5 things that have gone wrong with Arsenal's season

While they’re still in the Europa League and are currently sixth in the Premier League with a decent enough chance of capturing a Champions League spot at the end of the season, it’d be hard to say that 2017/18 has been successful for Arsenal thus far.

Despite having some of the most outstanding players in the league, Arsene Wenger’s team are unbelievably inconsistent – looking like world-beaters one week and then total losers the next – and things don’t look like they’re about to settle down and improve anytime soon. Now we’re past halfway in the season, here are five things that have gone wrong with Arsenal thus far.

#5 Lacazette hasn’t been firing on all cylinders

Alexandre Lacazette hasn't scored as many goals as Gunners fans would've hoped

When Arsenal announced the signing of French striker Alexandre Lacazette from Lyon in the summer, the general consensus was that they finally had a striker able to compete with the best in the Premier League – the likes of Harry Kane, Romelu Lukaku and Sergio Aguero. After all, Lacazette had been a goal machine at Lyon – averaging 28 goals per season in the years since 2013/14. At the Emirates, however, things haven’t gone quite so smoothly.

The top scorer in the Premier League is unsurprisingly Kane. He’s scored 18 league goals thus far. Aguero has 10, as does Lukaku and Premier League new boy Alvaro Morata. The big surprises have of course been Raheem Sterling – who’s hit 14 – and Mohamed Salah of Liverpool, currently on 17. Lacazette meanwhile is way behind with just 8 goals to his name thus far. For a man who set Arsenal back £46m, that amount of goals just isn’t good enough.

Granted, he could well come good yet – he’s scored goals against both Manchester teams, for instance, which is impressive – but right now it feels like Arsenal have simply signed an equal to Olivier Giroud rather than a striker who can truly replace their veteran striker. It feels like perhaps Lacazette simply scored so many goals because he was in a weaker league, rather than because he’s a legitimate world-class striker. It’s doubtful that Arsene Wenger will lose patience with him anytime soon, but if he doesn’t hit form soon then he could well end up being considered a big-money flop.

#4 They’ve had poor results in the big games

Liverpool hammered Arsenal 4-0 earlier in the season

It has become painfully clear in 2017/18 that there’s a gulf in class in the Premier League between the so-called “big six” – that being Manchester City, Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Tottenham and Arsenal – and the rest of the teams in the competition.

While all of the Premier League’s teams are capable of beating anyone on their best day, this gulf means that the results from games within the big six are more important than ever. At the very top of the league, it could well be the case that these games are the ones that decide where the title goes or who gets that all-important Champions League spot.

In these games, then, it’s clear from the results thus far that Arsenal are falling way short. Against their fellow big six teams, they’ve won just one game – the home fixture against Tottenham. They’ve picked up two draws with Chelsea – 2-2 at home and 0-0 away, and also drew 3-3 with Liverpool at the Emirates in one of the most exciting games this season.

But they’ve also lost to Liverpool away and to both Manchester City and United, and all three losses were damning – 4-0 against Liverpool and 3-1 in both the City and United games. Basically, Arsenal looked badly outclassed.

Picking up six points from seven games against the top six isn’t a good return at all, and if you throw in a handful of other poor results against the lower teams – losses to Watford and Stoke, and draws with Southampton and West Bromwich Albion – it all points to one conclusion – Arsenal just aren’t good enough to make the Champions League spots and they’re arguably the weakest side in the top six. It’s a pretty damning verdict on Arsene Wenger just one season after slipping from the top table in European football.

#3 They’re out of the FA Cup

Ben Brereton helped Nottingham Forest to knock Arsenal out of the FA Cup

A few weeks ago I wrote an article on Sportskeeda suggesting that Arsenal still had a good chance of winning one of the domestic cup competitions. Well, they’ve still got a good shot at the Carabao Cup as they’re in the semi-finals and are set to face Chelsea in the first leg of that tie this week.

The FA Cup, however, is lost already after a shocking third-round loss to Championship side Nottingham Forest. While the result was a shock, for anyone who actually watched the game it perhaps wasn’t too surprising as Forest outclassed the Gunners throughout.

