GW 33: Everton vs. Arsenal

We have a limited amount of Premier League games for us this weekend but we certainly won’t be lacking quality with one of these games being Everton against Arsenal. The sides are both fairly far up the table with Arsenal climbing to 4th while Everton are back in 10th after a resurgence in form from them, making this a crucial match for the sides if they are going to achieve their separate ambitions. Over the past few years, Arsenal have firmly dominated against Everton and in the last 6 matches between the sides Arsenal have won 5 with Everton’s only win in this period coming back in 2016. Interestingly, Everton have actually obtained 3 red cards in this period as well and although this trend is likely not to continue we could see fireworks in this match like we have in the past. The earlier match this season between the sides ended in a 2-0 win for Arsenal and although this scoreline seems quite convincing, Everton were perhaps the better side for the majority of the match. Everton dominated in the first half and put Arsenal under a lot of pressure but two quick goals shortly into the second half saw Arsenal get all three points. Everton took more shots and managed more shots on target in the match as expected goals predicted a scoreline of 1.07 to 0.93 in Everton’s favour showing that the match should’ve finished about level based on the chances that the teams managed to create.

Everton will be looking for a much different result this time round in order to help continue their progression that they’ve managed over the last few weeks. It’s been a disappointing season for Everton so far but they might be on the up after winning both of their last 2 while they’ve also only lost 1 of their last 5 as they’ve started to improve on their poor run of performances that they endured during the middle of the campaign. Their last 2 wins have been very impressive, against both Chelsea and West Ham, and against West Ham they firmly dominated, managing to win 2-0 in the end. In this match they breezed past the Hammers quite comfortably and although West Ham didn’t play particularly well, a lot of credit has to go to the way that Everton played and also how they were set up as they only allowed West Ham to take 3 shots, with a combined xG (expected goals) of a meager 0.09. Comparatively, Everton took 17 shots and managed 9 on target with an xG score of 2.66 as you can see that they were playing far more progressively despite only managing 51% of the ball. Looking forwards to this match, they’ll definitely play with a very similar system to the one that they’ve been using over their last few and to capitalize on Arsenal’s three at the back system they could look to pull their wingers wider while also pushing them forwards in order to expose the space that will be left on the outside of the centre-backs. Arsenal’s wing-backs do tend to play incredibly high up the field and as a result a lot of space will be left for Everton to counter-attack in, and if they do play their wingers higher, they could look to feed long balls to Calvert-Lewin and have him flick it on to the wingers, Richarlison in particular.

Richarlison has had quite an impressive season up to this point and although his form has waned slightly over the last couple months he is still one of the most crucial players to this Everton side. He has scored 12 goals in 27 starts and although he does play primarily as a winger he can also play up front and when he does play out wide he is almost used as a second striker, making runs to the back post. He is taking 2.6 shots per 90 and he is the perfect player to play as a high winger with Bernard and Sigurdsson as the creators behind him and Calvert-Lewin. Calvert-Lewin will also be important as he has had a breakout season this year after playing sparsely last campaign and will be looking to continue his good performances in this match. His role as a physical and tall striker in this side will prove to be quite handy as Everton will be able to launch balls up to him when they play on the counter-attack. From there he can either bring the ball down and try to beat the defender himself or lay it off to Richarlison or Sigurdsson who both naturally play quite high up the field. Although he hasn’t played as a creative forward too often this season he might need to diversify his game here in order to benefit his side while also helping some of Everton’s other key players to perform.

