Robin van Persie meets Alex Song's pass to volley home the winner
Match Report | Highlights | Arsene’s reaction
Last week we blew away Spurs with a five-star, five-goal derby demolition. This victory at Anfield could not have been more different: we absolutely sneaked it. And, to me at least, it felt just as sweet.
That is in part because in recent months Liverpool have become a team I love to hate. The disgraceful conduct of the club and in particular their manager during the Luis Suarez affair have left a horrible taste in the mouth. As regards Suarez himself, the media’s fawning over his performances doesn’t seem to tally with his consistently wayward finishing.
That said, his movement certainly gave us plenty of trouble. Arsenal were able to start with the same XI that beat Tottenham, and we started the game in a worryingly similar fashion, with plenty of gaps in and around the defence. Fortunately, however, Liverpool’s poor form in front of goal continued, and in Wojciech Szczesny Arsenal had a goalkeeper absolutely determined to keep them at bay.
That was never more clear than in the 19th minute, when Liverpool were awarded a penalty after Suarez went through on goal. Upon first viewing, he seemed to throw himself over Szczesny without any contact. The super super slow-mo replay seems to illustrate a little bang of the shin-pads, but how the referee saw it through a crowd of players and just how such a tiny nick caused Suarez to fly up in the air still bemuse me.
Dirt Kuyt stepped up to take the penalty, but Szczesny flung himself brilliantly to his right to save. However, the ball fell back to the Dutchman, and it looked for all the world as if he would tap in the rebound, only for Szczesny to dive across goal to palm it away. It was a breathtaking display of athleticism and determination.
Szczesny was, therefore, predictably peeved when beaten shortly after by his own man, as Laurent Koscielny failed to sort his own feet out and scuffed Jordan Henderson’s whipped cross in to the near post.
At this point, Arsenal simply weren’t in the game. Our midfield trio seemed too disparate, and Liverpool were exploiting the pace with some the constant movement of Suarez and Kuyt. Then, from nothing, an equaliser. Bacary Sagna found enough space and time to whip in a delicious cross to the near post, and Robin van Persie got the wrong side of Jamie Carragher to nod past Pepe Reina for his thirtieth goal of the season.
With just over half an hour played, it was 1-1. At the same point in the Spurs game, we had given a much better performance yet found been two nil down. It is, as they say, a funny old game.
In the second half, Arsenal improved significantly. A long break in the game at the start of the second half for an injury to Mikel Arteta slowed Liverpool’s momentum, and Arteta’s replacement Abou Diaby actually put in a pretty effective 28 minutes, giving a powerful, precise display and showing little sign of ring-rust. Diaby himself was withdrawn shortly before the end with a possible thigh problem, but the early signs are that it was precautionary. As for Arteta, he has gone to hospital with a concussion, but the club are hopeful he’ll shortly be fully recovered. Fingers crossed for both players.
Liverpool conspired to miss more chances – Martin Kelly somehow miscued from six yards out – but as the game wore on Arsenal began to create opportunities on the break, especially after introducing the pace of Gervinho for the ineffective Benayoun.
Liverpool needed a lesson in how to take a chance, and they got it from Robin van Persie. As the game entered stoppage time, Alex Song picked the ball up thirty-five yards from goal. He hadn’t had a great game, occasionally overrun in midfield, but had already displayed his eye for a crucial pass with a scything through-ball for Kieran Gibbs that led to a chance for Theo Walcott. This time, he clipped a beautiful lofted pass in to the path of Robin van Persie. Just as against Everton a few months back, Van Persie took the shot on the volley. This time, however, instead of striking across the ball with his laces, he placed a side-footed effort inside the near post. Pepe Reina didn’t even move.
It was a magical goal. Some have called it ‘Bergkamp-esque’. It’s a huge compliment, but RVP is his own man, and this was pure Van Persie. He shares that talent that all great players have to foresee a scenario before it happens; the vision to see a goal before it is scored, and the talent to execute it to perfection. Pure brilliance.
