‘Absolutely shocking’ – Tony Pulis explains where teams are going wrong against ‘new Stoke’ Arsenal
Yesterday at 06:56 AM
Tony Pulis revealed to talkSPORT exactly where teams are going wrong defending against Arsenal after they were labelled the ‘new Stoke City’.
It comes after Mikel Arteta’s side picked up the nickname following a 2-0 win over Manchester United, and a 1-1 draw with Fulham – all three of their goals coming from corners.
Speaking on talkSPORT, Pulis said: “Well listen, let’s go back further. I didn’t invent it, I’ll tell you that.
“I think the two of you are old enough to remember some fantastic innovations from teams and players Coventry City. Remember Willie Hunt smashing it to remember that David Armstrong was brilliant.
“Well, you, you say that when we were at Bournemouth, we won the league that year, I think we had 97 points in, in the 1986-87 season.
“Matt O’Connor used to do exactly the same. Put big John Williams on the near post, he just touched the ball to the near post. John would flick it on and we’d have four or five players following it up.
“I’ve been brought up with good knowledge that free kicks, set plays are very, very important and especially the teams who maybe haven’t got as much ability and as much quality as the top teams. We worked really hard at it.
“What we used to do and what we used to work on, especially at Stoke and when I was at West Brom as well where we had a fantastic record, if people man for man mark you, then we’d play a numbers game, so we’d go our top six against their top six.
“We knew their best headers would go against their best headers, but we always thought our sixth man would be stronger than their sixth man.
“So we would move people out of the middle of the goal and we’d get our sixth man attacking their sixth man and we had Chris Brunt, Matt Etherington, people with real quality who could deliver and leave the ball there.”
On marking the ‘corner kings’, Pulis added: “If they mark zonally, we would do what Arsenal are doing. A standing jump will never beat someone on a running jump. So we would move back and then run across the face of defenders.
“If you haven’t got the quality and you haven’t got players who want to score goals, you’re not going to do it.
“I think the biggest difference today is the marking. The marking is absolutely shocking. We used to get up and in people’s faces and really physically contest a ball that was coming in.
“Players today, they’re not even looking at the corner kick, they’re looking at the player, they’re trying to block the player off. Any movement away from that player leaves you in space and a chance to score.
“We’ve sort of gone away from good defending in this country and I’m not taking anything away from Arsenal, as you said, the quality of the deliveries is absolutely first class and they’ve got players who want to score.
“They’ve got players who are brave enough to get in there and get the ball, but some of the defending against Arsenal, it has been absolutely shocking.”
Since the start of last season until after their 2-0 win over Man United, Arsenal have scored 22 goals from corners – the most of any European side in the top 5 leagues.
Bayer Leverkusen follow in joint second with Borussia Monchengladbach. The next highest in the Premier League are Manchester City, with 15.
Everton, Liverpool and West Ham are jointly on 14.
Declan Rice and Bukayo Saka have the most assists from set plays since the start of last season, with seven apiece. Everton, Liverpool and West Ham are jointly on 14.
The comparison to Stoke City comes after their Premier League ratio of 43.1 per cent – 81 goals from corners out of a total of 188 under Pulis – Arsenal’s ration is currently 25.2 per cent of 119 league goals.
