Manchester United 1 - 0 Arsenal: Uncreative Title to Match Uncreative Midfield

Wayne Rooney's miss was by far Arsenal's only highlight. Pic via Guardian.

Manchester United 1: Park 41

Arsenal 0

For all of the complaining about Howard Webb that we may do, especially in the heat of the match when I'm a good three pints in, the fact of the matter is, even if there were a number of dubious decisions at Old Trafford yesterday, Arsenal certainly deserved their zero points. I'm going to do my best not to go into the officiating decisions, but how United were not booked once in this match is a crime. I'm always much the optimistic one, but still, there's been a lot to be concerned about in Arsenal's play this season, so let's dive right into this.

Arsenal made only one change to the side that beat Fulham in the league last weekend, necessitated by an injury picked up by Lukasz Fabianski. This meant Wojciech Szczesny would make his first start in the Premier League. Despite declaring himself fit again, Manuel Almunia was nowhere to be found, further indicating that he has likely played his final match in an Arsenal shirt. The outfield players were as they were in the last league match, including Tomas Rosicky in the middle of midfield, with Andrei Arshavin to the left and Samir Nasri to the right. Cesc Fabregas, still nursing his hamstring, started on the bench.

Arsenal put themselves behind the eight ball a bit at the start; it seemed like the back four wanted to pass back to Szczesny to get him an early touch on the ball, but with United's pressuring, the home side had a few solid opportunities created by Arsenal's own backward motion, but nothing exceedingly dangerous. The Gunners settled in after about ten minutes.

But, when I say settled in, I mean they worked themselves into a groove through which they were never going to score for one simple reason: there was no creative spark. Again. Without a fit Cesc Fabregas, the central role has fallen to Tomas Rosicky, who has had a few strong performances in the past and a few clunkers, and yesterday was the latter. Without Fabregas, the formation seems to, at times, be all over the place and when coupled with Arsene Wenger's high risk-high reward scheme of having Alex Song push forward, it creates a dangerous situation of counterattack vulnerability when ultimately, there's no one in an Arsenal shirt on the other end of a poorly placed cross.

United scored the match's only goal shortly before halftime. Nani sent a deflected ball into the box (the deflection courtesy Gael Clichy) that found the head of Ji-Sung Park, who twisted an unstoppable header into the corner of the net. Szczesny had no chance. Sebastian Squillaci tried to close down on Park, but he was too late in getting this. This was because Park was not Squillaci's man to cover in the first place; Alex Song is the one that should have been on the Korean.

Arsenal had all of one solid chance to score a goal in the second half (and, all game, really.) Samir Nasri took a left footed shot that Edwin van der Sar could only parry to his left, into the path of Marouane Chamakh. But, the Moroccan found himself wrong footed and caught off guard, and by the time Chamakh got a foot on the ball to take a shot, central defender Nemanja Vidic had already closed him down to block it.

United could have taken a 2-0 lead when they were given a preposterously dubious penalty as Clichy was whistled for handball in the area. To make this call, it has to be an intentional handball (Webb waived off a more legitimate shout for a penalty when Chamakh accidentally handled in the first half.) Nani kicked the ball at Clichy's arm, which was at his side and on the ground supporting his body. How that could be viewed as intentional is beyond me. It was the linesman who waved for the call, but it's still up to Webb to whistle for it. What followed was Wayne Rooney missing the net ridiculously, in what was probably the best moment of the match for an Arsenal supporter.

Arsenal brought in some heavy artillery off the bench, in the form of Cesc Fabregas, Robin van Persie, and Theo Walcott, but the three of them did nothing to change the flow of the match. The creativity and spark still wasn't there. In the end, it's another negative result in Manchester. A bit of a coincidental statistic to pass along, that I don't really think means that much in the grand scheme of things, is that Arsenal have never won the Premier League in a season where they have lost at Old Trafford. Again, small sample size (the Premier League only dates back to 1992) and bit coincidental, as Arsenal have won there and then not won the league as well (in 2006/07.)

Hipster Gooner Man of the Match: Nemanja Vidic