96' Frida Manaam goes down off the ball. I missed it (watching 2 games and messaging at the same time) But it looks pretty serious as there are about 8-10 team/medical staff surrounding her. Edit: She comes off on a stretcher 7 mins later and Russo replaces her. Probably a severe injury but presumably NOT life-threatening like what happened to Lockyear, Ericksen et al.
HT of Extra Time 0-0 still Players are cramping. Including Lauren James after her last flubbed shot. She's perhaps at the top of the list of players I'd like to see cramping at this stage.
That's it!!!! 1-0 to the Arsenal. Back to back League Cup titles, defeating Chelsea both times. Take that Ms. Hayes. [She wouldn't even shake Jonas's hand] Stina Blackstenius is my POTM and not just because of her goal.
Yup there's been a lot spoken about that afterwards. I only caught the no-handshake at the end but not the other stuff that led up to it. I haven't watched it back (yet). Apparently there was discussion/decision pre-match about single-ball vs multi-ball. Chelsea wanted single, and Arsenal wanted multi. So near the end (when Chelsea was trailing?), Cuthbert went to grab a multi-ball and Jonas tried to block her, because her coach had said no multi-ball. Emma was really ticked off by that, and later called it male aggression or something. Thus the little finger shove she supposedly did, which one pundit called female aggression. Tempest meet teacup. p.s. I've never ever liked Hayes. Respected her yet, but liked her absolutely not. So the fact that she's coming to USWNT gives me lots of mixed feelings.
I'd been wondering about 2 late incidents in the cup final so I watched those back: 1. Frida Maanum: At 96' she looked to be moving & playing pretty normally, then she walked out of camera view and seconds later people were pointing and the game was stopped. On the ground she was on her side... not sure if that's how she fell or if someone turned her to prevent choking. Since then I've seen virtually no info (whether she lost consciousness, whether they had to do dfib, etc). The only thing I heard was shortly afterwards that she was stable and talking. And in the days since then I've seen virtually no reports, I guess that's because of strict medical privacy protocols in UK? Hopefully we'll get more info soon, so that it doesn't turn into something like Princess Kate. JK. Sending love Frida. 2. Cuthbert/Eidevall/Hayes: 121' Chelsea are suddenly losing and desperate. Arsenal boots ball high/far into touch. Cuthbert grabs another ball which Jonas protests because Chelsea wanted single-ball. He never touches Cuthbert from what I saw. If anything she comes after him, but any altercation they have seems all verbal. Hayes isn't really involved and not very animated at the time. After FT, Jonas goes to shake Emma's hand and she says something harsh to him and pushes his chest. He shakes his head incredulously. Shortly afterwards she calls his actions "male aggression" maybe twice. From the TV footage I think Eidevall comes out looking OK and Hayes looks like a very sore loser, and who seems to have been the only one to employ physical aggression.
Released yesterday: https://www.arsenal.com/news/update-frida-maanum "Following the incident during The FA Women’s Continental League Cup Final on Sunday, which resulted in Maanum being substituted at the end of normal time, she has undergone extensive testing and support from our medical team at Arsenal. The test results have been reviewed by two leading cardiologists and there are no obvious cardiac causes found from these thorough investigations so far. Frida has subsequently had a monitoring device fitted to record her heart function and will now undergo a progressive return to training protocol. Once Frida has been monitored for a full one-week period, her normal training will be closely reviewed and monitored, before a decision will be made on her returning to play. Due to her continued progression and assessment at Arsenal, Frida will not be joining up with the Norway national team for their forthcoming European Championship qualifiers against Finland and the Netherlands."
Directly after the men's game (at least they don't overlap this time!) is ... AWFC vs Bristol City Sunday 14 April 2024 Streaming on Paramount+ (and FAPlayer?) 1:45pm ET In Friday's presser, Jonas said that Frida can't make the squad this weekend but perhaps next week. Viv is also still short of being able to. Otherwise he was getting the Internationals back so he didn't quite know all of their fitness levels at that time. It's not a meaningless game, but pretty close to it. And one we really should be winning comfortably.
HT ARS 3-0 BRC Nice to see at least one Arsenal team that can beat up on a lesser team. TBF Bristol are basically relegated.
FT 5-0 Braces for Mead & Russo, plus Owen Gol. Shots: 32(12)-4(1) Completely and utterly never ever in doubt. Too bad there aren't games like this in the EPL.
HT AWFC 1-0 LCFC Mead with the goal. We’re not dominating as much as we really should be, considering the opponent. Time to turn the screws in 2T. But it’s no given. Zinsberger has had to make some of the better saves I’ve ever seen her do.
Normally I’d encourage you to tune in. But apparently the Arsenal.com feed has crapped. After the halftime show, I had video without PBP audio, so I decided to restart the stream. Big mistake… now I can’t get anything. So they’re on their own for 2T I’m afraid. Edit: somehow I got it back on via Youtube
FT ARS 3-0 LEI It took us until 74' to finally take control, open it up. With a beautiful and rare marauding run down the center by Catley who normally is our LB but today played a bit of CB & CM... set up a tidy finish by Russo. Then Mead bagged her second. Fox played another in a steady series of good matches for club and country. I think I heard she was voted POTM today. And along the way some poignant returns for Maanum (after her scary collapse several matches ago due to a heart issue), and Miedema (trying to overcome a setback from her ACL surgery last year) All in all, like the men, we did just what we needed to do this weekend. But unlike the men, it would take a gargantuan collapse by the 2 teams ahead of us to have even a prayer of challenging for the league... with only 3 games to go.
Today we played at Everton and it ended 1-1. I didn’t watch it, for a few reasons, including that it conflicted with the men’s pregame and first half. probably just as well, as it sounds like it was both uninspiring and disappointing. We took the lead at 80’ and then they equalized at 95’
Well the season kinda fizzled, BUT there's a match tomorrow AND it has some significance... Man City Women vs Arsenal Women Sunday 5 May 2024 TV: CBSSN, Streaming: FAPlayer? 9:15am ET 2 games left. We no longer have a chance for 1st place but we could still throw a spanner. But I'm conflicted a bit. If we beat City we give Chelsea a small lifeline to try to overtake them, but we also give ourselves a small lifeline to pip Chelsea for 2nd place. Hmm... And even though Emma Hayes is about to head up my beloved USWNT, I still wouldn't mind sticking it to her while she's still at CFC. (I respect what she's achieved but I'm really gonna have to suppress my dislike of her when she comes stateside... not unlike how I would have to do that for Bruno G if Edu signed him)
17’ Citeh 1-0. One step closer to the title. And for the first time that I’ve noticed, they’ve filled their little 5K stadium. And generally out sung by our away crew.
93’ Stina with another! Super sub! Super duper. Can we complete Citeh’s collapse? Ending their record winning streak at 14? COYG!!!!
FT MC 1-2 ARS Now it’s clear, to me anyway… we need Chelsea to lose and we pip them for second, completing a truly horrible ending for the Emma Hayes era. We won’t have to wait long to know.
Extremely unlikely. But ya neva know. ps. One nice feature of our win today was that our two goals were made by Jonas’s four 2T subs.