By Walter Broeckx
Arsenal made 3 changes compared to the team that started the last match.
Flamini came back in the team in the place of Chambers and Koscielny took back the place of Gabriel. At left back Monreal came in the team again in the place of Gibbs.
The team that started: Cech, Bellerin, Mertesacker, Koscielny, Monreal, Flamini, Ramsey, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Ozil, Walcott, Giroud
On the beach: Gabriel, Gibbs, Iwobi, Reine-Adelaide, Ospina, Chambers, Campbell
A first dangerous cross from Bellerin but a defender can clear for a corner in the first minute. Bellerin again away on the flank but the Ox was too much out of balance to put it over the line. Two good chances in the opening minutes. After a corner there is a great deal of confusion in the Newcastle penalty area but Arsenal cannot capitalise. Walcott just can’t find enough room to get in a shot. Nice one touch football from Arsenal leading to another corner but no end result. So still 0-0 after 15 minutes.
Cech then had to be alert for the first header from Newcastle but he could push away the first header and hold on to the next shot. Taylor now for some 18 minutes ignoring any possible foul in favour of Arsenal but quick to punish every single one from Arsenal. Perez with a shot that goes wide. Arsenal not more as dominant as in the opening minutes. Still 0-0 after 30 minutes.
Oxlade-Chamberlain with a counter after a corner but Theo cannot control the ball when he gets it back from Ramsey in a promising position. Newcastle already taking lots of time to bring the ball back in to play each time. Colback bringing Giroud down when Arsenal start a counter and gets a deserved yellow card for his foul. Oxlade with a fine run, a pass to Giroud but a defender can just divert his shot in to a corner. Bellerin then with a bad pass in to the feet of Mitrovic but Per stays calm and heads the ball that bounces around to Cech. Mitrovic with a overhead kick but straight at Cech. Ramsey with a bad interception forcing Cech to make a brilliant save. Özil with a free kick in extra time but nobody at the end of it. So after a good start Arsenal drifted a bit in and out of the match in the first half and we go in the dressing room with a 0-0 score.
Cech with a great stop when Newcastle break and Wijnaldum one on one with our keeper but he makes a great stop. At the other end Giroud cannot make enough contact with his head to put the ball over the line. At the other end Mitrovic misses from close range. The match suddenly wide open in the opening minutes of the second half. Ramsey with a low sliding effort… not even 5 minutes in the second half…
Meanwhile Taylor giving every decisions very consistently against Arsenal when possible. Koscielny with a little pass to Giroud whose lobb is deflected but Taylor gives a goal kick… Still 0-0 after 60 minutes.
Every Newcastle player going down gets a free kick from Taylor who sees his chances of screwing us over getting bigger and bigger. A few free kicks for Newcastle pinning Arsenal back for a while. Arsenal players feeling what is going on and getting a bit frustrated. Losing concentration on the match is a known result from blowing only fouls from one team. After Newcastle really overdoing it with time wasting the ref finally gives a yellow card.
After 68 minutes Campbell comes on for Oxlade-Chamberlain.
Arsenal get a corner, Özil takes, Giroud heads it on after defender looped it high in the air and Koscielny came from behind a defender to push the ball over the line. GOAL! 1-0 to The Arsenal after 72 minutes.
Another corner for Arsenal but the shot from Monreal is blocked by Newcastle bodies. Monreal then with a cross that causes danger but the shot from Theo goes over. Amazing how quickly Newcastle can restart now after a goal kick….
Mitrovic at the other end with a header but over. Gibbs comes in on in the place of Walcott. Flamini gets a yellow card for a high foot, no complaints there. Taylor continuing to give fouls for each Newcastle player going to ground. Newcastle get a corner but Wijnaldum heads it over.
Arsenal with a good attack but the cross shot from Bellerin is punched away by the keeper and Newcastle can clear. Ramsey with a shot but again the keeper can stop it. Final substitution for Arsenal when Giroud goes off and Chambers comes on.
Ramseys sends Giroud away and gets it back, dribbles past the last man and misses the goal… And a minute later Özil with a low shot but again the wrong side of the post. Taylor then giving the first 50/50 to Arsenal in extra time. Wonders do happen. But with only a 1-0 anything can happen and Cech is on hand to stop an effort from De Jong in the final seconds.
