In this edition we look back on Saturday’s clash against Brentford in the Premier League.
Credit: Arsenal.com
HIGHLIGHT
Paul Hepker: Cobra Kai with a lightning strike at the far post to send us to the top of the table. Best supporting actor: Saka, for the perfect assist.
Dave Seager: Another late winner to celebrate and the amazing response of those lucky enough to get a ticket.
Gary Lawrence: Despite Brentford doubling up on Saka. He still found a way to create the winning goal. This team never give up and battle to the last second of the last minute of every game.
Dwayne Bingham: Clean sheet registered in a tough away fixture. Brentford may not be challenging for titles but their home form is quite impressive. The defence held firm and dealt with the majority of Brentford’s attacks. We never felt under siege but managed to deal with the very few moments of real danger.
Nigel Evans: Havertz scoring, hopefully it’ll give him the confidence to kick on now. The team keeping going until the last minute.
Michael McDonald: Arteta changing tactics back to sending Havertz to the back post.
Credit: Arsenal.com
LOWLIGHT
Paul Hepker: Ramsdale twisting himself into a pretzel trying to be what he thinks Arteta wants. Aaron’s not a thinker. He plays by heart, and that’s where it all fell down (imho).
Dave Seager: The awful Raya/Ramsdale situation. I wish Arteta had stuck with the 2 number 1s or had never said it. In my opinion – real error from the manager, creating a huge rod for his own back.
Gary Lawrence: The way Aaron Ramsdale has gone from a positive, confident goalkeeper to looking nervous and anxious. He seems broken and down and that’s understandable considering his circumstances. But it was great that his England teammate Declan Rice was there managing to spot the danger and get back to spare Ramsdale’s blushes magnificently clearing the ball off the line. It was sad to Aaron looking so sad when he went over to the Arsenal fans at the end. As if he was saying goodbye. However the fans sung his name and that seemed to lift him a bit.
Dwayne Bingham: Admittedly we won the game in the end but towards the end we had a very dangerous break. Nketiah received the ball on the left and in what seemed like the best option of that play was to pass the ball across to three onrushing Arsenal attackers, our striker chose to take a shot instead which was neither powerful or made the goalkeeper have to work as it rolled into his arms. Understandably we always want our strikers to be selfish at times as that’s what gets them goals but in that passage of play from the position he was in, shooting was the least logical option. We scored soon after so it is forgotten about but if we didn’t manage to get a winner I’m pretty sure that moment would have been a massive talking point amongst the fans.
Nigel Evans: The goal keeping situation is beyond a joke now.
Arteta has created a situation that needn’t have arisen.
Michael McDonald: I feel sad for Reiss Nelson. Even when our wingers are off form he can’t get on the field. I bet he didn’t bet on this when he signed his contract.
Credit: Arsenal.com
HEADLIGHT
Paul Hepker: Faced with a couple of “easier games” coming up – can we get the xPoints or will we shoot ourselves in the foot like we did with similar fixtures at the business end of last season?
Dave Seager: As Saka himself has pointed out, the doubling up on he and Gabi is causing an issue for our creativity. Others need to step up and lighten their load.
Gary Lawrence: It’s taken a while but I think we are finally starting to see the emergence of Kai Havertz into the player Arteta knew he could be. Scoring that winning goal will do wonders for his confidence and I think he’ll push on become more influential and go from strength to strength. He has all the talent to do so.
Dwayne Bingham: Lens in the week, on paper a winnable game but they will take confidence from winning the return fixture. It would be nice to register a win and secure group with a game to spare. I know Arteta doesn’t tend to rest players in group fixtures but it would be in best interests to utilise any opportunity to rest key players considering the volume of games we expect to play over the next few weeks.
Nigel Evans: Hopefully a win against Lens tonight to win our CL group and take it easy for the final game.
Michael McDonald: Arsenal are currently a seven out of ten team. Arsenal are top of the league. Other teams will improve also but we are in a really interesting position.
What do you think? Give us your highlight, lowlight and headlight in the comments below.
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