Arsenal suffered a damaging but entirely predictable defeat to Leicester City on Saturday, losing 2-0 to drop nine points behind their top-four rivals.

Leicester City 2-0 Arsenal

Technically Arsenal are only eight points behind the top four as things stand, but Manchester City have a game in hand and seem incredibly unlikely to finish below the Gunners this season.

The gap to the teams that have played the same number of game is nine points and a goal difference swing of eleven.

Arsenal managed to hang on in this game for a while, with a fairly even first half where the team deliberately conceded possession and hit on the counter-attack. In the end, they just didn’t pose enough of a threat though, whereas Leicester did.

The hosts scored twice through Jamie Vardy and James Maddison, firing Brendan Rodgers’ side up to second in the table.

The individual performances were fairly meaningless for Arsenal because as a team they just aren’t set up to take these games to their opponents. All the same, let’s have a look at our player ratings for the match.

Goalkeeper and Centre-Backs

• Bernd Leno 6 – In the first half, Leno did a great job of sweeping up behind the defence, given the threat posed by Jamie Vardy. He didn’t really have any chance with the goals in the second half though. His distribution was fine for the most part.
• Calum Chambers 6 – Probably the most comfortable of the back three in general, making a few vital clearances and tackles. Still wasn’t completely dependable though, as the defence struggled in general.
• David Luiz 5 – Played a great ball into Aubameyang at one point but he also conceded possession and pushed up too far on a few occasions, and he was lucky Leicester didn’t punish that.
• Rob Holding 5 – Looked shaky early on, losing the ball a couple of times taking risks in possession and letting Ayoze Perez in behind him.

Click ‘Next’ for Wing-Backs, Midfield, Forwards and Substitutes

Wing-Backs, Midfield and Forwards

• Hector Bellerín 6 – Though he did a good job defensively in the first half, he had a few loose touches and passes to concede possession, as to be expected on his comeback. He did improve in that regard somewhat and looked a threat going forward.
• Lucas Torreira 4 – It was far too easy for Leicester to skip around Arsenal’s midfield pairing, who offered little protection to the defence and similarly little going forward.
• Matteo Guendouzi 4 – As above, and Guendouzi’s forward passing was only very slightly more ambitious than his partner’s.
• Sead Kolašinac 6 – A bit unlucky Aubameyang had strayed offside for the disallowed Arsenal goal. Kolašinac had a half-decent game playing at wing-back but still had his part to play in the weak defensive effort.
• Mesut Özil 7 – Played well running the offensive midfield effort mostly on his own. Even made a few tackles, not that he should have to be involved in that regard as much as he is under Emery. Arsenal would have had no hope of scoring without him.
• Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang 6 – Strayed offside for the one good chance he did have, but he also made a couple for his strike partner and was unfortunately denied a clear chance at goal himself by an accidental handball by Ndidi. Had some particularly heavy touches.
• Alexandre Lacazette 4 – Missed a couple of great chances in the first half, and didn’t really have any in the second.

Substitutes

• Nicolas Pépé 6 – If Emery is trying to build Pépé up after his transfer then throwing him in when Arsenal have no hope is the complete opposite of the way he should go about it. The winger completed a couple of dribbles and won a free-kick in his 14 touches late in the game.
• Joe Willock 6 – Coming on for the last 10 minutes, Willock tried to make something happen, but again, he didn’t have much hope. The application was certainly there, as he made as many tackles in 10 minutes as any of the Arsenal starters in 90.