Why Has Arsenal’s Season Gone Wrong So Far?

Grace Gunn

1 day ago

7 min read

There was very little reason to expect Arsenal to be sitting 10th in the Women’s Super League at the first break of the season.

Having finished runners-up last season, Renee Slegers’ side entered the new campaign with genuine title ambitions, with many claiming them as league favourites. Instead, the opening five league games have produced just five points, leaving the Gunners 10 points behind reigning Champions Manchester City, who have won all five of their matches.

The league table makes for uncomfortable reading: one win, two draws and two defeats, four goals scored and six conceded. Arsenal have already dropped points against Crystal Palace and Manchester United, lost to Chelsea and Manchester City, and have scored just once in three of their opening five games.

To put that into context, the side lost just one WSL match last season…

And whilst the results are bad enough, the underlying numbers suggest that Arsenal's problems go considerably deeper than a simple run of bad luck.

A Poor Start To A Season That Promised So Much

The Gunners’ opening five fixtures were hardly straightforward though. Brighton away, a newly promoted Crystal Palace at home, Manchester United, Chelsea and Manchester City represented a demanding start.

But title challengers are expected to navigate difficult stretches of fixtures, and Arsenal had the chance to really lay down their marker but failed to do so.

The season began with a 1-0 win to Brighton, before a goalless draw against newly promoted Crystal Palace. A 1-1 draw with Manchester United followed, meaning Arsenal had taken just five points from their opening three matches.

Despite a less than inspiring start, Slegers’ side had the chance to bounce back and hurt their rivals Chelsea as they hosted the side at Emirates Stadium, but that didn’t go exactly to plan. The derby pretty much encapsulated their start to the season, unthreatening in front of goal, which led to a 1-0 defeat.

Already matching their loss tally from last season, Arsenal had yet another difficult challenge ahead of them as they travelled to The Etihad to face an undefeated City side. This was once again an opportunity for Slegers’ side to reinstate their names in the title fight, taking three points off of the league leaders, but despite going ahead on two occasions, the Champions proved to be too much for the visitors, producing a 4-2 win.

The result was particularly damaging because City came into the game with a perfect record and left with one.

Arsenal, meanwhile, had fallen to 10th.

The Table Tells Only Half The Story

Five points from five matches is the obvious problem, but the Gunners’ biggest issue has actually been their inability to turn chances into goals.

The Crystal Palace game is the clearest example.

Arsenal dominated possession and produced 30 shots, compared with just two from Palace. They also registered nine attempts on target and generated 2.57 expected goals (xG) but the crucial stat? They scored none.

It was an extreme example of the Reds’ attacking problems: the chances were there, but the finishing wasn't. Arsenal had underperformed their expected goals by 2.9 goals across their opening two league matches, the biggest negative differential in the division at that stage.

The biggest concern is that that theme continued.

After four games, one of the league’s title favourites had scored only two goals despite generating 6.64 xG, an underperformance of 4.64 goals. Their conversion rate was just 2.56%, whilst nine of the other 13 teams in the league had converted at least 10% of their shots.

Arsenal have not been creating enough good chances either, there’s an important distinction here.

The Palace match demonstrated that they can create huge quantities of chances. But across the wider sample, Arsenal have struggled to consistently manufacture high-quality opportunities.

Before the City game, their attack had produced only two league goals from 6.64 xG. Their average xG per shot was also extremely low, highlighting a problem with the quality of opportunities being generated.

Against Chelsea, the side failed to register a shot on target in the first half, the first time they had done so in a WSL game since November 2022, and that brings the focus and pressure onto the forwards.

Alessia Russo, who scored 13 WSL goals last season, had not scored in the league after the first four games, whilst missing a league-high six big chances during that period. But it would be unfair to stick all the blame on their star striker. The overriding sense coming from the Arsenal attack is their lack of confidence and assurance in front of goal.

The Chelsea game highlights this. Once again, they had the opportunity to create ‘chances’ but extra touches and a lack of certainty when in the area gave the Blues enough time to recover and put themselves in the way of the shot, providing limited threat towards Hannah Hampton.

The City Defeat Summed Arsenal Up

Sunday's 4-2 defeat against Man City arguably summed up Arsenal's season so far.

There were positives. Slegers’ side led twice. Things were looking up.

Lisa Baum put them ahead before half-time, and Russo scored shortly after the interval to make it 2-1. In fact, Arsenal's underlying numbers were arguably better than City's: they produced 1.61 xG to City's 1.01 and had 16 shots to City's nine.

