I think some of it was creativity, some of it was control. Fat lot of good the creativity would do if we didn't have the ball, which is what happened the second half.

[–] merc@sh.itjust.works 1 points 6 days ago

Fair enough, but to a certain extent creativity is control.

For example, Arsenal spent a lot of time trying to pass out from the back at various times, but it wasn't working. Someone like Eze or Odegaard would have helped a lot with that. It's not the attacking part of creativity, trying to find that final pass. But, it's still trying to unlock the puzzle of beating their press. Also, there were a lot of times where the ball was just dumped forward in the 2nd half, and there was nobody to hold onto it. Gyokeres is pretty bad at hold up play, but if he could have won the ball and given it to someone like Eze or Odegaard I think it would have given time for the rest of the team to get forward and then Arsenal could have tried to attack.