Flex was full of praise for Arsenal’s set pieces after seeing his beloved Man United sunk by two corners in their 2-0 defeat on Thursday.
Ruben Amorim lost his first match as Red Devils’ head coach at the Emirates Stadium following two goals from Jurien Timber and William Saliba.
Thanks to their set piece coach Nicolas Jover, the Gunners have become corner specialists with 22 goals in the Premier League since the start of 2023/24, seven more than any other team.
While full of praise for their set piece play, Man United influencer and host of talkSPORT’s Inside Devils Flex couldn’t help but jokingly compare Arsenal to the ultimate corner specialists, Stoke City.
Appearing on Inside Gooners, Flex said: “It was welcome to the Bet365 Stadium!
“That right side with Saka and Odegaard, I thought they’d have the luxury of the Emirates but the way the game panned out it’s actually the set pieces we’re talking about which is a common thing for Arsenal because they’re so good at them.
“It wasn’t the free-flowing football that you’d expect from Arsenal, I think we did a good job of nullifying their preferential play in open play.
“The disparity between the two teams was there. The fact that Arsenal had 13 corners and we had zero shows who was asking the questions and who was answering them.
I’m being a bit tongue-in-cheek talking about the Bet365 Stadium but I said to a few of the Arsenal fans down there, ‘I know you play in red and white blocks but you need to change that to stripes going down to a bit more like Stoke.’
“Arsenal deserved the win and there’s more than one way to skin a cat and set pieces are a big part of that.
“Really we’re all just made because we don’t know how to stop it. I saw all of those Arsenal players at the back post time and time and time again – it was like ‘somebody do something’.
“It feels like they’re going to score with every delivery and they could have scored from more set pieces.”
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Bukayo Saka and Declan Rice are the most feared players in Europe when it comes to set piece delivery with Saka on track to break the league record for assists in a season held by Thierry Henry.
The winger sits on ten assists, ten off the Frenchman’s record set in the 2002/03 season.
Not only do they dominate corners in the Premier League, they do so in Europe as seen by Gabriel Magalhaes’ smashing header against Sporting Lisbon last month.
In the aftermath of Arsenal’s victory over Man United, Dimitar Berbatov jokingly compared the Mikel Arteta’s Gunners to Tony Pulis’ Stoke side.
But responding to the comments, Arteta saw it as a compliment.
“I understood very well what Berbatov said,” added Arteta. “It was in the best possible way.
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“We will take it as a big compliment, 100 per cent.”
Arsenal have scored 30 goals from set pieces (excluding penalties) since 2023/24 which is 25.2% of their 119 goals.
Stoke on the other hand under Pulis had a ratio of 43.1% having scored 81 set piece goals from 188.
William Saliba’s goal on Wednesday was definitely an unconventional finish, coming off his bum to deflect in.
Journalist, Julien Laurens questioned: “Are we going to talk about Saliba’s bum or not? Have we ever seen a better goal scored with an Arsenal bum, I don’t think so?
I said to him after the game, ‘Why are you scoring with your bum?’ He ‘ay they all count brother.’
Gooners feared that with the absence of Gabriel their corner threat would be severely nullified but that was not the case.
With the likes of Saliba, Kai Havertz and Rice they have many six foot plus threats ready to get on the end of swerving deliveries.
“The set pieces are incredible,”Harry Symeou said. “The deliveries are on point, they’re put into a really dangerous area but there’s also variety to what we do.
He continued: “You’ve seen us set up with Gabriel on the penalty spot… and you’ve seen us use the front post as well as a weapon.
“The fact that the runs start from the far post is great because in that period where you’re running across the box is when you lose a marker.
“We’ve built up this psychological thing where you turn up every game and the opposition concede a corner. Their goalkeeper starts to be a bit apprehensive and questions himself, ‘How do I deal with this?’”
As Arsenal look to claw back Liverpool’s seven point lead their set piece weapon may be the key to a first league title since 2004.