In 2010, Arsene Wenger delivered a verdict that continues to define Stoke City’s identity as a club more than a decade later.
“You cannot say it is football any more,” said the then Arsenal manager, referencing Stoke’s bold set-piece strategy under his counterpart Tony Pulis, as reported by UK newspaper The Guardian. “It is more rugby on the goalkeepers than football.”
Looking back at that era in 2020, Liam Lawrence, a midfielder in that Stoke side of a decade earlier, described Arsenal of those days to Sky Sports as a “five-a-side team” who liked “playing in little combinations”. They were gifted, with technical stars including Cesc Fabregas, Samir Nasri and Robin van Persie, and were capable of blowing away inferior opposition, while Stoke had developed a reputation as snarling, physically dominant and aggressive. As footballing philosophies went, Wenger and Pulis were yin and yang in the Premier League.
Fast forward 14 years, and few would have expected that Arsenal would return to competing for a Premier League title they last won in 2004 while drawing comparisons to none other than Pulis’ Stoke.
“The Premier League is the only league in the world where you have so many players around the goalkeeper, pushing, shoving and making chaos — normally it’s going to be a foul, but not here (in England),” former Manchester United striker turned pundit Dimitar Berbatov said on Amazon Prime’s post-match coverage following Arsenal’s 2-0 win over United on Wednesday, where both goals were scored from corners.
“You need to be strong. (United head coach Ruben Amorim) was probably watching on the side thinking, ‘What is going on with my ’keeper?’. You need to work on that.
“As we joked, Arsenal are the new Stoke City, depending on set pieces that can give you the win. Like it did today.”
“Arsenal are the new Stoke City!” 😂
Dimitar Berbatov on the Gunners’ threat from set-pieces and Man Utd’s inability to adapt to the threat…#PLonPrime #ARSMUN pic.twitter.com/lRLHqOzs9D
— Amazon Prime Video Sport (@primevideosport) December 4, 2024
There was a smile as the former player for not only United but Arsenal’s arch-rivals Tottenham Hotspur striker compared them to that Stoke side, aware of the hysteria it was likely to cause between two fanbases with lots of history.
After all, the Britannia Stadium (now called the bet365) in the English Midlands was Wenger’s true hoodoo ground, losing on five of eight trips there between 2008 and 2014 with no answer for Stoke’s set-piece quality. It was also the site of Arsenal midfielder Aaron Ramsey’s horrific leg break in 2010, caused by a red-card challenge by Stoke defender Ryan Shawcross, who left the pitch in tears after seeing the Welshman writhing on the ground.
However, considering the effectiveness of Pulis’ set-piece strategy, particularly in Stoke’s debut Premier League season in 2008-09, and how the legacy of the intimidation it caused opposition defences is still referenced today, perhaps Berbatov’s statement should be viewed in a more complimentary light.
Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta has built a side with dominance from set pieces in mind. Mikel Merino was recruited in the summer shortly after scoring the winning goal in a Euro 2024 semi-final with a header, joining physically imposing team-mates Ben White, Thomas Partey, Riccardo Calafiori, Kai Havertz, William Saliba and Gabriel. Saliba took over from fellow centre-back Gabriel, who was absent from the squad on Wednesday through injury, to score the second goal against United. Arsenal are so tall as a team that Declan Rice, who stands comfortably over 6ft (182cm) and has displayed his quality in the box from set-piece situations for West Ham, Arsenal and England’s national team, is freed up to take the corners rather than trying to score from them.
Arguably the most famous image of Pulis’ tenure as Stoke manager came in 2008, when Hull City goalkeeper Boaz Myhill had the opportunity to put the ball out for a throw-in but passed it out for a corner instead to avoid having to defend against another of Rory Delap’s famed long throws. Built on Delap’s ability to hurl the ball into the penalty area from just about anywhere past halfway, Stoke scored nine of their 38 top-flight goals in that 2008-09 season from throw-ins.
“They were almost better than corners,” Lawrence told Sky Sports in 2020. “They were just ridiculous. The trajectory he got on them was amazing. They were flat and straight and kept going. Even if they didn’t come off one of our lads, they would come off one of theirs and end up anywhere. They caused havoc.”
Combining those throws with the heights and physical qualities of players such as Shawcross, Ricardo Fuller and Dave Kitson, it would have been remiss of Pulis not to use them to give his side the best fighting chance of competing in the Premier League.
Arteta and Nicolas Jover, Arsenal’s set-piece coach, are simply doing the same thing higher up the table.
For Jurrien Timber’s opening goal on Wednesday, the Arsenal set-piece unit lined up a few yards past the far post, allowing them to build momentum and attack the corner front-on ahead of the static United defence.
Timber, the shortest of the group, attacked the near post, with United’s most aerially proficient defenders, Harry Maguire, Matthijs de Ligt and Diogo Dalot occupied with the movements of Saliba and Havertz. Rice whipped a cross over the heads of Bruno Fernandes and Rasmus Hojlund, who failed to win the first contact, and Timber glanced a free header in with goalkeeper Andre Onana helpless.
The arrangement was fairly similar as Arsenal made it 2-0, but Partey waited at the far post for Bukayo Saka’s delivery.
Perhaps influenced by the Timber opener, United’s defensive unit focused on the attackers sprinting towards the near post, leaving Partey alone to head across goal. Partey’s header deflected in off Saliba’s backside a couple of yards from goal.
In the next clip, taken from a rare 3-1 win at Stoke for Wenger’s team in 2010, it’s apparent that their set-piece arrangement was less orchestrated than that of Arsenal today, but the effect is the same.
Instead of a whipped delivery from Saka or Rice, Delap’s flat, bullet-style throw means Shawcross only has to guide his header goalwards, with the power on the delivery enough to beat a goalkeeper if well directed. Shawcross’ header misses the goal, but Danny Pugh gambles on the far post, as Gabriel Jesus did for Arsenal in the 2-0 win over Brighton last December, and scores from close range.
Jover’s set-piece strategy is more organised and strategic than Pulis’ was, but the purpose remains the same: to create chaos around the goalkeeper and maximise the aerial quality of your tallest and most powerful players.
After all, it’s easy to forget Arteta’s philosophy was not entirely shaped by his football education at Barcelona, playing for Wenger at Arsenal and assisting Pep Guardiola at Manchester City. He played more Premier League games for David Moyes, Pulis’ contemporary, than any other manager and was initially signed as part of Everton’s central midfield rebuild after hard-tackling Thomas Gravesen departed for Real Madrid in 2005.
Despite the memorable goals and brilliant displays, Arsenal rarely threatened to win the Premier League while Stoke were at their relative height. In Wenger’s final season as their manager, 2017-18, six-time title winner Rio Ferdinand reflected on the Arsenal side of that era, saying Alex Ferguson’s Manchester United team talks centred on how they could “outrun and overpower them”, suggesting “they (didn’t) like it if you’re aggressive”. For Ferdinand, it was in stark contrast to the Arsenal sides of the early 2000s, where “you would have to fight,” as reported in 2017 by UK newspaper the Daily Mail.
Arsenal’s evolution into a more pragmatic side, combining the technical quality of Martin Odegaard and Saka with the force and physicality displayed in set pieces, is a potentially title-contending trick Wenger missed after the ‘Invincibles’ generation of two decades ago. Now, it’s being rediscovered under Arteta.
(Top photo: Julian Finney/Getty Images)
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