Put Your Phones Away And Start Supporting The Arsenal against Aston Villa

Here's the brilliant Charlie Ashmore with his latest Five Key Takeaways as Arsenal vs Aston Villa looms

1 - The warnings keep coming

I have been a bit repetitive in recent match takeaways, observing that we needed to do more to extend our lead in matches to avoid the risk of a momentary lapse costing us points. 

This was a classic example of why a one goal lead is never enough and fortunately on this occasion we had managed to double our lead before, in what is becoming an annoying feature of our matches, we appeared to lose our heads for a spell and make a game which we had completely dominated suddenly look in the balance again. 

I have written before how the tension of a title challenge exaggerates, certainly in the eyes of the match-going fan, the feeling of stress in games which on review in the cold light of day afterwards were never really in doubt.  Statistically this looks like one of those games. 

However, we may well have been a world class save from Raya away from dropping points and I for one am not going to apologise for feeling the strain...

2 - 13 points…

I believe this result leaves us 13 points ahead of where we were for the same fixtures last season. 

If we match our results from last season for the rest of this season we will finish on 87 points. 

We have the opportunity this week to increase that by five points if we can beat Villa and Bournemouth.  

The average in Premier League history required to win the league is 87.7 but in the Pep Guardiola era that average stands at 92.6. 

With Manchester City breathing down our necks we cannot relax our point gathering exercises as even 92 may not be enough, so for the rest of the season we have to win the games we won last year and improve still further in the others.  

I suggested that in the seven games between Chelsea and Liverpool we needed to gather a minimum of 17.  Losing at Villa reduced our margin for error to nil as any further dropped points took us below that 17.  So this week is huge…….

3 - Right back Rice….and the return of important players

 One of the features of Arsenal’s recruitment policy under Mikel Arteta has been adaptability. 

I cannot think of a single outfield player in the squad who is one dimensional in terms of how and where they can play. 

Declan Rice’s season has been outstanding and his turn at right back was incredible. 

So disciplined in a position he cannot have played in for years, he was exceptional. His energy is quite remarkable but we still need to make sure we look after him and give him the occasional rest. 

He is so important to us and we cannot afford to lose him to injury. 

Talking of important players it was lovely to see Martin Odegaard  have such a terrific game. 

He was involved in so much of what we did well going forward, creating chances, finding openings and making things tick in the way we became used too before his dip last season. 

Gabriel taking to the filed again was a welcome sight even if he showed some inevitable rust. And we have Jesus back, with Kai Havertz apparently on the cusp. 

I would ask whether the injury Gods were turning their attention elsewhere at last but the loss of Jurrien Timber and then, in the warm up, Riccardo Calafiori, suggests otherwise, sadly.

4 - What has the kitman done with our shooting boots?

 I read a horrible stat after the game. It’s horrible not just because it is based on the inherently horrible xG data.  It’s horrible because we have apparently scored just one goal from an xG of 9.23 in the last four games.  That of course excludes the leader in the current goalscoring stakes, the hitherto unheralded Mr O Goal. A welcome addition to the ranks though he is, we really need to start banging them in ourselves. 

Good chances are being missed in a manner that, if it doesn’t change, will derail us at some point. From Viktor Gyokeres’ tame early toe poke when he had done so well to roll the defender as the ball bounced over him to create the opportunity (a simple lob was all that was required) to Gabi Martinelli blazing over the bar after brilliant work by Bukayo Saka to set him up and in fairness a great piece of movement by Gabi to get to the position we just have to do better.

5 - Put your damned phones away

Two matches running now unfamiliar people have been sat in the seats in front of us and on both occasions they spent the whole match not only filming every attack but even watching the attacks on their phones. 

Why? What on earth are they ever going to do with the footage? What is the bloody point. 

You might say, what does it matter to me if they want to do that? 

It’s annoying and distracting is the answer – they are sat directly between me and my view of the pitch. 

They are holding their phones up between me and my view of the pitch and it is totally unnecessary. 

I have been to a couple of gigs in the last year or so where phones were banned. They were put in secure pouches for the duration. Let me tell you the experience was immeasurably better for the absence of a sea of raised phones throughout.

More importantly, because every person who might otherwise have been holding their phone up was enjoying what was happening on stage, in the moment, and becoming part of the atmosphere of the gig. 

Similarly if these people put their phones away and watched the drama unfold in the moment they could enhance the atmosphere by even, God forbid, joining in some of the singing. 

One of the beauties of a football match is that the crowd play their part – so put your wretched phones away and play your part in this title challenge. 

You might just help make the difference.