs narrow, creating space for Walker on the overlap. Meanwhile, Eric Dier consistently dropped to the right of Spurs’ centre-back pairing, in an unusual position almost in the manner of an old-fashioned right-half, to give Walker positional freedom. Although this was Spurs’ only genuine attacking approach, it nearly worked perfectly: at 0-0, the game’s clearest chance came from Walker swinging in a cross towards Érik Lamela, who slightly awkwardly deflected the ball towards goal, forcing David Ospina into a smart stop.
Coquelin’s stupid dismissal changed the game completely, with Tottenham turning a 1-0 deficit into a 2-1 lead courtesy of Toby Alderweireld smashing home a corner that was not cleared properly, then Harry Kane’s wonder goal from a tight angle. These two types of goal are distinctly Spurs: they have scored more set-piece goals than any other side this season, while only Manchester City have scored more from long range. The one remaining question mark about Pochettino’s side is precisely how they penetrate opposition defences, but these two sources of goals suggest they do not always need to.
With 16 minutes left, Wenger gambled. He introduced Oliver Giroud for Elneny – meaning Arsenal had neither of the holding midfielders who started the game, but essentially had three forwards, with Mesut Özil and Ramsey behind. Arsenal equalised immediately – Sánchez raced through the Spurs defence, who were perhaps distracted, adjusting to the challenge of facing an extra forward – and fired in the equaliser.
Wenger was now faced with a stick-or-twist dilemma with this extremely open system. Ten minutes later he decided to shore up the midfield by introducing Mathieu Flamini for Welbeck, effectively confirming he would be content with a draw – even if Ramsey had the game’s final chance to snatch all three points.
Ultimately both managers expressed their dissatisfaction with the draw. Wenger was confident Arsenal would have won all three points but for Coquelin’s needless dismissal, while Pochettino was annoyed Tottenham threw away a one-goal, and one-man, advantage in the final 15 minutes.
But Wenger will take comfort from the success of his tactical decisions. His use of Elneny negated Tottenham’s midfield strength, his use of Welbeck exposed their defensive weakness, and the introduction of Giroud helped Arsenal immediately hit the equaliser. Against a side widely considered to be better organised than them, it was an impressive strategic performance.