Three talking points from the defeat to Arsenal

West Ham 1-5 Arsenal. Here are three talking points from the game…

Our weakness at right-back was evident once again

We knew that going into the game we were in trouble with Michail Antonio out injured. Right-back has been a problematic position for us since Carl Jenkinson went out of form and returned to Arsenal after his injury. Since then, both Antonio and Sam Byram have been tried at right-back with little success.

James Collins’ injury forced Slaven Bilic to switch to a four-man defence with Alvaro Arbeloa coming on to play at right-back and the results were disastrous. Arbeloa’s poor positioning allowed Arsenal to get in behind our defence with ease and this was a constant theme throughout the game. In the first half, majority of Arsenal’s attacks came down the right hand side and the game would have been out of sight after only thirty minutes had Arsenal’s end-product not been poor. Bilic simply has to go out and buy another right-back in January.

Ashley Fletcher has to be given more chances

Going into this game Fletcher had only started one Premier League game but his goal against Manchester United and an injury to Diafra Sakho meant that Bilic was almost forced to play him.

Fletcher’s confidence grew as the game went on and his overall performance was good with his movement causing problems for Arsenal’s defence early on in the second half. His only other start was against Manchester City who were in-form thus it’s no surprise that he struggled during that game. He needs to be given more chances against the ‘easier’ opponents and we may see him get on the scoresheet more often.

Sloppy decisions on the ball have been far too common this season

Throughout the game, and this season, we have seen our players make poor decisions on the ball consistently and we have been punished for it. In the lead up to Arsenal’s opener, Angelo Ogbonna’s decision to play a risky pass allowed Arsenal to intercept the ball and within a few passes Mesut Ozil put the ball in the back of the net with Winston Reid also failing to win the ball off Alexis Sanchez.

This has not only been a problem in defence with our end-product in attack also costing us. Let’s not forget that we started the second half well though our failure to take our chances meant that Arsenal ran away with the game. Bilic said in September that we need to ‘get back to basics’ but time is running out for him and the team and we all fear another humiliating defeat next week against Liverpool.