The Liverpool trend that offers Arsenal newfound hope of upsetting champions | OneFootball

In Arsenal’s analysis for this Sunday at Anfield, they have already noticed something different about Liverpool beyond new players. The champions now try the unexpected much more. It is as if the attackers have been given greater creative licences, to indulge some of their individual quality. Hence the soaring beauty of Rio Ngumoha’s raucous winning goal against Newcastle United.

That can make this Liverpool team much more unpredictable, especially as stars like Mohammed Salah attempt things others couldn’t imagine. A fitting game for Eberechi Eze to make his debut, perhaps.

The offset is that it also makes Liverpool much more open, to go with Arne Slot’s front-loaded system. It’s not just that Ryan Gravenberch pinned the midfield together on his own against Newcastle. The more freedom you give players, the less proscribed any formation is going to be. So, if someone like Florian Wirtz loses the ball when trying something riskier, there’s instantly much more space in behind.

Arne Slot has been willing to take such risks because Liverpool have the quality to punish you out of nowhere. He’s been vindicated by two results so far, despite the questions about performance. It’s almost as if the Liverpool manager is very literally trying to push the boundaries of last season; to move the lines of his formation; to try new things in order to go to new levels.

Against that, Mikel Arteta has sought to harden his team’s boundaries; to fill in the remaining gaps. He surveyed last season and knows what Arsenal’s top level is good enough - “probably better than Liverpool’s”, in the words of some insiders. The problem was depth and alternatives, two issues very much tackled by this summer’s business.

Arsenal now have multiple possible configurations for all areas of the pitch - to the point that Bukayo Saka’s injury isn’t the disaster it might have been - but it is still all within Arteta’s design. There isn’t the same scope for individual imagination. So, although Arteta’s ideal might be that opposition managers find it impossible to predict his line-ups, he knows exactly what he wants from them.

Sunday’s potential title clash might consequently represent more control against more release; order against unpredictability. The difference could also decide the season.

It has already defined the entire summer.

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Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta is preparing for Sunday’s trip to Premier League champions Liverpool (Nick Potts/PA) (PA Wire)

Some Arsenal sources have argued that, rather than signing six different players, they should have just gone bigger with the budget by securing Martin Zubimendi, Eze… and Alexander Isak. The rationale is they should have only signed game-changers, to elevate the squad, rather than so many alternative options, that mostly deepen it.

Liverpool have almost taken exactly that approach. Sure, they have still signed four players - and want to make it six with a new forward and Marc Guehi as a defender - but all are starters. Since even the full-backs play in a different way to Andy Robertson and Trent Alexander-Arnold, both Milos Kerkez and Jeremie Frimping can also be considered “game-changers”.

Wirtz’s style is obviously what people really mean when they use that description, and Isak would be a level beyond. Liverpool have generally gone for players that change the boundaries.

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Liverpool head coach Arne Slot is urging his team to express themselves more this term (PA)

These differences have even manifested in the teams’ goal records so far. Liverpool have scored seven but conceded four. Arsenal have scored six but conceded none.

Despite these contrasts, there is still common ground, that is just as relevant to the title race.

All of this comes in a Pep Guardiola-shaped landscape. Both of these managers have enthused about how they’re disciples of that tactical school, and everything they do is informed by those principles. They implement the same positional game.

It merely shows how influential Guardiola’s football has become, and how far it’s spread, that two diverging interpretations can still rightly cast themselves as from the exact same ideology.

This is perhaps a lesson that Ruben Amorim should heed, as he so dogmatically adheres to his own ideas. More adaptation is possible within the same broad ideology.

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Eberechi Eze could provide a spark for Arsenal at Anfield (PA Wire)

Slot duly seems to be following the Andoni Iraola-influenced line in now allowing greater individual freedom.

Guardiola’s own interpretation can’t yet be dismissed so readily, either. Manchester City may look a different force when this new group internalise his approach.

And yet the very fact that Liverpool and Arsenal were top two last season, and are already two of just three teams with 100 percent records this season, further suggests this might be the shape of things to come.

If so, it would be the first proper title rivalry not to feature City since 2015-16, maybe even 2010-11.

Last season never really got going, after all. Liverpool were too far ahead. It just sowed some seeds.

A rivalry has grown between fans, certainly online. That has been stoked by some of Arteta’s statements and how - yes - some at Arsenal think they are the better team. Liverpool did not beat them last season. Some insiders even express frustration that Saka’s injury means this will be the third successive meeting where Liverpool get to face an Arteta side without senior players.

Against that, Liverpool can point to their own issues - including in midfield now - but they don’t need to. They can simply point to the Premier League trophy.

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Mohamed Salah and his teammates are attempting riskier moves on the pitch (AP)

They’ve gone there and done it, in a way Arsenal have yet to prove they can.

Any animosity from such futile debates, mind, has not yet extended to the pitch, the sidelines or even the boardrooms.

There is so far respect between the coaching teams, and that extends from the executive boxes. There, both FSG and the Kroenkes have found common cause in discussing football’s direction.

Other stakeholders would argue that in itself is a sign of American-led machinations about the game’s future. The two clubs did drive a Super League, after all.

It’s not like there’s been much rancour from history, either, despite this rivalry having this vintage feel due to their vaunted status in English football.

Liverpool and Arsenal might have been involved in the most famous title race of all, in 1988-89, but that was one of few. The primary emotions that surrounded it were also solemnity and respect, given Hillsborough.

Outside Michael Thomas’ exhilarating moment, there have only been four other seasons where Liverpool and Arsenal finished as the top two. Of those, probably only 1972-73 was a proper title race.

So, if this is to develop into a race, the main difference might really be the tactical approaches. Arsenal can’t even point to last year’s difference of £80m in wages, given what they’ve spent since.

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Bukayo Saka will miss the game through injury (PA Wire)

It’s all why this Sunday’s match feels unusually significant for a fixture so early in the season, especially given all of the unknowns.

One unknown is whether Arsenal can finally step up. Another is what Liverpool’s attack will try in any given moment.

That will pose a new test to Arsenal’s hardline defence, who themselves will be much more robust than either Bournemouth or Newcastle.

A more restrained counter-attacking game might make sense for Arteta, but Slot surely won’t play a team as open as on Monday. Will his midfield be reshaped? Is that where the need for Eze without Saka will be even greater?

Charging all of this is that need for a title statement. Will Liverpool actually go for that bit more control, as Arsenal allow a greater release?