Not the prettiest of wins but a big win after a very hard Christmas period. We get 9 points out of 12 and with Leicester not being able to win against Bournemouth we now have a two point gap between us and the team in 2nd place.
An ugly win, dug out in difficult circumstances.
That’s what champions are made of isn’t it?
Or maybe that’s just when other teams do it?
Well done lads.
COYG
Listened to David Hillier on Arsenal.com.
Clearly a narrow win, with Newcastle playing well. However, also clear that ref was ignoring fouls against us and awarding imaginary fouls to them.
Quinn on SKY:
“I still don’t think Arsenal BELEIVE they can win the PL.”
So you cant criticise Arsenals results so lets start criticising what there thinking.
You couldn’t make this shite up.
Another clean sheet for Chec. 3 points for the Arsenal & almost the 5 yellow cards.
BBC headline ‘Unconvincing Arsenal’. Niall Quinn – Arsenal doesn’t seem to want to win the premiership. Your report tells the true story, Walter. A dogged opponent and a biased referee. But we still won and are two points clear at the top. That’s what matters. Well done the team!
Yes, congratulations on the clean sheet Petr!
I seen one nice comment about Ozil during the game. Someone was surprised he can still handle the ball in the rain.
—
I seen a surprising comment out of the ManU game.
> “I thought Lukasz Fabianski had scored right at the end. It was a great header.”
“almost the 5 yellow cards”?
Pat
or an alternative headline could be:
BELLOW PAR ARSENAL DIG OUT CRUCIAL WIN
Oh no, that’s only when United or Chelsea do it. Silly me.
Three hard won points this afternoon. Thought Taylor had a better first half than second but never honest. The Newcastle keeper should definitely have been booked for time wasting. We rode our luck at times but surely I more than any other Championship winner does at times. No assist forÖzil today – back to nicking a living I guess.
Gord
Yep. He went up for a last minute corner and put it just wide with the last touch of the game.
Surprising that Newcastle started timewasting at a point when they were on top and looking likely to score.
This is how desperate they were not to lose when they had a good chance to win.
A win with A.Taylor in charge doing his best to prevent it, hopefully that means we can win it this year!
If only Fabianski had scored and today would have been perfect!
Ozil was shadowed throughout the game and had little room and time.
I don’t know but most if not all teams go through a blip.
Hopefully Arsenal can continue the epl charge.
I leave all the predictions about easy games to the FFM and the journos.
In this league you have to earn every point; this is not Spain or Germany.
We already know that any team can beat another so you have to be on your game. This is why the term ‘winning ugly’ came into being primarily in the English game. Arsenal won another home game, even though not at their best. They won ugly – something that is usually praised. How many times have Arsenal been criticised for not being able to win these types of games? Yet when we do, we get criticised! Arsenal and our Manager can never win, the agenda is key.
Please ignore Matt le Tissier – he was a boyhood Spurs fan so he’s just being mischevious.
In fact ignore the media, the pundits and the AAA – that was an excellent 3 points and a real banana skin. Anyone who doesn’t see that should stick to their Fantasy Football Addiction and then wonder why their bookmaker is richer than them.
We are top of the league…..!!
Poor performance tonight and a very frustrating match, the team looked tired maybe reserving energy for Sunderland and Liverpool match. We grind it out and won that’s more important than the poor performance. Two points clear at the top. Hopefully Watford beat ManC and we be 6 points clear of them.
This was a nervy game that panned out exactly as I thought it would before the match started. Newcastle have been very good in the last few weeks but have often been let down by poor marksmanship in front of the opposition goal and bad luck in front of theirs. I thought my fears were unfounded when we started brightly but Newcastle weathered the storm for the first 10 minutes and soon started taking the game to us. This is perfectly natural in a competitive setting.
It is nonsense on the part of the commentators knocking our hard fought victory and some of our fans (e.g. Serge here) piling on.
