Analysis: Southampton

Ralph Hasenhuttl set his Southampton team up in a 3-4-3 formation, with Yan Valery, Oriol Romeu, Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg and Matt Targett forming a midfield line of four behind a front three of Stuart Armstrong, Nathan Redmond and Danny Ings.

In possession, Southampton looked to drop Redmond and/or Armstrong in between the lines to receive the ball from their defenders or midfielders. As the ball travelled in to their feet, this would trigger the forward runs of Targett or Valery, who looked to run ahead of the ball and receive out wide in a position to cross – exactly as seen when Targett centred for Ings to head the Saints ahead.

The relationship between Targett and Armstrong on the left was key to Southampton’s strategy in the first half, with regular rotations between the two; Armstrong always looked to draw Stephan Lichtsteiner or Hector Bellerin towards him in order to create the space for Targett to run into. Central midfielders Romeu and Hojbjerg looked to circulate possession and control the central areas, generally sitting deeper so as to protect against counter-attacks. As midfield was congested throughout the game, Southampton mainly looked to exploit the half-spaces and wide areas in their attacks, tending to shoot from outside the box or create chances from crosses rather than sending runners in behind early. No surprise, then, that all three of their goals on the day came from crosses.

Out of possession, Southampton used a variety of structures based on the state of the game and the Arsenal approach – this flexibility was crucial to Southampton’s success and one reason why the visitors only registered four shots on target.

The initial structure was 5-2-3, with Valery and Targett staying with their defensive line and the roles elsewhere within the shape clear. Armstrong and Redmond would press Arsenal’s outside centre-backs (Lichtsteiner and Granit Xhaka), with Romeu and Hojbjerg locking on to Matteo Guendouzi and Lucas Torreira in midfield. Valery and Targett would squeeze up to press Nacho Monreal and Bellerin regardless of how deep they dropped, but only if the ball was being played out to that side – this enabled the other wing-back to tuck in and maintain a back four.

The role of the centre-backs was key, due to the tendency of Alex Iwobi and Henrikh Mkhitaryan to drop and play between the lines. The Southampton defenders were happy to allow them to do this, but as soon as any Arsenal player looked likely to play into their feet, they would be on the front foot and ready to step out of their defensive line and close down. These decisions weren’t just limited to when Arsenal played out from the back, however. Even later in the game, when Southampton were much deeper, their centre-backs would be ready to step out to press an Arsenal attacker dropping between the lines.

As Arsenal changed to a 4-2-2-2 in the second half, Southampton adapted their press. They no longer needed three players to press the Arsenal centre-backs, but they did need an extra man in midfield – so Redmond and Ings would now press Xhaka and Laurent Koscielny, while Armstrong dropped into midfield with Romeu and Hojbjerg. The full-backs would still look to press Lichtsteiner, now operating at right-back, and Monreal, but if they dropped much further up the pitch then Armstrong or Hojbjerg would sometimes move across to close them down – this in turn allowed Targett and Valery to stay with their defensive line. The extra Arsenal attacker didn’t make a huge difference in terms of creating superiority for the visitors, because Southampton still had their back four or five intact – and the principles of stepping in to deal with dropping players and staying compact remained the same.

For the final 20 minutes, Southampton used a 5-4-1 formation in which substitute Charlie Austin led the line but didn’t press much. Instead, he would show the defenders one way, while fellow sub Shane Long and Armstrong played alongside Hojbjerg and Romeu in midfield.