Let’s gooooooooooo!!! 3 points are all that matters and the boys got the job done today. This match had typical Arsenal screwing it up when the pressure is on at home, the crowd gets all amped up, and then Arsenal usually would find a way to fuck it all up. But today, not sure what deal Arteta made with the devil but the opposite happened. It wasn’t pretty, it was sloppy, it was damn ugly, it made me not want to live for most of the game, but we made it out with 3 points and moving onto the next match. Arsenal nabbed a goal in extra-time to take us past Wolves at the Emirates with a score of 2-1. With Spurs losing to Burnley yesterday and Wolves fighting for top 4 with us, this match ended up being a 6 point swing between us and Wolves as you can see from the league table before this week’s matches:
And now after….
Just looking at the table, we have to be considered in the driver’s seat for the top 4 but still a good amount of football left to play. We have our games in hand, all be it, against Liverpool, Chelsea, and Spurs but fuck it, today I am going to be optimistic about it before they let me down later in the season.
PRE-MATCH/FIRST HALF – Mikel chose the same lineup that played against Brentford over the weekend except Martinelli coming in for the injured ESR. Wolves lined up with a different lineup than when we played them at the Molineux a few weeks back with Hwang, Moutinho, and Nouri coming in for Trincao, Dendoncker, and Marcal. The match appropriately started with Martin Atkinson fucking us with a no-call on a Semedo trip on Martinelli in the Wolves box, not even a fucking minute into the game. The Premier League couldn’t wait a minute before they wanted to screw us. Despite the positive start from Arsenal, in the 10th minute, Gabriel got caught on the right side of our own box and played an errant back pass for Ramsdale. Hwang reacted brilliantly to get a touch and take it around Ramsdale for an open net finish to put Wolves up 1-0. Of fucking course. One could point to Ben White not reacting but to be fair, Hwang was on that pass so fast, White never had a chance. We didn’t respond well at all after the goal with Wolves controlling the rest of the half more or less with minor sparks from Arsenal resulting in nothing.
SECOND HALF – The second half started with me shitting my pants when Hwang was played through by Podence but had a tough angle and missed the open net with Ramsdale rushing out. Arsenal then kept pushing and pushing with no luck. Wolves were doing what Arsenal usually does best and that was wasting time. Every chance they had, every ball stoppage, it was a full on production by Wolves to get the back back started. Nico Pépé then comes on for Gabi Martinelli and changed the game. Wolves were sitting in such a low block and inviting us to try and break them. We needed a dribbler to come in and change the pace a bit and break up our side to side passing. Ødegaard then plays a through ball to Eddie who came on for Cédric combined well with Pépé to get us back to level in the 82nd minute. At this point, all hell broke loose, we kept pushing and pushing…. and then Saka cuts on his right and forces a save from Sá. Pépé gets the ball by the right corner flag and finds Ødegaard who found Lacazette who played a 1-2 with Pépé to find himself 1-on-1 with Sà and to force an own goal and give us all 3 damn points. Get Innnnn Boysssss!!!!! Just a gutsy performance from the boys. Definitely the loudest pop I have heard from the Emirates in years, I think since Danny Welbeck’s finish against Leicester in 2016.
Match Superlatives:
MOTM: Nico Pépé, only played 20 minutes but contributed to both goals
Who do I get to laugh at: Every Wolves fan and player that cried about us celebrating when we beat them with 10-men at the Molineux
What team do I thankfully not support: Every team that doesn’t have any games in hand, couldn’t be me.
MATCH RATINGS:
Ramsdale: 7/10 – Did what he had to do when asked upon
Cédric: 6/10 – Euro 2016 champion
Ben White: 6/10 – Maybe should have done better for the first goal but reliable enough to see the game out for us
Gabriel: 5/10 – At fault for the first goal, did well the rest of the game. He does have moments where he finds himself flat-footed, just need to be able to see out those moments.
Tierney : 6/10 – worked his ass off
Thomas Partey: 7/10 – solid all the way around, clearly our most talented player at the moment from a pure footballing standpoint.
Xhaka: 6/10 – I don’t get Mikel having Xhaka so high for someone that is so immobile and unathletic
Martinelli: 5.5/10 – Lot of effort but nothing came about for him.
Ødegaard: 7/10 – Had his moments of quality. Contributed to our first goal.
Bukayo Saka: 6.5/10 – Always looking to make something happen
Lacazette: 8/10 – Outside of his goal that ended up being an own goal, pretty much dreadful but doesn’t fucking matter cause we got the 3 points.
Pépé: 8.5/10 – literally did all you can do for a substitute, more than deserving of a start soon
Eddie: 7/10 – Combined with Pépé for the first goal.
Nuno – not on long enough to rate but has great hair.
Kent: 10/10 – Me being able to laugh at Spurs for completely erasing their Man Cit victory with a loss against Burnley, you can’t make this shit up.
We don’t have a game til March 6th against Watford. Lettuce pray our rivals in the table do us a favor and mess up before we get a chance to.