Newcastle are fighting for their survival and would naturally give it their all. Had we taken our chances created in the first 10 minutes of the game, this might have ended as another goal-fest in our favour. Nonetheless, we did enough to claim 3 points. We weren’t lucky. We were rugged and stuck with it till we got our goal and we defended resolutely to maintain it.
What else is the team expected to do?
Congrats to the team all the positively supportive everywhere.
18 games to go; Come on Arsenal!!!
Quick write up Walter and it’s 1-0 to the Arsenal. Read somewhere on twitter that score line was the 100th 1-0 to the Arsenal in the premier league.
Aside, it seems the Manchester united lap dogs finally got something to glory about since the beginning of their woes. The media celebrating Rooney’s goal as the premier league second highest goal scorer.
Having read Fishpies analysis of how much is needed to win the league and optimistic side of me doing my own analysis…. And targeting 50 points in the remaining 19 games, and now a hard fought 3 points won.,
Come on gunners 47 more.
Serge – I predicted 5 yellow cards as bet of the day.
Good job Walter. We got exactly what Andrew predicted in his Referee Preview – a terrible, biased performance from Mr. Taylor. Disgraceful. Just glad no one was injured by the Newcastle “aggression”. This is a very good win on a tough day. The conditions were atrocious and yet not one commentator or even blogger has mentioned how much this affects the skill players. Contrary to what you have heard from the media during and after the match, Arsenal slogged through, never quitting in the challenges, tracking back and trying to make something happen. They took the points. As others have stated, if it were a media darling team and not Arsenal they would be praised for winning this kind of match. But, of course, they’re criticised. Remember ‘boring, boring Arsenal’? How about boring, boring media, boring, boring experts. And same old, same old refereeing.
Ooops Watford score 1 – 0 v Man City
Don’t mind critics like Caraghar,Owen and all other media pundits out there….its 1-0 to the Arsenal and we are wining the epl this season we are the best team in the epl now.
Menace
Right, I get it. Almost correct
1 – 0 to the Arsenal – never in doubt! 🙂
A very hard fought win against a determined Newcastle and one of the more insidious members of the PGMO. A very valuable three points – well done the team and manager.
We look a bit tired these days – look forward to the return of the ebullient and effervescent Sanchez!
Manchester city is slugging it out with Watford, but it’s looking like their porridge is becoming super watery
1-1 Toure gets one back.
1-1
Tough final 10 minutes for Watford I fear.
As I say that 1-2 City
Aguero gets a second for City. Great goal. So we have competition from the oilers.
I just visited the match report at Arsenal.com, and Privacy Badger warned me that the page is tracking people with SoundCloud now. Or, it is trying to.
Funny how despite being outplayed for 82 minutes, Man Citys late win has earned them praise and claims of ‘thats what Champions do’. If that had been us, we would have been slaughtered and called lucky. The Newcastle win has shown up the double standards.
I read Wenger’s interview at Arsenal.com, and I am more convinced that this Elneny transfer is a non-story. Or rather, it is all a fiction created by some medja person who needs to find a new job as a janitor.
But, it was funny to read that Wenger doesn’t know if he has ever made any good signings, because all the press harps about are how bad all of his signings are.
I don’t really bother what the “experts” say any more. We could have won 10-0 and they stil would hve started with their “Happy Roo Year” shit!
City were rubbish and managed a win because of weak refereeing nd Watford’s tiredness in the last 10 minutes.
Finally, if the media is represented by some idjut whose vocabulary is 95% the term “Irm” – then there really is no point to them!
I went to church today and it was full of the aaa, their media hacks and lovers and distraught former player pundits on their scrawny knees, praying and screaming to their respective deities to smash the Arsenal, destroy every AFC Gunners’ career and damn Wenger to eternal 4th place in the EPL……they are so fearful that we’ll actually win it all and devastate their comfortable negativity that they have descended into revisionist wishlists.
Just back after a day at the Arsenal.
I think I shall build a directory of football telepaths – the people who know what we are thinking, and the people who know what we will be thinking next month.
