On the Whistle: Newcastle 1-0 Arsenal - "The officiating was not good. Neither was our attack."

Full time at St James' Park, Newcastle United 1 Arsenal 0. The unbeaten start to the Premier League campaign is over. It's not been a very nice few days, what with the heavy defeat at West Ham as well into the bargain. What can I say? I mean a lot to analyse here and a lot of the talk is going to be about the officiating, particularly the VAR decision on the goal that Newcastle scored. I will talk about that because I think you have to. I think we need to talk about the performance as well. What I would say is that I thought Arsenal, in some respects, equipped themselves really well against Newcastle. I thought this was a typical kind of performance from this iteration of this Arsenal team. Newcastle are incredibly physical and I thought Arsenal showed a capacity to live with that that was really impressive, even without people like Thomas I thought the way that Declan Rice, William Saliba, Gabriel all competed in the duels was very impressive. I thought technically Arsenal showed a capacity to live with Newcastle's physicality. They really close you down but Arsenal were very composed, particularly in the first half. Saliba again, some lovely touches shrugging off the opposition and just shifting away from them. Jorginho, some good passing under pressure. So, I thought there was a lot to Declan Rice I really, really think was excellent, particularly in that first half. I thought Martin Odegaard wasn't there today and I thought Rice put in a captain's performance in his absence. I thought it was really good. So, on that side of the game, Arsenal did really well and it was a tight match, a match without many chances and a match that probably should have and I think that would have been a fair result. I think for Arsenal to lose feels unfair. On the other side of the coin, what I would say is that we didn't create anything in the game. They did not create a great deal either but when you don't create anything, you leave yourself vulnerable. You leave yourself vulnerable to a freak mistake or an officiating error or just a wonder goal, just a guy picking up the ball 30 yards out and banging it in the top corner. When you do not create, when you are not a threat, when you do not look like you're going to score goals, that can always happen. I feel like we learnt that when Unai Emery was Arsenal's manager and the margins in games were so fine that it could just go against you. I know people may bristle at that and they may say, well that doesn't excuse poor officiating and I'm not saying it to excuse poor officiating. I'm just saying if you create chances and you score goals, you offer yourself that protection and I am a bit worried about our capacity to create chances. Maybe because it comes off the back of the West Ham game as well where until stoppage time we just weren't a threat. Maybe because we had a dozen corners in this game and didn't really do anything with them. I know there are explanations. Odegaard is out. Jesus is out. Those players are really important, particularly Jesus. He brings chaos, unpredictability, imagination, pressing, all things that can unlock defences in ways that I don't necessarily think Eddie and Ketty can do. But I do just think that this performance is very characteristic of this current Arsenal team, which is that they are very physically robust, very defensively assured and impressive, and a little bit less threatening going forward. In fact, I'll say a fair bit less threatening going forward. And I think that can be a problem for you and it was a problem for Arsenal today. That said, I'll be honest, if this game had ended 0-0, I'd probably say the same thing. But we'd be talking more about the solid defence, the ability in duels, the physical power that we show we can live with. We would be talking more about that. But we haven't won. We've lost. And so you've got to look at the deficiencies. You've got to look at how you could have been better. Let's talk about the officiating. We'll get on to the goal. For me, I have more sympathy with the goal than I do with the Bruno Guimaraes situation. We'll talk about Kai Havertz first. Kai Havertz leaps into a challenge. I think it was silly of him. It's not a red card tackle, it's a yellow card. But if he is a millisecond different in his timing, it probably is a red card because he leaves the ground. I don't think he should have done it. I think it was reckless. That said, I have been calling on Kai Havertz to be more aggressive, more assertive on the pitch. So I can't criticise him too much for trying to do that. And actually, all round, I thought he had one of his better games today. So I thought the referee got that one right. And VAR got that one right by giving a yellow card, not a red. I think it very nearly could have been a red if the contact had been slightly different. But crucially, it wasn't. So it was a yellow card. And it was quite funny watching Newcastle get annoyed about that. The Bruno Guimaraes one, the one where he goes and forearms Jorginho, that is a red card for me. That has to be a red card. And I am staggered at how swiftly VAR seemed to deal with that. That was a player who'd completely lost their head, who leapt into a challenge himself shortly before with two feet, didn't make contact, got up, ran over and forearmed a player in the head. In the Sky Studio afterwards, they're saying, well, it's not an elbow, it's a forearm. Guess what, guys? It doesn't need to be an elbow for it to be a red card offence. A fist will do. A forearm will do. That's violent conduct. It was nothing to do with the game in play. That's a red card. For