Arsenal’s season has been derailed – the title now feels beyond them

This was the day everything caught up with Arsenal.

Punishing injuries, falling foul of officials, a lack of firepower and failure to strengthen the squad in January — they all played their part in this 1-0 home defeat against West Ham United. Arsenal had been on an unbeaten stretch of 15 consecutive league matches, but they could only outrun their problems for so long.

For his part, manager Mikel Arteta was in no mood for excuses. “Very disappointed, obviously very angry as well,” the Arsenal manager said in his post-match press conference. “We didn’t hit the levels today and I am very much responsible for that so I am very, very angry.”

Arteta rejected the chance to put this defeat down to injuries, red cards, recruitment, or anything beyond Arsenal’s performance on the day. “I refuse that completely because I am talking about the standards of the players and the team that we played today, me included,” he said. “That was nowhere near the levels that we have to hit to have the opportunity to win a Premier League. We were very consistent, yes, but football is about what you do today and today, nowhere near.”

It’s typical of Arteta, who often demands a culture of accountability. His refusal to deal in excuses is commendable.

But it’s also a necessity. What else can he say? It is not yet March. What good would it do him to admit Arsenal’s season has been derailed by bad luck and bad decisions? As a coach, his job is to extract the maximum from this ground of players between now and the end of the season. Publicly and privately, his focus will be on controlling the controllables.

And he is right, too. There were issues with this performance — ones that cannot be put down to ill fortune or fine margins. Arsenal lacked urgency in possession, and were uncharacteristically vulnerable in defence. Even with the limitations placed on the squad, the performance was not good enough.

Despite that, and Arteta’s rhetoric, it is hard to look past the fact that Arsenal are playing without their four first-choice attackers. Kai Havertz, Bukayo Saka, Gabriel Martinelli and Gabriel Jesus are on the sidelines. One area of the team has been severely afflicted with injuries. Arguably the closest parallel within the Premier League is at Tottenham, whose defence has suffered dreadfully. The impact on their season has been devastating. Arsenal are now reckoning with a crisis of their own.

Arsenal’s stretched squad leant an air of desperation to the occasion. Mikel Merino’s impact as a substitute against Leicester was undeniable, but the euphoria generated by his late cameo overshadowed how badly Arsenal laboured for the first 80 minutes against a side that had lost 12 of its previous 15 games. Expecting Merino to be as effective in consecutive weeks — let alone until the end of the season — was perhaps a stretch.

As Arsenal chased an equaliser, three of Arteta’s four substitutes were full-backs. The manager rolled the dice, withdrawing record signing Declan Rice to shift Zinchenko into central midfield — a position in which he had been palpably hesitant to use the Ukraine international. The introduction of Raheem Sterling with just 10 minutes to go seemed to be made more in hope than expectation. Arteta ended up substituting William Saliba to field an unconventional back line that included Ben White and Jurrien Timber. These were desperate measures for desperate times.

It would be fascinating to know how the Arsenal hierarchy reflect on last month’s transfer window. They took a unified decision to proceed without signing an emergency attacker. Do the club’s decision-makers still have the courage of their convictions, believing they took the right decision for the long-term benefit of the club? Or do they feel regret, mourning an opportunity missed?

Arsenal’s slim hopes of an equaliser were all but extinguished when substitute Myles Lewis-Skelly was sent off for hauling down Mohammed Kudus. The 18-year-old Lewis-Skelly is having an outstanding debut season with the first team, but this was arguably the first moment in which his inexperience showed.

Lewis-Skelly’s red card was fatal (Ian Kington/IKImages/AFP via Getty Images)

Teenagers will make mistakes, that’s part of their development. The problem is that Arsenal are in a position where they have left themselves no margin for any error. It was Arsenal’s fifth red card in the Premier League this season, two more than any other side. Playing that many games a man down is not sustainable.

Arteta will continue to demand more, and the chances are he will get it. Arsenal will play better than this. They remain a very able team.

But the idea of them overhauling Liverpool seems fanciful. Arne Slot’s side have wobbled slightly in recent weeks but Arsenal have been unable to take full advantage, and may be 11 points behind the Merseysiders when they walk out to face Nottingham Forest on Wednesday.

There might be twists and turns in the title race — but it’s difficult to escape the feeling that Arsenal’s season has already been mangled almost to breaking point.

(Top photo: Warren Little/Getty Images)