Tony
bias like liars,
meddlesome media mewing moanings
may May meander to May
And Arsenal and Arsene
Grinning outside the Green Boulevard of Islington
While Spurs spare us the Guard of Honour
As we gallivant with EPL silver cup , sorry Trophy
While the Riley is riled to see Dean and Taylor
tuning after the motorcades to touch the boots of King Ozil
and Carrager scrambling for the autograph of Cech the Czech
The aaa hiding under the underground ,
pretending to wait for train hooded in winter hoods
but The AKBs strutting like Conquistadors the earth have never seen.
Bring on May.
Love from Nigeria
Interesting to see that in our last 2 matches we had 2 important goals from defenders
Taylor tried every trick in the book to screw us, and failed.
Very vital three points. Sounds like we were below our best, these can be the most telling of wins in the grand scheme of things.
Newcastle should not be underestimated, they have beaten two media darlings in recent weeks, and they would have taken great encouragement from the officiating by the sound of it.
Glad we signed Cech
Another plus, the points we have accumulated should mean we will not be relegated this season.
Oh Dear, A. Taylor.
You tried so hard to screw the Arsenal with INCOSISTENT reffering, the most odious one. But you failed miserably.
Sorry to see that Moss tried and succeed to screw in the S’oton game and before in Norwich game too. He had just perfect record of Arsenal wins in his matches, so he tried to change that. To get some monkeys of his back. What a miserable man he is!
It is great to see Arsenal win that kind of matches, but not so great to see such poor play form first eleven players.
Ozil has at least one of Coloccini, Tiote or Colback on his heels for the most time of the match. But most of the time both the 2 midfielders.
Theo, Ramsey, Ox could not capitalize on that. Both Ramsey and Flamini lacked discipline to protect the back four.
Thanks To Petr Cech for clean sheet, it enabled Arsenal the win.
Thanks God McLaren went really wild and subbed BOTH Tiote and Colback. After that Arsenal could catch up with created chances, because there was no real midfield protection left in front of Newcastle defence. Really bad stuff from Newcasle manager.
It seams that Arsene failed to choose the best eleven for this match. Koscielny and Monreal were somewhat rusty. Flamini has not much left in the tank for running around, Walcott is still away from his best form. Ox is out of form completely. Just one good action with dribble which followed feeding Giroud is simple not good. Some bad fouls to that. Campbell went to improve on that with good defensive and offensive output.
But maybe there will be something good from that minutes spend on the pitch by Ox. A tiny bit of hope still remains, but really tiny. He tried too hard.
Now he only managed to piss of Ozil. Mesut could teach him some lessons how to use the brain more too than just legs.
If only players could rest enough (and at least Alexis could come back) for the combo away games at Anfield and at Brittania… It can be so great if Arsenal could get more than 2,33 points average gain from next 3 matches during last 4 saisons. It me be the most significiant call for championship if Arsenal manage to win at least 2 of the 3 remaning January EPL fixtures. I can’t wait for that.
Personally, I thought Flamini was superb… Apart from Cech (MoM), our best player…
After compact attacking for about 10 mins, we became a little panicky when Newcastle got braver, but stuck in there with some good defending and GKing later taking the goal.
The ref was trying hard not to be obvious but ended up being just that and probably frustrated that he did not manage to stop Arsenal, still 3 more points and that’s what we need.
They had Theo and Bellerin well marked and cancelled them out which is why it was no surprise that Kos scored, Kos who was always trying to make something happen.
Well done lads, who’s next, oh the FA cup, hope to see some youth play.
Some of the medja have nothing better to do than see who posts to twitter.
Anyway, apparently David Seaman and Kanu twitted about the game. Both positive, which was nice to see. I hadn’t seen twits by Kanu mentioned before.
WOO HOO , HOO ! A very , very hard fought win , but the 3 points are most welcome . And never going to be relegated this year , and the Foxes are also safe !Man City are almost there !
After watching the game from two different cable streams , with both so biased commentary that I went back to muting the sound and enjoyed the silence more ! Anyone listening in would have thought that the final score was 1-3 !
How nice if at the end of today’s matches , we have twice the points as last year’s champions ! And the Spuds stay just still !
Can’t we have a “we don’t want Anthony Taylor” petition?
Even better would be a ‘PGMO is past its sell by date’ petition. We want new officials reporting directly to the FA. No more Limited companies that hide all their business.