Arsenal then saw out eight minutes of injury time, incurred by Arteta’s injury, with surprising maturity. Sub Alex Chamberlain even came close to adding a third with a rasping shot from the edge of the box.
Six points from games against Spurs and the scousers is a tremendous return, and if we can make it nine against Newcastle we’ll have given our chances of finishing in the top four a tremendous boost. As regards yesterday’s result, we owe plenty to key men at either end of the pitch: Wojciech Szczesny and Robin van Persie. Szczesny underlined his enormous potential with a match-winning display, and as for Van Persie? Well, we’re running our of superlatives. In fact, we’re well past that. We’re running out of ways to say that we’re running out of superlatives.
After the game, Sky saw fit to spend the majority of their ‘post match analysis’ discussing whether or not Van Persie would sign a new contract with Arsenal. Outside of a transfer window, I find such chat dull and pointless. As he’s stated many times, he’ll make his decision at the end of the season. In the meantime, it’s impossible to question his commitment to the cause. Last summer pundits were queueing up to say that he “wasn’t captaincy material”, but all season long he’s demonstrated that he’s a player determined to lead by example. His class was underlined by the fact he handed his Man of the Match champagne to Szczesny – a week after doing the same for Theo Walcott.
This win definitively puts Liverpool out of the race for fourth place – though for my money it’s been a straight fight between us and Chelsea for some time. As I type this, Chelsea have just been defeated by West Brom at the Hawthorns, making this a tremendous day for Arsenal fans. Fourth place is now officially in our hands. Gooners will be quietly hoping this defeat doesn’t seen Andre Villas Boas dismissed – he’s doing us plenty of favours at the moment.
There are still plenty of big games between now and May, and we’re all aware that a three point gap at this stage is only worth so much. What’s infinitely more valuable is the fight this squad are displaying: this was their fourth comeback in the space of little more than a month.
We’ve had some dark days this season. Let’s enjoy the good ones.
1st gun. Old skool!
i hope this one man team starts its free fall at the end of the season like they always do, if they can do it without van then they deserve it otherwise, just shutup. hoping roy keane could come out of retirement
You bitter little cunt
“hoping roy keane could come out of retirement” – what for to nobble RVP?
That’s evil, it’s like me saying I hope a gang of thugs knifes you tonight. Prick
Like ur conclusion.really good time.i don’t understand why some people like espnsoccernet and telegraph hate Arsenal.man u does it and they are class but when Arsenal do it, we don’t deserve it.crap.we will finish 3rd.
One man team?wat is the role of a striker?miss goals,defend goals or scores goals.?please come again.
Jih,or whatever ur name,shut up.those who dont appreciate odas dont expect good things in to come to dem.since u dont see anything good in arsenal,why dont u leave dem alone n watch those who play better.u wil eat ur words at d end of d season.
What a bunch of fags out here tonight. Nonetheless it was a brilliant game in which the defence showed unusual maturity especially in the second half. Of course our Goalkeeper was responsible for 90% of the credit. And RVP is on fire obviously. What a clean strike.! I personally feel from an Arsenal supporter’s point of view that if u can’t enjoy these kinda moments then the whole idea of supporting a club is lost.
right, good win by the lads but i’ve read on numerous websites comments from fans of other teams that now all of a sudden arsenal fans are warming up again to wenger. bollocks. i support the lads and hope each week that they can overcome wenger’s lack of tactics, planning for opposition, and general stubborness.
wenger has overseen a steady and sharp decline to the point where we now cannot stay within 4 goals of good but not great european teams like milan.
here’s hoping that we finish strong, qualify for the champions league and wenger steps aside.
again, great road win over pool even if we were outplayed.
Glass half full or glass half empty. 4th is like a trophy?? 3 wks ago, after losing to ManUtd and then Swansea and Sunderland, 4th was wishful thinking not to mention cutting down Spurs’ lead from 10 points to a possible 4.
I hope we finish in the top 4. A section of fans want Wenger out and wins against Spurs and Pool may mean we make the top 4 and Wenger continues in charge but the reality is he will still be in charge if we finish 5th or 6th.
