Jonas Eidevall: Where did it all go wrong at Arsenal?

After a dramatic and turbulent start to the season, Arsenal are now looking for a new head coach following the departure of Jonas Eidevall.

Eidevall resigned as the pressure mounted before reaching an untenable level this week. The Swedish coach has been with the club since 2021, winning two League Cups in his tenure.

Arsenal have had an underwhelming start to the 2024-25 campaign, to say the least, winning only one of four games in the Women’s Super League. The Gunners were humiliated in Europe, losing 5-2 to Bayern Munich in their opening game of the Women’s Champions League group stages.

However, the tale of Eidevall’s demise reaches back further than just the poor start to this campaign, and there have been a number of factors that have led up to this poor run.

Arsenal fans would have been optimistic at the beginning of last season, off the back of a 2022-23 campaign that saw them narrowly defeated by Wolfsburg in the semi-finals of the Champions League. They also won the Women’s League Cup for the sixth time in the club’s history.

But that optimism turned sour with an early elimination in the qualifiers of the Champions League, with the Gunners going down to Paris FC. It left Eidevall only competing for domestic trophies last term. They did win a second consecutive League Cup under his guidance but failed to keep pace with Chelsea and Manchester City in the league, trailing five points behind the top two.

Recruitment in Eidevall’s time has also been a controversial topic, and the biggest controversy of them all came at the end of last season when the WSL’s all-time leading goalscorer Vivianne Miedema, who plundered 125 goals for the Gunners in all competitions, left on a free transfer. And she joined would-be title rivals Man City.

Such a big decision meant Eidevall needed a strong start, or questions would naturally be asked. But instead, he is now out of a job.

Club statement: Jonas Eidevall

— Arsenal Women (@ArsenalWFC) October 15, 2024

Seven Days of Football Hell

Football is full of fine margins, and while Eidevall may have fallen victim to a poor run of results, the numbers suggest his side should have done much better.

Starting at home to Everton on October 6, when the Gunners could only muster a draw against the struggling, injury-ravaged Toffees

The story of Arsenal’s season so far was highlighted in this game, as their inability to convert chances cost them. They racked up 21 shots. Frida Maanum attempted seven of them alone, the joint-highest total for a player in the WSL this season. Yet they could not break the deadlock.

Confident this was a blip, Arsenal headed into their midweek clash with Bayern Munich looking for a result to give them the uptick in confidence they needed.

On the face of it, a 5-2 defeat may have seemed a harsh outcome, given that Bayern only marginally edged the expected goals (xG), generating 1.89 to Arsenal’s 1.57. Then again, Bayern only had 10 shots, and Manuela Zinsberger conceded from half of them.

But to truly tell the story of the game, we must look at the difference between the two halves. Arsenal took the lead and had full control of the opening period, limiting Bayern to three shots and an xG of just 0.17. Indeed, the Gunners would have been ahead at half-time had home goalkeeper Maria Grohs not made three fine saves. Bayern captain Glodis Viggosdottir struck two minutes before half-time from a superb Georgia Stanway assist. That strike had only an 8% chance of finding the net, but find the net it did.

It ultimately was a familiar tale for Eidevall’s Arsenal. They create chances, but cannot take advantage, and the pressure really was on when Chelsea visited Emirates Stadium on Saturday.

A 2-1 defeat was ultimately the final nail in Eidevall’s coffin.

Two early goals for Sonia Bompastor’s team left Arsenal fighting an uphill battle, and while their spirit was admirable, it once again was not enough.

Caitlin Foord reduced the deficit before half-time, and it is fair to say Arsenal were unlucky not to score more against Chelsea. Their 2.62 xG is the highest total across their four league matches so far, ahead of the 2.24 they accumulated against Man City in September.

Arsenal had 20 shots, but only got four of them on target – Chelsea, on the flip side, hit the target with six of their 11 attempts.

The Gunners hit the woodwork and created four big chances, defined as an opportunity from which a player would reasonably be expected to score, but they could not make the most of them and ultimately allowed three going the other way.

Eidevall’s team had 46 touches in Chelsea’s area, whereas the Blues had 19 in the Gunners’ 18-yard box. Another tale of not being able to make the chances count.

Since the start of last season, only Man City (68) and Chelsea (81) have scored more WSL goals than Arsenal (57), while the Gunners’ 62.5 xG ranks behind only the Blues’ 64.9.

In fact, no team has had more shots in that time than Arsenal (503), though their 161 shots on target is tied for third with Tottenham, and way behind Chelsea’s 200 and Man City’s 206.

Arsenal have underperformed their xG by 5.5. Man City (+11.3), Chelsea (+16.1), and even outside title bets Manchester United (+8.5) and Liverpool (+10.4) have all outperformed their xG, showing a clinical level of finishing that the Gunners have lacked.

Finishing has been a problem, as evidenced by an 11.33% shot conversion rate, which ranks seventh out of the 13 teams to have competed in the league since the start of last term. Chelsea, in comparison, have converted 16.98% of their attempts.

Only Chelsea (96) have had more big chances than Arsenal (86), but the Gunners again drop down to joint-third when it comes to scoring them, putting away 31. That 36% big chance conversion rate ranks joint-second poorest, alongside Spurs, and ahead of only Everton (27.27%).

Eidevall by the Numbers

Eidevall was always going to have a tough act to follow, replacing Joe Montemurro, who lifted the WSL title in 2018-19, wrestling it away from the grasp of Chelsea and Emma Hayes, stopping their steamroller of success.

