How did Liverpool helped Man City to score a goal from a free kick against Arsenal?

We have watched the second goal for Man city from a free kick and some people said that Stones was lucky not to be in an offside position and they aren’t fully wrong,but it was a perfect plan from citizens depending on Arsenal defensive shape.

Arsenal’s defensive shape in free kicks:

Let's start by Arsenal’s defensive main system which is high line zonal marking-late drop.That means that Arsenal defends zonally and the line drops late when the taker touches the ball using offside trap to make the opponent far from the goal.

There are many different roles depending on the distance from the goal,the direction and the opponent but here we will focus on two points that Man City exploited:

1-Two takers manipulation: once the first taker moved, White and Gabriel dropped before the line and that was dangerous.

-Next match,Arsenal’s line dropped together despite two takers manipulation but the second problem appeared:

2-White’s different role: He has to block the last man of the opponent who tried to ran on far post in blind side who is dangerous because he had time and space far from the goalkeeper and jump from movement.

-Here,Konate(green) just pushed him pretending that he was the target man but he aimed to make VVD(yellow) onside despite his start in an offside position.

But the ball was a little far with Partey and Gabriel annoying him.

Here in our match,there are many different things but we will focus on the main idea which looked like liverpool's :

-Akanji (yellow) was more far from the line to drag white.

-Stones(green) started in front of Gabriel to took his attention.

When Bernardo moved towards the ball,Stones(green)moved behind Gabriel and made sure that he saw him making sure that he was in an off side situation.

-At the same time,Akanji(yellow) ran and white followed him thinking that stones blocked Gabriel to make Akanji free behind him .

-Here,Line dealed well with two takers manipulation but when De Bruyne is close to touch the ball ,Stones moved a little towards the goal with Gabriel sure that he was in an offside position

-White decided to stop and block Akanji with his back but Akanji pushed him to make Stones onside.

-Note: Dias stood with Rodri (who started in an offside position with Haaland) in front of Partey which made xhaka stepped back to help him and that helped Haaland to move freely towards near post.

-Haaland and Rodri moved towards the near post in case Ramsdale punched the ball or if the ball missed the goal.