If I had a magic wand, I would bring in Podolski, Cavani, Hazard & Verthongen. Imagine those 4 in the squad!
Nothing against Daymee, but its always strange to me how football fans only seem to want the players their club has been linked with. I can think of plenty of players not playing for Barcelona (and alike) and to whom Arsenal hasn’t been linked to I’d like at the club.
Pool out of it now. Chavs in self destruct. We have won four in the trot. I know there were times we looked pretty average and lost the midfield battle without doubt. But after spuds lose to manure, drop 2 at everton then we are going to be all over them. Our midfield needs a rest and we should accept we are out of Europe and give the tie to the kids so we can be in the cl next year. We are not turning over a four goal deficit against an Italian side. Leave it to the kids. Let make overturning spuds our priority and bring back st totts day!!!
Well said mnm! We want St Totts day more than the CL! I mean scoring 4 at home is possible but keeping a clean sheet is much harder. But we all know that Wenger won’t do that. He’ll put in a strong first team, make them run to death – and go out anyway, lose confidence and begin the decline again. Someone slap him.
You know if you asked the first team what they wanted, I bet they would all want to play to make amends for what happened at the San Siro.
Personally I have thought along similar lines – why bother, lets focus on the league – keeping our strength for the league surely must have crossed Wengers mind.
But equally – I am sure he and the players fancy their chances playing on the velvet that is the Emirates pitch. And I know I’ve entertained ever so briefly, the fantasy that we could do one over them.
The reality of course is that we will probably win the match whatever team we field – but I suspect we wont be able to score enough to make it through.
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Next week is Newcastle who struggled with a draw against Sunderland. Lets hope we can take all 3 points.
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Does anyone know how Arteta is recovering?
Hmm still bitter spurs trolls posting here. You better watch out loose to manu and your just 4 points ahead of Arsenal, so much for your egos thinking you could win the league. PS the gays that keep making out that buying players x, y and z for £200M will win things just look at Chealsea today… you even wanted boas as Arsenals manager what a bunch of morons.
Very accurate post GS. Only point I we differ on was diaby. He was really impressive for his first ten minutes, then diss appeared for the next 18. No doubt due to injury. But infuriatingly he does have some touches in his locker. That makem cunt certainly robbed us of a talent and the whole pl to be fair.
Mun….. this is probably the first time i’ve seen u being positive
What a way to nick it…!!!
Just to opine about van Persie – I believe he is an excellent striker who will stay forever at the Arsenal because he loves the club and he loves how his kids are growing up into little pommies.
The best environment for his kids would be Australia, which is the best environment for everyone. But a good substitute is England, where kids can watch Neighbours and Home and Away every night of the week and see what it’s like to be an Aussie kid in an Aussie suburb or beach town.
Still buzzing from the RVP volley! Mainly because i just saw the match on replay. You just know how it’s going to end when the cross came in.
We didn’t actually do enough in midfield, lots of tired legs. So like GS said, thankfully the players that sandwich them did well.
Suarez is just an irritating prick.
Good win
Looks like GS may have called it right after all. Predicted a top 4 finish, and we could be gunning for 3rd if United win today.
After the Milan defeat he even suggested we could get 3 successive wins, which to be honest looked even more ludicrously overoptimistic even by GS standards!
We rode our luck yesterday, and the Scousers are saying we were spawny. However, playing at places like Anfield and alike will see us under the cosh, so anything we get out of such games is a big bonus. I can remember us going there in the 90’s pre Wenger and always taking the lead with a Wrighty penalty or something, but then getting thumped 4-1 a few times.
The feelgood factor has returned after these 2 results. But this is how it will be for the next 2 seasons. Enjoy the occasional good result mixed in with the occasional disastrous result. No challenging for trophies, just battling it out for 4th place. And I think the majority of Arsenal fans are happy and willing to pay for this. Those of us who would like to see more ambition, will be told we are not proper fans and to go support Spurs.