That feat was impressive at the time but has aged particularly well, as the Blues have gone on to lift the title every season since then.

Eidevall oversaw 120 matches in all competitions, winning 80 – that is more wins than any other manager in Arsenal’s history.

His 66.67% win ratio in all competitions ranks second out of Arsenal’s managers to have overseen at least five games, behind only Montemurro (75% – 78/104).

Eidevall, like his immediate predecessor, has managed 70 WSL games while at Arsenal, winning 49 of those – 70%. He has suffered just 11 defeats.

Meanwhile, of ever-present WSL teams since Eidevall took over, only Chelsea (45) have conceded fewer goals than Arsenal (50), and the Blues are also the only side to lose fewer matches (seven, compared to the Gunners’ 11 defeats).

So, it is fair to say, Eidevall had his team right up there. In fact, only six managers in the WSL’s history (not including the Spring Series), have overseen more games during one spell at a single club than the 41-year-old – Emma Hayes (204 – Chelsea), Kelly Chambers (134 – Reading), Nick Cushing (96 – Man City), Gareth Taylor (92 – Man City), David Parker (86 – Birmingham City) and Hope Powell (85 – Brighton).

Meanwhile, Eidevall’s 70% win ratio in the WSL is the sixth-best of any boss to oversee at least 10 games in the competition, after Montemurro (75.71% – 53/70), Taylor (73.91% – 68/92), Harvey (71.43% – 20/28), Kerr (71.43% – 10/4) and Hayes (71.08%).

It was fitting, perhaps, that a defeat to Chelsea marked the end for Eidevall. Across his seven WSL meetings with the Blues, he only managed one win, finishing on the losing side three times. He managed better against Man City – he beat Taylor’s team on four occasions, and only suffered one defeat.

It was a similar story against London rivals Tottenham, with Arsenal coming out with a record of W4 D1 L1 from six WSL matches.

With career numbers such as these, he may feel slightly aggrieved to be in the position he finds himself now, but crucially those accomplishments were not enough to stem the tide of mounting pressure around his side’s underperformance.

Only one team has won the WSL title after winning just one of their opening four matches, and that was Liverpool in 2014 (W1 D3), and their early-season dip has seen the odds stack against them in terms of a potential title charge.

Ahead of the season, Arsenal had a 16.1% chance of winning the title – that has now plummeted to just 1.4%.

Opta’s supercomputer made third place the most likely position for Arsenal (37%) prior to the campaign. The model now forecasts Arsenal to finish fourth, with a 43.8% chance of doing so – it gives them an 11.9% chance of finishing second, while the likelihood of them coming third is still a relatively high 34.5%.

Arsenal’s season is still salvageable, and even though Eidevall has officially resigned, the club’s board may have had to act regardless sooner rather than later.

Out in the Cold

It has been a tale of underperformance of a team that has all the ability to challenge for trophies both domestically and in Europe. Arsenal’s rich history of success and pioneering teams of the past leave fans and the clubs’ expectations high.

After a decade of unprecedented success, Chelsea and Hayes have forced their rivals to perform at the top level and anything less than perfect has meant Arsenal playing the bridesmaid to the Blues in recent years.

Eidevall may have had more success in his time if the team had not been hit by significant injuries to key players such as Beth Mead, Miedema, captain Leah Williamson and others, who would have made the difference in games such as that painful Champions League semi-final defeat to Wolfsburg.

There has also been scrutiny over the transfer policy under Eidevall, and Miedema might have proved the final straw in that regard. The Dutchwoman swiftly came back to haunt her old club when she netted against them in the opening game of the season, extending her record tally to 81 WSL goals.

She has also been crucial in the Champions League, where her big game experience proved key in helping Man City secure a 2-0 defeat of current champions Barcelona, and set up City’s first goal in that tie. Her composure and ability to create for her team-mates is certainly something Arsenal have been lacking.

Eidevall’s team selections have also been a consistent sticking point. With such talent at his disposal as Mariona Caldentey, Stina Blackstenius, Alessia Russo, Mead and Maanum, Foord and Rosa Kafaji, he has been unable to get the balance right.

Big signings such as Russo have not met expectations, and she has struggled to spark this term. She is yet to score in the WSL from nine shots. Her xGoT drops to 0.4 from 1.3 xG, showing her finishing has been below par.

The new manager will need to find a way to get these players gelling in front of goal, while between the sticks Arsenal must commit to a number one they can truly trust.

Since the start of last season, Sabrina D’Angelo and Zinsberger have slightly underperformed when it comes to preventing goals, based on Opta’s xGoT model.

D’Angelo, who has only played four WSL matches since the start of last season, has helped the Gunners keep two clean sheets, but in those two other games, she conceded three times (excluding own goals) from an xGoT conceded of 2.76.

Zinsberger has played 19 WSL games in that time and conceded 19 goals from 18.0 xGoT conceded.

However, Eidevall did make a positive move this summer to bring in Daphne van Domselaar, and she has overperformed so far, keeping out two goals more than would have been anticipated (two goals conceded from 4.0 xGoT conceded), albeit only across a small sample size of three games. Sticking with her may be the best option for Eidevall’s replacement.

While some misfortune in the early weeks of this season may have hastened his exit, it has increasingly seemed like the time might be right for a change at Arsenal.

Eidevall will ultimately walk away from the Gunners with his head held high, but he will also be rueing what might have been as he hands over one of Europe’s most talented squads at a time when there are more eyes on women’s football than ever before.