There was a moment during the 3–0 loss at Crystal Palace on Monday which summed up Arsenal’s current problems so perfectly, no protest or chant or tweet or YouTube video could improve on it.

Yet all it was, was an ever–so–slightly over-hit through ball.

On the overlap

About fifteen minutes into the game, whilst in the middle of one of several lengthy spells of possession that Arsenal ‘enjoyed’ during the game, Alexis Sanchez was on the left wing whilst standing over the ball waiting to pick out a runner.

Nacho Monreal ran around the outside of Alexis, and was given a pass to run onto that just had too much on it, and it went out for a goal kick. Monreal turned around with a slight grimace as he knew that it was almost a perfect pass, and Alexis slapped his hands together with similar regret at the missed opportunity.

This has been a common tactic throughout Arsene Wenger’s tenure at the club. In an attempt to create as many efficient goalscoring opportunities as possible, his solution to seeing the opposition line up with two banks of four or sometimes five players, has been to overload the wings with his fullbacks and create a mismatch for one of his creative midfielders to take advantage of.

Take Theo Walcott’s goal against Chelsea as the perfect example of this.

Alex Iwobi gets the ball on the left wing, the defence comes across the field to deny him space, Hector Bellerin runs around the back of the Cesar Azpilicueta on the opposite side of the pitch and is free to cross the ball across the face of goal to an open Walcott for an easy tap–in.

This ball to the back post is one that both Alexis and Mesut Özil are both fond of and excellent at delivering.

It’s why during large spells of the game, both of them will be within five to ten yards of each other, as they’re trying to bait the defence into collapsing on top of them, leaving space in behind for others to run in.

Sometimes it’ll work and either Walcott or Bellerin will be free on the opposite wing with a chance to score. But most of the time, it doesn’t, and Alexis is forced to pass the ball down the left wing for the oncoming Monreal to put in a cross.

And here’s the problem. Arsenal’s best way of creating space up front is to use their fullbacks as attacking outlets whenever possible.

What happens when Arsenal’s fullbacks aren’t given any space to run into?

3–0 at Crystal Palace happens.

Perfect pass

Unless a pass is absolutely perfect, and a run is perfectly timed, Arsenal have no answer to teams who simply position their wingers beside their fullbacks when defending the ball. Every time Arsenal look for that ball around the defence, they find that the defence is waiting exactly where they want to pass to. So Arsenal shuffle the ball over to the other side of the pitch, in the hope of the defensive line following the ball and then leaving space. That doesn’t work, so Arsenal go back the other way again.

And so on, and so on, all until Alexis gets frustrated and either tries to beat four men by himself outside the penalty area, or he waits for Monreal to run around the outside and passes it to him instead. Now, if Monreal was as much of an attacking threat as say Marcus Alonso is for Chelsea, or Seamus Coleman is for Everton, then sending him on overlapping runs would be a fine idea.

But he isn’t.

Nacho Monreal has played 163 games for Arsenal. He’s scored two goals.

Nacho Monreal has played 32 games for Arsenal this season. He has two assists.

The other side

It’s not much better on the other side of the field either.

Hector Bellerin also only has two assists this season, and whilst he may have scored more goals than Monreal, it’s only one more, and his last goal came fifty–three weeks ago.

For a team that relies so much on creating efficient opportunities rather than multiple ones, Arsenal need their fullbacks to keep up their share of goals/assists to at least be a credible threat to defences, and they especially need them to be effective going forward for all the problems they cause behind them when possession is lost.

For exactly how inefficient Arsenal have been this season, read this by Ted Knutson. It’s superb.

Why does all of this sum up Arsenal’s problems so perfectly?

Well, for the whole of the second half, Arsenal didn’t record a single shot on target.

They made three substitutions, all of whom were like for like replacements.

Nothing was done to change the way Arsenal played, only the players themselves were changed, this despite playing against a team that had quite clearly had figured out a way to stop Arsenal’s attacking play dead in its tracks.

This is what Arsenal does when it’s in trouble; the same thing over and over again.

Instead of looking at what is being done wrong and trying to change the procedure, Wenger changes the player instead.

Instead of giving fans an insight into the decision making process at the club, the board leaks news of a ‘war chest’ or a huge contract offer to someone at the club.

Just like Alexis’ through ball to Monreal, the work Arsene Wenger and the board are trying to do may seem plausible in theory, but unless done perfectly it is merely playing into the hands of their opponents.

The longer it goes on, the more obvious it will become.