After a few games without much joy , many of ‘them’ must be at their wits end ( is there a pun in there somewhere ?) ! All their predictions of doom and gloom are getting unraveled pronto .
And those daily quotes from the classics are quite biting them right up their arses ! Before they do the unthinkable , let them give pause and read this fine article , titled ,
How to maintain a healthy relationship when you are depressed by Lisa Esile at
http://tinybuddha.com/blog/how-to-maintain-a-healthy-relationship-when-youre-depressed/
We do this with a public interest view and in sympathy with their grieving and suffering families and pets ! And windows , and doors, but definitely not their wrought iron gates !
She starts with these quotes –
“Love isn’t a state of perfect caring. It is an active noun, like struggle. To love someone is to strive to accept that person exactly the way he or she is, right here and now.” ~Fred Rogers
“Beware of the half truth. You may have gotten hold of the wrong half.” ~Unknown
When you’re depressed, your perception about many things changes—so how does this affect your relationships?
When you’re depressed you can’t access feelings of self-love. And since the love you feel for others is a reflection of the love you feel for yourself, this is why you feel disconnected.
When you don’t understand what happens when you’re depressed and you listen to everything your depressed mind says, you can cause havoc in your relationship.
Sharing with a loved one and/or health professional that you’re feeling depressed can be hugely helpful, and something I highly recommend.
Rather than respond to all the rubbish your mind is telling you, it can be more useful to take a step back and just notice what you’re thinking.
But what if this isn’t just me being depressed; I mean I shouldn’t tolerate being treated badly?
So how do you honor yourself when you’re depressed and give yourself the love and kindness you need without blowing up an otherwise loving relationship?
1. Don’t believe everything your mind says.
2. Don’t make assumptions.
3. Connect with your loved one over the bigger picture.
4. Know that your mind is very convincing.
5. This time will pass.
Please read it many times ,or slowly , or with the Google translator to understand it better . Talk to your elders , learn wisdom from them .
Next we shall try to help ‘them’ to cope in the future with a series of self help articles for dummies , beginning with , ” Success – how to deal with it.”
“Funny how despite being outplayed for 82 minutes, Man Citys late win has earned them praise and claims of ‘thats what Champions do’. If that had been us, we would have been slaughtered and called lucky. The Newcastle win has shown up the double standards”
Proudkev
But it’s true. that IS what champions are made of.City look like making this an exciting finish.I remember a famous two very late goals against Man U at Highbury to secure a rare double. We were deservedly praised, and still would be.
I get the impression that you don’t really want us to be praised, and resent it when we are.
That win gave me a lot of joy. Also a great example of what goals do in games now.
I don’t think Newcastle were bus parking yesterday, they seemed fairly positive and to commit some numbers to attacks, and yet look what happened when, a goal down, they really committed numbers to attack : no more good chances for them; one great one, one good one, a couple more close things for us.
Another great demonstration of the importance of the first goal and how dramatically it alters the look, feel and action on the pitch.
Pretty big bugbear of mine is when, after a good win, where we score a few and (especially once ahead) create lots of good chances with exciting football, people lament us failing to do that the next time we are struggling in a game, as though there’s been this tremendous and inexplicable crash in our performance.
What’s normally happened is just that the first goal didn’t come, the opposition therefore continued to sit and hope for a break and the lovely spaces for us to break into therefore never emerged.
Doesn’t excuse us playing badly or mean that yesterday’s ropey performance till the goal should be considered better than it was, but I believe if fans appreciated the vast difference between the football we are likely to play, thanks to space, once ahead, as opposed to drawing or, gulp, being behind, there’d be a lot more patience with the team.
It doesn’t half increase the tension for me when the scores are level, and put me in a bad place if we go behind, but…it’s pretty exciting, and once ahead, that’s when the really beautiful stuff, with, say, Ozil and Ramsey breaking in space and only 2 or 3 defenders tends to happen.
Yesterday was a bit ominous in the City game, because that sort of comeback seems the sort of thing we’d need to do once or twice to win the league, and we’ve not been good at them for quite a while; but just like we’ve massively improved in big games, maybe that can be the next big step.