Leeds had a brutal reality check at Arsenal – they must not linger on it

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In the 96 league games Daniel Farke had managed with Leeds United before Saturday’s trip to Arsenal, the club had tasted defeat on just 15 occasions. This is an ownership, management, squad and fanbase which has grown to forget that weekend sting.

Then they walked headfirst into one of the best four teams in Europe last season, the Premier League runners-up for the past three years. This was a brutal reality check; a sniff of the smelling salts Leeds have been working towards for the past two years.

United haven’t taken a beating like this since Liverpool put six past them at Elland Road in April 2023, one month before their relegation and just as the wheels began to fall off for Javi Gracia. This was a sobering reminder of what they are up against this season, just five days after the relief of Monday’s opening win against Everton.

The obvious caveats need to be addressed at the outset. Arsenal hope to win the division and potentially the Champions League too. This was their first home game of the season and the natives were buoyed by their shiny new players, including the introduction of Eberechi Eze pre-match.

Leeds, newly promoted and hoping to buck a concerning one-and-done trend for new faces in the top flight, were away from home and without captain Ethan Ampadu. Beating rivals like Everton at home is far more important than thrashings on the road by title challengers.

As the cliche goes, games like this will not decide whether Leeds remain in the Premier League next May. But that does not mean games like this can be discarded without effort, of course. There are ways of losing a game.

When Leeds do concede one or two goals in a match, they cannot afford to let the tally reach four or five too often. As we know from the end of Marcelo Bielsa’s tenure and 2023’s relegation, no club or management can survive weekly thrashings.

On Saturday, Jurrien Timber’s set-piece opener heralded an eventual collapse. Arsenal’s first four goals were struck across a 22-minute burst that straddled half time. Bukayo Saka’s stoppage-time strike killed Farke’s motivational half-time team talk.

Leeds were 2-0 down by half time (Julian Finney/Getty Images)

Viktor Gyokeres’ maiden Arsenal goal three minutes after the break then made a mockery of Farke’s revised version. It was curtains for Leeds and, while faults can be picked in virtually all of the goals they shipped, it’s really hard to draw too many meaningful conclusions when the gulf between the two teams is this big.

There will be food for thought for Farke, all the same. There will at least be another four away trips like this to teams with aspirations of winning the league this season. The manager must take lessons from this and refine his blueprint for those games accordingly.

The most significant tactical thread to pull at was, arguably, Farke’s decision to retain Joel Piroe at the tip of his attack.

Piroe came into this season as the club’s best finisher in the best form with an excellent pre-season under his belt. However, in a match where Leeds were expected to defend their own third for long periods, having to go long with their passes, would the taller and stronger Lukas Nmecha have been a better option? When you consider William Saliba and Gabriel, two of Europe’s most aerially-dominant centre-backs, were patrolling the halfway line, does that make it an easier decision?

All of this is easy in hindsight and Piroe did have one or two neat moments of dropping deeper to help build attacks but, across the 90 minutes, it seems Nmecha would have been better suited to keeping hold of Lucas Perri’s long passes forward. Saliba and Gabriel would have still likely bossed Nmecha in that scenario, but Piroe was helpless as possession was ceded over his head time after time.

Lucas Perri’s distribution was the other tactical decision Farke had to get right. Based on how each avenue played out, however, it may have been impossible to find an answer in this setting. The Brazilian seemed keen to go long with his opening three or four punts up the field but Piroe and Wilfried Gnonto were left hoping for loose second balls off Saliba or Timber’s heads as, generally, United’s No 1 was kicking possession away every time he went upfield. The first time Perri did go short, he could have easily seen the ball in the back of his own net.

(Henry Nicholls/AFP via Getty Images)

Pascal Struijk exchanged passes with Perri on the edge of the six-yard box and he then went forward to Anton Stach, running towards his own goal. The German collected on the edge of the area, but pressure at his back from Martin Zubimendi forced the ball loose towards Gyokeres. On another day, he realises how much time he has and slots it home from five yards.

Farke said they deliberately mixed up Perri’s passing range during the game, generally choosing the more pragmatic long ball, but this is a crucial part of the game plan Leeds will need to refine before similar tests of this level.

The elephant in the room was Ampadu’s absence. The captain would not have single-handedly kept Arsenal at bay, but the combined loss of his influence and Ilia Gruev’s evident struggles really hit the United engine room hard. Troublingly, Ampadu will miss Newcastle United’s visit next weekend too.

How does Farke approach that return to Elland Road? Helpfully, Tuesday’s Carabao Cup game at Sheffield Wednesday gives the manager and players a swift chance to reset and draw a line under their drubbing. They will not want to linger on this.

 (Top photo: Justin Setterfield/Getty Images)

This news was originally published on this post .

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