Yet they still found themselves on the end of a 4-2 loss.

That is perhaps the most frustrating aspect of Arsenal's current situation. There are performances where the team looks capable of competing with the very best, but they’re not converting those moments into results.

City, meanwhile, showed the ruthlessness the Reds have been missing.

Lauren Hemp scored twice, Kerstin Casparij equalised with her first touch after coming on, and Bunny Shaw eventually put the game beyond Arsenal. Andree Jeglertz’s side seemed like they were never going to lose despite falling behind twice, as for the Gunners, well, the cycle continued.

The Defensive Problems

For all the focus on Arsenal's attack, the defensive side of the team is starting to become an issue too.

Six goals conceded in five league games doesn't look catastrophic on paper, but the side statistically had the best defence last season, conceding the fewest (14) in the league, so after reinforcing in the summer with World Cup and Champions League winner Ona Batlle, they were aiming for the same defensive stability.

However, the key issue is the fact they have repeatedly made mistakes at critical moments.

The Champions League draw with Paris FC three days before was another example.

Arsenal led 2-0 but surrendered the advantage to draw 2-2, with a bizarre late handball incident involving Leah Williamson contributing to the host’s equaliser.

Then came City.

The Reds twice had the lead and twice allowed City back into the match. The second half became increasingly uncomfortable as City found spaces with Arsenal losing control. It means that, across the league and UWCL, Arsenal have now had several opportunities to close games out and failed to do so.

That is particularly striking given the experience in the squad and highlights the bigger picture.

The Pressure Is Inevitable

Renee Slegers signed a contract extension through 2029 in January, and the club has publicly backed her despite the difficult start.

Slegers herself has spoken about the support she continues to receive from the hierarchy, but football is ultimately judged by results.

And the pressure is understandable.

Before the City match, Arsenal had never previously been 10 points behind the WSL leaders after five matches. The fact that it has now happened underlines just how unusual this opening has been. Typically, the side have started slow for their standards but not quite this slow.

There is still an enormous amount of football to play of course, and the WSL season has only reached its fifth round of fixtures, with Arsenal still having plenty of time to recover, but the gap to a City side who simply don’t know how to lose at the moment is already significant.

Manchester City: 15 points from 15. Arsenal: 5 points from 15.

With Chelsea already on 13 points and London City Lionesses on 12, the Gunners are not simply chasing one team. They have already given themselves a substantial amount of ground to make up in the race for the UWCL places as well, and after the transfer window they had, missing out would seem almost inexcusable.

What Has Gone Wrong?

The answer is not one single problem.

It’s a combination of poor finishing, inconsistent chance creation, defensive lapses and an inability to manage matches when they have the advantage.

The statistics make that particularly clear.

10th in the WSL
5 points from 5 games
1 win, 2 draws, 2 defeats
4 goals scored
6 goals conceded
10 points behind Manchester City
6.64 xG but only 2 goals after four matches
2.56% shot conversion rate after four games
30 shots against Crystal Palace and still no goal
2-0 lead surrendered against Paris FC in the Champions League
2-1 lead surrendered against Manchester City

The worrying part for Arsenal is that these issues have appeared in different ways.

Against Palace, they couldn't finish. Against Chelsea, they struggled to create. Against City, they couldn't protect a lead. Against Paris FC, they couldn't close out a two-goal advantage.

Those are different problems, but they all produce the same thing: points left behind.

There is still time, but they need a quick response. The international break arrives at a useful moment for Slegers and her players, giving them the opportunity to reset, experience a different environment and come back with more confidence.

For the head coach, she has the opportunity to step away from the noise, assess why a team that finished second last season has started so poorly, and work out how to turn promising performances into victories.

The underlying numbers offer at least some hope. Arsenal have created enough chances in certain matches to suggest the attack is not fundamentally broken, whilst the 2-1 lead at City demonstrated that this squad is capable of hurting the best team in the division.

But potential is no longer enough.

For a club whose ambitions extend far beyond 10th place, the recovery needs to start quickly because the most alarming statistic of all isn't the four goals they’ve scored, or the six they have conceded, it’s 10.

Ten points behind the league leaders after only five games is a deficit Arsenal have never previously faced at this stage of a WSL season but after a hugely impressive summer window, once the side click and regain that confidence, Slegers’ side will surely find a way back into the conversation.