Again, this summer there will be the talk of Podolski and Hazard etc that Wenger should buy, but a strong finish and top 4 place this season will see Wenger reverting to resting on his laurels again, with no significant investment. We all have our own opinions of how many signings we are away from challenging, but in my book we are miles away.
I may be a miserable twat for the negativity after such a great week, but it’s how I see things. Without Wenger’s stubbornness and frugality, this feelgood factor could be prevalent all season.
holy hell chelsea sacked avb….
Was def a good win and I for one am always happy when arsenal win but the team looked tired and our squad is so weak we are not gonna have anything left for Milan but to be honest I think they screwed that up with the most awful display from wenger yet in Europe .there are so many managerial mistakes it is not even funny .three of our so called star players are on the last fifteen months of there’d contract can anyone explain why this is actually happening baring in mind we have lost out bigtime previuosly and have obviously not learned a thing ….madness and rank I am afraid .tell me has diary played a reserve game yet as I was surprised to see him come on ….anyone would think with his injury record at least three reserve outing to get him in shape and used to playing would be simple common sense but oh no we chuck him straight back in and by surprise he gets injured again and god knows what that has done to him mentally but s we know wenger does not care to much as they have committed to using youth even though they have data that says bone development can suffer with guys between the age of 18-21 and can have serious long turn effect …. Think Ramsey who we have to play after a double leg break the year before because our squad is obviously strong enough but let’s be honest is there any goner out there who believes we have a strong enough squad? but our manager does even though he has been proven to be wrong seven times in a row and yet we are still asked judge me in may …which frigging may arsene ? No innovation ,no ambition but a good away win against a Liverpool side who look to be going in the right direction and will no doubt add to the current squad in the summer
weg… we also have the fine aussie drama winners and losers although its been shunted around the schedule in order to get over a 100 viewers…. mind its not as classic as prisoner cell block h,,,, which was and is an institution,,, of fine drama and plot lines that left us gripped week in week out,,,,, i can still here the midnight oil album in the background…..
villa boas has been laid off by by chelsea,,,,
im pleased for chesney,,, superb for the lad,,,
weg,,,do they still show prisoner down stairs?
RSPCA, I saw it a couple of times as a kid on rerun, but haven’t seen it for years. We’re all about watching sit-coms by Chuck Lorre these days.
Who would want AVB in charge of the Arsenal instead of Arsene Wenger?
Be honest!
Not me, but there are a few others I would take;)
Not me
apparently John Sitton has been linked with Pat Rices job.
We are doing well, but take it easy guys…the race is far from over. Our remaining fixtures in the league are:
Newcastle, Everton (A), A.Villa, QPR (A), Man City, Wolves (A), Wigan, Chelsea, Stoke (A), Norwich, WBA (A)
In at least 5 of those games, 3 points are not guaranteed at all. So would say even a top 4 finish (let alone overtaking Spurs) is still a huge task guys.
Pray that no big injuries come in (RvP in particular) and that the likes of Walcott, Ramsey & Arteta need to lift up their games and put in consitent performances.
And you can bet the rest of the season rests on the shoulders of our defenders & the form of RvP.
RVP has been a senseation over the last 12/14 months.
Behind only Messi and Ronaldo at the moment – his consistency has been unbelievable.
Not an Arsenal fan – but hope he stays. Would be a complete loss if he left the Premier League and it would be even worse if he went to City.
We need the league to stay competitive. Just look at the Spanish league – only two teams can win it year in, year out. where as in the English league there are potential 4 or 5 clubs that could put a string of results together and win it.
weg… i would take AVB onm the coaching staff… fella got a rough ride at chelse… deserved better!
I quite like RVB myself. I think he’s got the potential to be a great manager. He got shafted at Chelsea because he’s used to working with professional footballers, not Englishmen.
szcz
sag kos gibbs
ver
song ros
gerv theo
ox RVP
GO FOR IT…!!!
Only 3 def’s…. vermaelen as DM…. song more forward…. Ox and RvP together…!!!!
COME ON ARSENAL
We’ve won the CL Knock-Out Round Trophy for another year.
ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED!!!!!!!!!!!!!