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Saturday, December 01, 2007

Arsenal score beautifully but win ugly. The sign of champions!


By 1970’s Gooner

Isn’t this what championship winning teams are made of? To get the three points when the team is not performing well. When it is under pressure and the opponents are pushing forward with at times 68% possession?

Yet it never remotely looked like the game would turn out to be like this. Not after Arsenal scored two beautifully carved out goals to counter the earlier one scored by Gardner as early as the 14th minute.

The first one arriving 12 minutes later after slick interplay on the right wing with Rosicky laying the ball back just inside the area for the on coming Flamini to power it home.

The second on the 36th minute was created on the same flank again with Sagna providing a beautifully weighted cross for Adebayor to thump it home with a strong header.

Villa always looked dangerous especially when Carew was fed those high balls and they started the second half in determined mood.

When the main playmaker and outstanding player on the pitch, Hleb, had to depart limping heavily after he was cynically chopped down from behind by Carew, Arsenal lost their rhythm.

Villa sensed this and pushed even more forward searching for that equalizer. Arsenal stopped playing football and restricted themselves to just stopping the opponents.

Wenger made an astute substitution taking Arsenal’s remaining creative player, Rosicky for a defensive midfielder, Gilberto. This gave the defensive shield that the tiring Diarra was increasingly failing to provide.

When Carew’s header cannoned off Almunia’s cross bar we all knew that it was going to be Arsenal’s day.

It’s probably going to be Arsenal’s year!

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Being of a somewhat cynical nature it seldom suprises me that it is the playmakers who are so often victims of "clumsy' or 'cynical' tackles. Not just Arsenal's players but in general. Ronaldo, Reyes come quickly to mind.
Much as i supprt Arsenal it is time to instill some discipline in the players and have Gallas - or whoever is captain, doing the communicating to the referee. Sagna and Flamini were overboard today.
Lets not get the Chelsea, ManU habit of surrounding and trying to intimidate the ref.

Anonymous said...

Yes you are right but even Gallas got booked swearing at the ref!

Wrighty7 said...

Great result today. Villa have been playing well and to go to Villa park and come away with 3 points is superb! Its a great start to a tough month of fixtures. I agree with 1970's about winning ugly, it has to be done sometimes! In the 1st half I thought we were excellent and the 2nd was a complete turn around! Football is a strange game sometimes! Well done today boys!

Anonymous said...

Its a great response for a team to come back from their 3-1 loss to win with such a resilient display.

Flamini and Hleb's performance meant that we didn't miss Fabregas that much and I see good things from Diarra in the future.

The only thing negative is Gilbertos impressive performance... he's gonna be leaving in Janurary, and you can't say we won't miss him.

But thats the price you pay when you want a top team. Good players leave to make space for better ones.

Aw well.

Anonymous said...

Diarra looked quite good in the first half and tired in the second. He will improve with more games. I think Wenger has captured another star there.

Anonymous said...

Cut away all the crap about Villa's resolve and energy in the second-half, the game turned after the complete hatchet-job done on Hleb by Carew. Without Hleb's extraordinary skills, especially his ability to hold up the ball and time his passes perfectly, the Arsenal midfield was a shadow of itself. Yet Carew, the assassin, stayed on the field to pose a constant threat to the Gunners. Perfect tactics Mr. O'Neill.

Anonymous said...

shotta, u hit the nail on the head. Villa had a plan 2 eliminate hleb bcoz he was running the show, they had already made some hard challenges on hleb at the start of the second half so it was no surprise that john carew injured him with a cynical challenge. We then lacked creativity in midfield as rosicky had no1 2 link up with. i still expect us 2 go 2 newcastle and borogh and win, even without fabregas, hleb and van persie but we r defo gonna need them against chelsea.

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