In Spain they call it “bajar” - the feeling of being in control of a situation until suddenly, rapidly, you’re not. As Mikel Arteta once famously described, it was a sensation he only experienced once as a player and it happened at Anfield.
“I could only see red shirts flying around,” he explained in the Arsenal: All or Nothing documentary. “The game is passing all over me, I cannot react, emotionally, physically I cannot cope, everything goes too fast.” Arteta implied that, on a special night, Anfield and its atmosphere has an ability to make even the strongest opposition feel powerless, that even if you think you’re ready, “bajar” can just happen to you.
Yet, last season, Arsenal’s latest moment of “bajar” was self-inflicted. “There are certain things we didn’t manage very well,” Arteta admitted on Friday. The Arsenal boss did not reference his former vice-captain Granit Xhaka by name ahead of returning to Anfield but among the many things that went wrong during last season’s title challenge, it was the midfielder’s lack of cool in the heat of battle that signified the start of an unravelling in the spring. Leading Liverpool by two goals, Xhaka’s needless confrontation with Trent Alexander-Arnold provoked Anfield and sparked Jurgen Klopp’s team into life. Arsenal were left to pay the price as they threw away two points in the title race, which they never quite recovered from over the run-in.
Xhaka was supposed to be one of Arsenal’s leaders but his moment of madness when his team were in charge represented their collective inexperience. Leading the title race for the first time under Arteta, Arsenal lacked the ruthlessness to put Liverpool to the sword when they had the chance and allowed the hosts back into the game. Despite cutting through Liverpool in a brilliant first-half display, and one of the finest away spells Anfield has seen in many a year, it counted for nothing. “They were outstanding, until we found a way into the game,” Klopp reflected on Friday. The final exchanges were thrilling - either team could have won it - but it was not the performance of champions.
Xhaka’s clash with Alexander-Arnold turned the game on Arsenal’s last visit to Anfield— (Getty Images)
Now Arsenal return to Anfield having swapped chaos for control. Ahead of Christmas, Arteta’s side find themselves in a similar position as they top the Premier League table but the Gunners have looked like a different team this season. In terms of the numbers, Arsenal’s defensive record is the best in division by a clear margin; Arsenal have continued to look to dominate possession but have done so while allowing the fewest shots on target in the Premier League over the first 17 games of the season, conceding just 39 to Manchester City’s 50, Everton’s 58 and Liverpool’s 63. If it has at times come at a cost to their creativity, it has granted Arsenal the stability they lacked over the final weeks of last year.
And as Arsenal head to Merseyside looking to eviscerate the demons of last season and an 11-year winless record, perhaps the breaking of another spell can be indicative of their progression. Last weekend, Arsenal became the first Premier League team in 33 matches to stop Brighton from scoring. Roberto De Zerbi’s free-flowing side had, in that time, thrashed Arsenal 3-0 in May when their title hopes were finally up in smoke, but on their return to the Emirates they were limited to just one shot on target throughout 2-0 defeat. It was domination from the start, built on the two key pillars in the Arsenal side in Declan Rice and William Saliba.
Rice has transformed Arsenal since his club-record arrival from West Ham— (Getty Images)
If it showed Arsenal’s capacity to learn from falling short, now Arteta’s side head to Anfield with their spine reinforced by the presence of both Rice and Saliba. In his first season in Arsenal’s midfield, Rice is representing more and more of a £105m bargain with each week, an early contender for player of the season amid City’s faltering title defence. Saliba would have to be considered, too, as the 22-year-old’s imperious form continues to underline how much of a blow his injury absence in April and May was for Arsenal’s title chances. That absence, of course, included Anfield.
Together, they make Arsenal a different proposition for Liverpool to face, their instincts allowing the visitors to squeeze the Reds high and dominate possession; their physicality and ability to cover ground in midfield making Arteta’s side less susceptible to counter-attacks and the open spaces Liverpool thrive upon. In front of them, Arsenal’s high-class forward line is getting fewer chances and facing increased pressure to be more clinical with them, their profligacy costly in what was otherwise a commanding performance at Aston Villa earlier this month. Then there is Kai Havertz, in form with four goals from his last seven games, who offers a different dimension as well.
Arteta is winless at Liverpool as a manager in the Premier League and lost his cool in a 3-1 defeat in 2021— (Getty Images)
But for all of the signs that Arsenal have evolved and matured from last season’s title bid, there isn’t a better place to test that progress than Anfield: a place where Arsenal haven’t won since Arteta was at the base of their midfield. Arsenal have lost 5-1 twice, 4-0 twice and 3-1 twice, and a ground that retains such special memories from 1989 has become a symbol of what has been missing in the years in which the Gunners have not been worthy of competing. Now Arsenal have the characters they have at times lacked, the control that is required at the place where it can just evaporate through your fingers. And, if the atmosphere at Anfield has become a hot topic in Liverpool ahead of this pre-Christmas battle of title contenders, Arsenal can show just how much they’ve grown up in order to keep it quiet.
