Competition Neglect - aka "where Arsenal are going wrong"

"DISMAL ARSENAL FLOUNDER AT HOME TO MONACO"

was just one of many negative headlines of this sort that referred to Wednesday nights Champions League debacle. I think you'd be hard-pressed to find anyone saying...

"YOU KNOW, I THINK THAT WENT WELL"
Who wasn't being totally sarcastic. 

The Background

Think back to November, when Arsenal hosted an even less highly esteemed side in the form of Belgian champions Anderlecht (who had not won in any of their previous 12 Champions League games). Having taken a 3-0 lead, Arsenal wound up carelessly conceding three late goals, giving Anderlecht a point and wrecking Arsenal's hopes of finishing first in the group. In the past four seasons (when they have faced Barcelona, Bayern Munchen - twice - and Milan) they have failed to win their group on three occasions, and have also failed to make it past the last-16. Indeed having won their group in 2011-2012, and having consequently drawn AC Milan, Arsenal travelled away for the first leg and contrived to suffer an ignominious 4-0 defeat, a deficit they ultimately couldn't recover in the return leg. Take into account the 6-0 loss suffered at Chelsea in March, the 5-1 reverse away at Liverpool a month earlier, the 8-2 to Manchester United a couple of seasons before that, and their recurring failure to make progress through the knockout stages of the Champions League, and you have a very distinctive pattern. This is a competition that, since taking over almost 20 years ago, Arsene Wenger has never won. 

Competition Neglect

Competition Neglect is an aspect of the general self-enhancing bias that affects all of us, it is both common and understandable. In essence, when a person is suffering from Competition Neglect they focus on what they know and want and are capable of, neglecting the plans and skills of others. If you think only of your strengths, and ignore the strengths of your opponent, you are exhibiting Competition Neglect. We are proposing that Competition Neglect from Arsene Wenger is the primary cause of this pattern of recurring disappointment. 

A Recurring Problem

If you look back at the Liverpool away fixture from last season, you see that Arsenal fielded a very attacking line-up when visiting the most prolific counter-attacking team in the division at that time. Against Chelsea the game was over in quarter of an hour as Arsenal were ripped apart. The way I see it, you could only overlook an attack of Sturridge, Sterling and Suarez, which is decimating teams left, right and centre, if you never take them into account in the first place. If you dismiss the opposition tactics, and send your team out to play the same way regardless, and don't reorganise when it isn't working (which Wenger noticeably doesn't - a persistent feature of Arsenal's tactical setup is its immunity to adapting based on distinctive features of developing situations), you leave yourself exposed. If you think of Arsenal's recurring disappointments in this way, they begin to make sense. It is not just that they keep failing, it is that they keep failing in the same way. 

The Invincibles

It's not like Arsene Wenger hasn't always done this. But it's different if you've got Vieira and Henry. You can keep playing your own way, you earn the right to play your own way, if the opposition is weaker than you. But if your protecting midfield player is the magnificently average Francois Coquelin, and your attacking talent is Danny Welbeck and Olivier Giroud, you can't expect to get away with it, and indeed, Arsenal clearly don't. Even when they finally did win silverware last season, it was a failure to take Hull's strengths into account that saw the game almost beyond them inside 10 minutes. 

Focusing on What You Want To Do

Arsene Wenger wants his teams to play football. He neglects the fact that Monaco don't want his team to play football. His team plays in the same way every game, without taking into consideration that the opposition will be expecting this. When was the last time you even got an inkling that Arsenal had a plan b, or that Arsene Wenger had even considered that they needed one? How often do they actually alter their strategy in any noticeable way? 

The Way Arsenal Play

To return to that Anderlecht game, Paul Merson opened the studio analysis of the tie by describing Arsenal as "tactically clueless". With the score at 3-0 Arsenal continued to throw players forward, with the consequence that the defence was left exposed to the counter attack, and the midfield players were too high up to get back effectively - as was the case for the second and third goals against Monaco, both of which resulted from breakaways when the defence was left exposed in an almost laughably incompetent manner. For the second goal, they were left with two back, and with one of them being Per Mertesacker, who is noted for his lack of explosive capabilities, it was essentially one back against a Monaco counter attack. In the end Koscielny was the only defender on the right side of the ball, with the midfield charging back ahead of him, leaving Berbatov enough time to pick his spot and bag a second away goal. There was a complete reckless disregard for Martial's pace on the break, or for Monaco's numbers and quality in attack. 
The Percentages
If you are calling a coin that is being tossed while it is in the air, and you do this enough times, and you always go with Heads, you will be right half the time. If you play the same way against every opposition, sometimes this will work, but sometimes it will not. This inflexibility equally explains Arsenal's consistent league positions - they have a squad that is good enough to win most games, but not enough to realistically challenge for the title. 

They Are Not Good Enough

This Arsenal team is not good enough to neglect the plans and skills of others. Their repeated failures, and their tactical "cluelessness", is plausibly explained by this deficiency. For those of you who want to look at the Man City game as evidence against this theory, I would point out that the players had to ask Arsene to adjust his tactics, and it worked. When he calls the shots, Arsenal falter, and they do it regularly.