Exactly! Bournemouth has come out gangbusters in 2T. Very nearly equalized. Chelsea looks to be taking care of business against the other south coast team. Now we need to do likewise. Please, please, please don't try to manage a 1-0 lead! And while I write that Leno makes a good save to keep them from equalizing again. COME ON!
Ooh, Martinelli is coming in for the final 30 mins. Good move Emery! Edit: and he takes off Pepe, which I think is another smart move. Leave Saka on there who has more chemistry with Martinelli.
Gunners' team defense is tough to watch. Too many players immediately retreating to cover a zone rather than getting a player, and confusion on 3 occasions this half so far regarding who covers who. Also, Arsenal has done poorly in trying switch or stretch the field. Almost all their long balls have resulted in turnovers.
Luiz has done his knee a bit. And so perhaps this is finally the time where Holding reclaims his spot. Or perhaps it was just Luiz making a meal of an injury? And while we're talking about that, Sokratis needs to cut out his play acting whenever he gets scraped by his opponent. That's not a good look for a CB.
Kola has had a solid match today. Get the feeling he could be a great role player if on a team where everyone else held their own and communicated well.
Anytime you can park the bus after going up 1-0 at home to the worst defensive team in the league you have to do it.
Auba's been super quiet today. To be fair, very little service came his way. Saka comes off for Torreira. Bakayo had a pretty good game I thought... a few moments of near brilliance. Where LT plays will tell us everything about how Emery is managing the last 10 mins.
They just waltz into our box. All the time. We are playing with fire. Can we hold on for the final 5 mins???
Arsenal don't seem to do well playing with a loan striker. Seems odd given the volume of quality support players on hand but they struggle to figure out how to coordinate the attack. To that end Auba could do better in staying central and forcing the issue during counterattacks. 5' extra time and Arsenal doing their best to live dangerously.
FT. 1-0. 3rd place... I'll take it. But we surely don't look like a 3rd place team. Meanwhile maybe Citeh supporters are saying the same about being a 2nd place team. As Wolves beats them at Eastlands! Crazy stuff.
Great result, clean sheet, dismal performance except for chambers who was massive. Just terrible passing through out, beaten for every second ball, not many chances created. Bournemouth deserve a point, Wilson should’ve scored instead of passed. At the end they were just bypassing our midfield from the fence straight into the box.
We were a little lucky to get a result today, but Pool look like the lucky bandits of the weekend. They steal 3 pts at the death on a very fortunate PK, while City drop all 3 pts. 8 pt gap at the top. On Oct 6th!
I'll take the win but a very uninspiring performance. Chambers and Kolsanic played well but we still looked poor overall in defense late and there was no creativity offensively. Xhaka is just a waste of space, and if this is Emery idea of how football should be played this is going to be a long, boring and inconsistent season.
Xhaka kept on fouling and fouling I was hoping he was going to get a yellow for cumulative fouls so he would at least be out the next game for his fifth yellow card of the season