Arsenal produced a really poor second-half performance and allowed Aston Villa to go away with a 2-0 win from the Emirates Stadium.
However, the Gunners’ weakest link at the back was arguably Oleksandr Zinchenko – who produced a really poor performance.
Zinchenko’s biggest problem was his lack of positional sense, as he often drifted out of his positions or disrupted the defensive shape with his moving around.
A clip has now gone viral showing how the Ukrainian full-back derailed Arsenal’s defensive shape. It’s one from the second half which shows Zinchenko a long way away from the other Arsenal defenders, who have steered high up the pitch to maintain the defensive high-line.
The left-back, meanwhile, plays Leon Bailey onside by dropping deeper towards his own box to invite trouble from the opposition.
A lot of Gooners are infuriated by Zinchenko’s lack of positional sense and defensive frailness, as they reacted on Reddit.
Crobby2: “Physical mistakes or limitations I can accept, but his mental game would have been poor if it was a U15 match.”
ThePresident26: “Hope Timber is the player we think he is because i cant take Zinchenko for another season.”
SoupBoth: “Crowd turned on him today. Honestly don’t really want him to start again this season.”
TriplyCrownVillainy: “That’s shocking LMFAO. What on earth is he doing dropping so deep for? That’s not even remotely close to the other 3 defenders. Also — we knew his defensive awareness is shocking, so while this clip is baffling, it’s not a surprise. But — his strength was supposed to be with the ball, and today Zinchenko was utterly shit at that too.”
Masson011: “When you're a bad defender you do this. He has no confidence in his ability to defend his man 1 to 1. No wonder he sits in midfield all game lmao. That first goal he's comically out of position.”
Goonerya: “Watching this makes me feel bad for Kiwior tbh. He was part of our best 8-game run this year and got binned for this.”
