Sometimes X Factor has to make way for results

There are certain jobs where you just can’t win. Being a politician is one, being a football manager is another. At least with the latter, you can attempt humour (and sometimes pull it off).  There’s the added perk of being in and around football most days of the week too.

In a society that always wants more and better and more again, you have to wonder where that mentality comes from. When the press questioned Mikel Arteta’s approach to the City game last weekend, you kind of get your answer. Football is about performance versus expectation. It always has been, and it partly explains why xG has become so popular, and remains in vogue.

Should Arteta have started Eberechi Eze? Should they have put their foot on City’s throats as they did in the same, resulting 5-1 fixture, last year? They succumbed to a wonder goal at Anfield, a decisive match-defining moment of brilliance. They’ve won every other game, and done it rotating. They’ve created expectation in the four wins prior to hosting City, the depth of squad and talent is evident, but the bar has been raised in the last four seasons also.

Going from fifth, to three consecutive second-place finishes is progress, especially when the league itself (or at least those at the summit) keep improving. It’s easy to say, on paper, Arsenal should be disposing of City. But both teams are in different states and depths of transition. City of last year were in disarray. For a coach who personifies control, Pep Guardiola had lost it. So had Manchester City as a club; a complacent transfer policy was starting to wreak havoc on the pitch.

Rayan Cherki (injured), Savinho (underperforming), Jack Grealish (deemed not fitting of the philosophy), Oscar Bobb (recovering fitness), Phil Foden (rediscovering form) means City are not the finished article going forward. Omar Marmoush is injured, and only Bernardo Silva and Jeremy Doku can be classed as trusted, fit wingers. Last year’s 44 goals conceded is only the second time City have conceded more than a goal a game in the Pep era. It’s the defence that’s needed attention more than attack, and the work that’s been done in that department shone in the tie.

Pep’s decided they need to be a bit more “shit,” but it turns out they are quite good at being that too. The performance at The Emirates didn’t have the dark arts colour of a Mourinho team, but it was a shade of.

It’s a sign of humility from Guardiola, where others have remained dogmatic: Ruben Amorim, Ange Postecoglou (last season), and to an extent, Graham Potter, Guardiola has accepted he doesn’t always need a unique idea, just a new one. If football is about performance versus expectation, coaching is about what tune you can get from the players you have, in the environment you are in.

Arsenal, right now, are better than City. Pep adapted. City, regardless, can never be written off. And this was Arteta’s humility and flexibility. Arsenal’s winning of the league, if and when it happens, will be born of their consistent, marginal improvements. A tweak of the system here, a twist in a set-piece plan there, and the right signings to keep them moving forward. Going for the jugular against City every time won’t work. An almost perfect counter-attack aside, Arsenal win the game 1-0, galvanised by a late winner coming from the bench.

Arsenal’s wing wizards have been impressive this term; Eze drawing in defenders against Palace whilst Noni Madueke was contrastingly more direct in the right. Gabriel Martinelli has landed blows off the bench. Bukayo Saka needs to regain fitness yet too.

Regardless, it’s a point won for each, not two lost. Home to Burnley is a different prospect for the Cityzens though, as is Newcastle away for the Gunners. Let’s see how Guardiola and his former understudy change tact. They will. The best managers always do.