A 4-2 loss to a side who currently sit in 8th position in the Championship and don’t even have a permanent manager right now (academy coach Gary Brazil currently acts as caretaker)? How did Wenger allow this to happen? Well, for one, Wenger clearly either underestimated Forest as an opponent or simply decided the FA Cup wasn’t worth making a real push for. Either one would’ve been a mistake.

To underestimate Forest based on their position in the league is almost understandable, but they also have a couple of the best young players in the Championship – Kieran Dowell and Ben Brereton – as well as solid veterans like Michael Mancienne and Armand Traore. And Wenger’s decision to play a lot of fringe players (Theo Walcott, Matheu Debuchy) as well as a lot of inexperienced youngsters (Reiss Nelson, Joe Willock, Ashley Maitland-Niles) cost them dearly too.

And so Arsenal have essentially thrown away a chance at winning a big trophy this season – something that could’ve sweetened the fans if they miss out on the top four again.

#2 They haven’t sorted out the Alexis Sanchez situation

Alexis Sanchez is likely to leave at a cut-price this month

In the summer, despite signing Alexandre Lacazette, the biggest reason Arsenal were in the news was due to the situation surrounding their biggest star, Alexis Sanchez. The Chile international has been rumoured to be looking for the exit at the Emirates for some time, and in the summer the word was that he was likely on his way to rejoin Pep Guardiola at Manchester City – despite City not really needing the player. The deal couldn’t get done though, and so Alexis has remained at the Emirates and for the most part, he’s performed decently.

The big problem, however, is that his contract with Arsenal expires in June. That means that he could walk away for nothing come the summer, so of course, it makes total sense that they’d look to sell him in this month’s transfer window. And naturally, Manchester City again seem the likely suitors. Which bodes the question, why didn’t Arsenal just sell him in the summer? And if they ever thought there was the chance of the Chilean signing a new contract, why haven’t they managed to sort it out yet?

The likely answer is that he was never going to stick around. Which means for the want of 8 goals and 3 assists in all competitions, they’ve probably lost quite a substantial amount of money for the player. City supposedly think they can sign Sanchez for £25m, whereas in the summer that figure would’ve been far higher.

It’s a classic Arsenal mistake that could easily have been avoided, as if they’d sold Sanchez for bigger money in the summer, they could well have bought a replacement – perhaps Thomas Lemar – in time for the beginning of the season, rather than attempting to scramble for one halfway through with the Champions League almost out of reach.

#1 Their defence has been largely unsettled

Arsenal's defence - featuring the likes of Shkodran Mustafi - has been unsettled

It’s a well-known fact that to win a competition like the Premier League – or even get into the top four in such a competitive time – any team needs a strong, settled defence. Look at Chelsea last year, for instance, who simply took over the league once Antonio Conte settled on a three-man defence usually involving Cezar Azpilicueta, David Luiz and Gary Cahill. This season they’ve had some defensive struggles and it’s largely because they’ve moved away from that settled system.

Arsenal meanwhile have largely stuck to the three-man defence that Arsene Wenger stumbled upon last season, but the personnel has seemingly changed from week-to-week. It’s quite telling that the only Arsenal players who have appeared in every Premier League game thus far have been goalkeeper Petr Cech, and wing-back Hector Bellerin.

The other defenders – Shkodran Mustafi, Nacho Monreal, Rob Holding, Laurent Koscielny, Per Mertesacker, Calum Chambers and Sead Kolasinac – have been in and out of the team through the season, with all of them playing in different spots in the three-man defence, too.

This unsettled defence may well be to blame for Arsenal’s poor record this season when it comes to goals conceded. They’ve leaked 28 in the Premier League thus far – the most of any side in the top seven, 7 more than close rivals Tottenham and 3 more than Liverpool, who have been lambasted for a weak defence.

And they’ve looked incredibly vulnerable in numerous games, particularly against their top six rivals. The failure to stick with a settled defence may cost Arsenal their Champions League spot and is definitely one of the biggest things that have gone wrong for the Gunners this season.