Fulham’s Marco Silva Names 1 Arsenal Star ‘Impossible to Stop’ – Not Bukayo Saka

Marco Silva, the manager of Fulham, named one Arsenal player as “impossible to stop” after the team’s 1-0 Los Angeles defeat. And although Bukayo Saka had a productive afternoon against the Cottagers, the Portuguese manager chose to choose a different player.

On Saturday night, Mikel Arteta’s team was put to the test in west London as Fulham made life difficult for the opposition players. The Gunners had 16 shots throughout the game, but they were unable to get past Bernd Leno and the home team’s defence.

VAR overruled Saka’s penalty call, and his team may have received a spot kick thanks to attacker Viktor Gyokeres. However, Leandro Trossard ultimately scored a close-range corner to put Arsenal three points ahead of Manchester City at the top of the standings.

Silva: ‘Difficult to Control’ Gabriel

The corner eventually found its way through to Trossard for the game’s lone goal after Gabriel flicked it on at the near post. Several Premier League teams have struggled this season to contain the Brazilian’s threat from set-pieces because of his height and agility.

Silva confirmed that viewpoint in an interview with BBC Sport after the game, saying that his team found it “impossible to stop” Gabriel in the build-up to the goal. That was the case even though Fulham recognised him as Arsenal’s main danger and researched ways to lessen his impact from free kicks and corners.

The Fulham manager remarked, “Gabriel jumps so high, it’s impossible to stop him.” “Controlling it is really challenging.

“We did a great job blocking his run for the majority of the game. We departed Gabriel’s path because we were too exposed. He wasn’t supposed to run in that area. Controlling any flick at the back post is really challenging.

During his press conference following the game, Silva kept expressing his frustration with Arsenal’s goal. “Offensive set-pieces are not just about one, two, or three players; it’s about the takers, and they are fortunate to have very good takers as well,” he added. “It’s frustrating, okay, and difficult to stop.”

“It’s difficult for you, and I believe it’s difficult for Arsenal when they play other teams as well, not just the clubs they play against. They have, in my opinion, scored 60% of their goals from set pieces, demonstrating their strength at that precise moment.

“The frustration for us is that we showed throughout the game we were well prepared for that moment but this is the type of game where you have to keep the focus for 90, 95 minutes, most of the time we did a very good job, in one moment we let him [Gabriel] go with power, the way he jumped was very difficult to control, even when the flick comes in the front post it’s far more difficult to control in the far post.”