Arsenal have had an extremely successful season up to this point and looking at the league table they will have been very happy with what they’ve achieved so far. They are currently in 4th place meaning they are in a prime position to claim a Champions League place, while they’ve also played a game less than all the teams near them in the league table and they could actually move up to 3rd after this match. They’ve also been in superb form recently as they’re unbeaten in their last 6 matches while they’ve won 5 of these meaning they’ve done better than 1st place Liverpool in this period and it finally looks like Arsenal are starting to manage consistency against sides that are lower in the table. Their last match ended in a pretty comfortable 2-0 win over Newcastle as they dominated throughout the match, managing an impressive 71% possession. They were also much more productive than Newcastle and although they only took 7 shots, which is about 5 less than their average in the league, they managed 4 on target while they limited Newcastle to only 3 shots in total. They also managed an xG score of 1.04 while Newcastle had an atrocious 0.04 showing a surprising defensive solidity from this Arsenal side. In this upcoming match, they again have to be prepared to have a lot of the ball and it’s likely that they’ll line up in a similar way, in a 3-4-2-1 shape. When you look at this formation while also taking into account the fact that Everton play with a 4-2-3-1, the clear space that Arsenal can look to expose is the area in which Everton’s defensive midfielders will be occupying. They can look to play their two inside forwards quite centrally while also bringing one of their central-midfielders forwards when attacking in order to drag Everton’s players centrally before perhaps playing wide to expose the newly opened space there.

After being frozen out of the squad for a short while, Mesut Ozil has now started in both of Arsenal’s last 2 Premier League matches and his creative contribution could prove to be vital in this fixture. He will likely be playing as one of the inside forwards and due to the nature of his game you’d expect to find him very centrally. He’ll be largely in charge of the creation from the center of the field while also putting pressure on the defensive midfielders and while he has dropped off slightly this season he is still an elite creator and he is managing 2.4 key passes and 0.36 expected assists per 90 showing that he can still act as the creative fulcrum for Arsenal. Sead Kolasinac will also be important from a wide position as the attacking outlet that he provides from wing-back has proved to be a differential option for Arsenal this campaign. From wing-back he has been making 1.5 key passes per match and he has 5 assists in 19 starts as he plays very high up the field in order to accomodate for the lack of natural wide players at Arsenal’s disposure. Like mentioned earlier, Arsenal could look to create space by overloading the middle of the park which could then open up the wide areas and if this does happen you would expect Kolasinac to be crucial in utilizing this wide space.

Everton are looking fine in terms of injuries with only Yerry Mina out for this match. He is suffering from a hamstring injury that could keep him out for quite some time and that could cause Everton some pretty big problems not necessarily in this match but over the remainder of the season. The reason that this shouldn’t be too costly for Everton in this individual match is because they have Kurt Zouma at their disposal who has actually been preferred over Mina this season and has played slightly better and you would expect him to be fine to start with Michael Keane. Arsenal are facing much more in terms of injury problems as Holding, Bellerin and Welbeck are all suffering from long term problems while Koscielny, Xhaka and Ramsey could also miss from more minor issues and Torreira is suspended. That means that they will have four first team players missing for sure while another three could also be unavailable and when you have this many absentees it is almost impossible to put together a strong and coherent starting eleven. The main problem will be in the midfield because they could be missing Torreira, Xhaka and Ramsey, three players who have been regular starters in the middle of the park and if all of these players were to miss, they could have to play with a very inexperienced midfield lineup of Guendouzi and one of either Elneny or Suarez and although Guendouzi has been played quite a lot over the course of the campaign, it’s usually been with an experienced holding midfield player and Elneny and Suarez have only managed 242 Premier League minutes between them.

Arsenal are the clear favourites coming into the match but when you take a closer look and evaluate some of the other factors you can see why some people might consider Everton strong contenders in this match. They are starting to get their form together, while they have less injuries and they’ve actually taken quite a few points of big sides this campaign, but the most important feature is that they are at home where they’ve managed to create quite a fortress for themselves. Everton have managed 1.56 points when at home this season compared to 1.12 when away gaining 7 more points when at home despite playing 16 games both home and away. This shows that Everton have been a much more promising side when at home but the real reason that they’ll have such a big home advantage in this match is Arsenal’s terrible away record. Arsenal have the 10th best away record in the league and when you consider that their actual position in the league is 4th this record looks absolutely appalling as they’ve only won 5 of their 14 away Premier League matches this season. Because the fixture is being played at Goodison Park I’m not going to predict an Arsenal win and instead I’m going with a 1-1 draw.