me, that is the major officiating mistake of the day. Again, a lot of people disagree with that. I'll come on to why that is now. The goal. There are three reasons that goal could have been disallowed, right? And we'll go through them chronologically. The first is the possibility of the ball being out of play. The second is a potential foul on Gabriel. And the third is a potential offside. Now, the VAR stance, as far as I understand it, was that they could not definitively prove any of those things. And in that situation, they have to go with the on-field result. And I actually can accept that because I think the on-field officials need to have autonomy and authority to a certain extent. And if VAR cannot comprehensively, beyond any doubt, prove it, then I accept it. I accept it feels unfair because there are three things, three reasons that that goal could have been disallowed. But you cannot disallow a goal cumulatively. Now, I've seen all the same pictures as you. I've seen a ball that looks like it's out of play. But can I say beyond any doubt that the entire ball, that entire sphere is over the line? I can't. Can I tell you the exact point at which the ball strikes Joe Linton and whether or not the Newcastle player who scores is actually offside at that point in time? Again, I cannot. For me, the one I take greatest issue with is the foul. I think when you're looking at that in slow motion, that looks a lot like a foul to me. What I would say is that in a pre-VAR time, in real time, I'm not sure anyone would say that. So it feels absurd. I think the reason they checked all three of those things is because they knew they didn't know if that ball went out of play. And I think as soon as they were like, we actually can't tell if that ball's out of play. I think at that point in time, they were like, we need to be 1000% on this goal. And they checked it with greater intricacy than they ordinarily would. I think they would have loved a reason to disallow it, but they couldn't quite have that clarity. I wonder if we'll see technology brought in which tells you when the ball is out of play, because they can do it for the goal, for the goal line decisions. Maybe that's based on some technology within the crossbar itself. But that feels like something that could easily be introduced, an automated thing that tells you when the ball is out of play. It feels like an oversight now, doesn't it? I know many of you will be like, that goal is a disgrace. It's corruption. It absolutely should not have stood. And I can see that argument. I'm just saying that for me, the Guimaraes one is harder to understand. My impression of watching that VAR was because they didn't know the ball was out of play. I think they tried to find as many reasons as they could to disallow it. And ultimately, they couldn't choose one conclusively. We should speak about that goal from an Arsenal perspective as well. Ben White, I think he could have done better. The ball goes across goal and I think he gambles it's going out of play. Maybe he's knackered. I don't know. I haven't seen the full move. Maybe he's sprinted back 40-50 yards. But he basically stays in his box. He doesn't even really jog out towards it. And from that position, Newcastle are able to put in a good cross and score. I think we should talk about the goalkeeper. This is not a David Rye versus Aaron Ramsdale point of view. Aaron Ramsdale came in for the West Ham game. I don't think he had a great game. I don't think that Mikel Arteta is choosing between them at this point in time. I think he's made his choice. So let's talk about David Rye purely in terms of David Rye without having it in the context of this Aaron Ramsdale debate. That aggressive positioning at the near post, it does come with a risk if someone looks over your head. And funnily enough, Mudrik said it after he scored the fluke goal. Oh, my coach has said watch his aggressive positioning at the near post. He sort of tried to claim it was deliberate. He couldn't get away with that. But I do wonder if you're an opposition analyst, are you saying, don't aim your crosses to the near post, loop them over him to the far post. Because he's 5'9 and he positions very aggressively on the near post. And it works a lot of the time, he claims crosses. But I wonder if it's something people are looking at. And I wonder if it's something that Inaki Kanya, Mikel Arteta should look at and just think, does he need to be quite so aggressive there? He's good coming off his line. He's good claiming the ball. Does he need that aggressive position? Because I think it's been several times in his Arsenal career, he seemed to be caught under a cross. I think it happened in the first half as well. Yeah. I still find it hard to believe Arsenal lost that game. I really think that they were unfortunate to lose it. I think they did a lot right. It would have been a sort of gutsy 0-0 draw. It was a very gutsy game, very physical game. A game low on chances. But I come back to my point, I would have liked to see Arsenal create a little bit more. And I actually hoped in that end period, once players like Zinchenko, Vieira, Trossard, who are a little bit more, less kind of system players and a bit more individual sometimes that it might happen. But it didn't. It didn't. I'll leave it there, guys. Listen, let me have it in the comments below if you think I'm wrong. That's what they're for. Let me know what you thought of the officiating, what you thought of the performance. And do subscribe for more videos. I've had a very long day, so I'm going to call it a day there. But I'll speak to you all soon on Wednesday night after Sevilla, if not before. Take care, guys. Bye-bye.