Arsenal have reason for hope despite Southampton defeat as Premier League title boost emerges

Arsenal fell to Southampton in the FA Cup but amongst the worthy criticism, are there any glimmers of hope and positivity?

I find it really difficult to feel positive at the moment. Are the League Cup and the FA Cup the most important competitions for Arsenal this season?

No, but the reality is what we have seen in these past two weeks is reason to be worried. That is all the narrative will now be, and when you look at Manchester City smashing four goals past Liverpool, the word that comes to mind is ‘ominous’.

What a win at Wembley would have done for this team, in retrospect, we can see would have been a serious boost. Instead, the fear of what has happened now needs to be arrested by Mikel Arteta.

What we saw on Saturday evening was, yes, a heavily changed team which had just four of the team that started in the cup final. One was the keeper who made a mistake that kick-started City’s victory, and one of the others, Ben White, who also misjudged a leap and gifted another lead to their opponents.

Max Dowman is an incredible player; the talent that radiates from him is just a delight to watch. However, the fact that a 16-year-old player is consistently outshining players many years his senior in terms of threat and intent raises huge questions in itself.

When asked why his players have such an issue with the taking of chances and whether it is a broader issue that the club will look to solve perhaps in the summer Arteta had a classic retort lined up.

“I love my players,” he said. “What they have done for nine months. I'm not going to criticise them because we lost a game here in the manner that they tried. And the way they are putting their bodies through everything. Some of them probably didn't even have to be here today. I'm not going to do that. I'm going to defend them more than ever.

“Someone has to take responsibility. That's me and we have the most beautiful period of the season ahead of us. And now is the moment. In the season, you always have moments. Normally two or three. This is the first moment that we have.

“With a certain level of difficulty, we're going to say difficulty when we're going to play the Champions League quarter-finals and the run-up for the league. If this is a difficult period, I believe there are many other ones that are much more difficult. So stand up, make yourself comfortable and deliver like we’ve been doing all season.”

Arsenal spent a huge amount of money in the summer in order to have the depth to compete across all fronts. But when the team has been heavily rotated, as we have seen here, we can see the vulnerabilities.

They reached this round, scraping past League One Mansfield Town. Even at Portsmouth, they had to come from a goal down, and when Arteta changed his wingers at both Bournemouth and Nottingham Forest this season, they have really struggled, dropping points in the latter.

The floor of this squad has gone up, no doubt, but the problem is that some of these players are just not good enough anymore. Gabriel Jesus was lost, offering next to nothing.

Despite some bright showings earlier in the season, replacing Jorginho, a former Ballon d’Or contender, with Christian Norgaard has been a considerable step backwards and while Martin Zubimendi’s form has dropped off massively, he’s played so many minutes because the number two defensive midfielder has a chasm between himself and the Spaniard.

But the forward line… it lacks so much threat. Viktor Gyokeres, given one chance in those areas, is deadly; we have seen it time and time again, but Arsenal just cannot seem to effectively get the ball into him in those areas.

Martin Odegaard will take pelters for the backheel that eventually led to the Southampton opener, but he shouldn’t. We’ve asked for more invention, flair and quality, and he brought that.

Everything in the first half was going through him and Dowman, and I still firmly believe the Norwegian is going to be critical for this side during the run-in. Speaking of which, if there is to be hope from this dark period, it must come from some hope that two fewer games in this cup opens the door for much-needed breaks for the remaining two.

The Premier League and the Champions League represent two huge opportunities. But there is no doubt now that it is very much a must that the Gunners win one of these two otherwise… well it is almost too awful to even describe in this moment.