By Walter Broeckx
A few changes as could be expected with the busy schedule we are looking at and some returns in the team. Özil started and also Kolasinac in the starting line up. Up front Lacazette and Aubameyang both starting. Torreira getting some rest and on the bench with Elneny taking his place. A back 4 in this match with Monreal playing on the left side.
Arsenal starting with: Leno, Maitland-Niles, Sokratis, Monreal, Kolasinac, Xhaka, Elneny, Guendouzi, Özil, Lacazette, Aubameyang.
On the beach: Cech, Lichtsteiner, Torreira, Ramsey, Iwobi, Saka, Nketiah
A good first attack from left to right ending with a low shot from Maitland-Niles that was saved by Hart and then a defender could block the rebound from Aubameyang. Burnely could counter and a striker one on one with Leno but he saved with his foot. A lively opening with only 2 minutes on the clock. Xhaka with a low shot from distance but Hart smothered the ball. A cross from Lacazette causes all kind of trouble in the Burnley penalty area with Elneny heading the ball towards goal but they somehow can clear the ball. Burnley trying the kick and rush aproach most of the time. Özil with a great ball to the far post and Kolasinac puts it back in front of goal and Aubameyang shoots it against the back of the net. GOAL! 1-0 to The Arsenal after 14 minutes.
Another good attack on the left flank after some 19 minutes with Kolasinac making a good run but Elneny couldn’t really control the cross and in the end Maitland-Niles with a shot but no problem for Hart. Burnley beying very physical and Friend letting them do so and so putting some pressure on Arsenal. Özil being rather targetted by the Burnley players. Arsenal as a result dropping their tempo letting Burnley back in the match again. Arseenal a few times being wasteful when they had good chances to start a quick attack on the rare occassions Burnley committed themselves forward. 1-0 after 30 minutes.
A little bit of handbags going on when Sokratis shields a ball out of play and when he gets wrestled down Barnes who held him by the neck it seems. A rugby tackle from the Burnley player that gets him a yellow card. After 38 minutes Monreal goes off and Lichtsteiner comes on. Blimey…. not what we needed. It looks like we go back to a back 3 with Xhaka dropping back in the centre? Sokratis gets a yellow card for pulling down Barnes. Xhaka with a back header to Leno who can pick up a ball from under his crossbar. Lacazette almost round the last man but the defender could play the ball out between his feet. Arsenal go in at half time 1-0 in front.
Leno has to rush outside the penalty area to head a deep ball awayq and he is being fouled by a high leg from Wood and a foul is given and a yellow card it seems. Burnley trying to put us under pressure and when Özil almost gives the ball away he and Guendouzi can win it back on the edge of the Arsenal penalty area. The ball goes to Kolasinac who runs his flank and then gives it to Lacazette who pushes it further to Aubameyang. Aubameyang runs a few meters and then hits the target with his shot. GOAL!! 2-0 to The Arsenal after 47 minutes!
Barnes then puts his knee in the back of Guendouzi…. foul is given but no card. That could have been his second card and he knew Goundouzi was in front of him so it was deliberate. Maitland-Niles the next victim of Burnley players being very physical. Both can carry on. Lacazette wins the ball in a promising position but Friend saw a foul…. It was being physical like Burnley did most of the time when nothing was given. Burnley get a free kick and all the Burnley players are offside but nothing is given but luckily Arsenal can clear for a corner. It is clear Arsenal cannot use their body at all at the other end Burnley can. Guendouzi gets a yellow card when a Burnley player goes down without contact…. After 58 minutes Elneny goes off and Torreira comes on.
Burnley kick left, right and centre… Aubameyang being tripped by Mee when Arsenal launch a promising attack. Torreira with the free kick but the ball goes over. Arsenal can’t clear the ball after a free kick and the ball ends up in front of Barnes who scores. 2-1 after 63 minutes.
Aubameyang wins the ball in midfield and it goes to Kolasinac but his cross was just behind Lacazette and Burnley can block the shot. Burnley now with a few promising attacks with too many room around our penalty area. Westwood again going in hard on Xhaka and the ref tells Burnley it has to end. You could end it with a yellow or second yellow card ref. Still 2-1 after 75 minutes.
After 77 minutes Lacazette comes off and Iwobi comes on. Lacazette clearly being not happy so that will be the talk in the media the next days I guess. Maitland-Niles gets a knock on the head after a free kick. a few replays showing that when Arsenal players go down without contact the ref gives nothing, Burnley players going down are given a free kick…. Özil on a rare Arsenal attack after Torreira with a great tackle but his cross is cleared. Sokratis with a good interception and launches the counter attack. Iwobi seems to lose the ball but Kolasinac pops up and gives a low cross but nobody at the end of the inviting ball. Arsenal attack again when Iwobi wins the ball in his own half. It goes ot Özil who runs and goes past two defenders and shoots. It is blocked and falls to Iwobi who with a hint of offside scores. Half a foot offside according to the TV who still do have that line. Not visible for the assistant I think. GOAL!!! 3-1 to The Aresnal after 92 minutes.
It was about hard work with Burnley players constantly on the edge of the laws with again a few casualties it seems. Let us hope we can recover a few players for the next games.
Good afternoon Walter (morning for me). Nice to see you following things.
I put this on the previous page, perhaps better here?
> The last commentary I followed (or one before that?), at one point it took the commentary 4 or 5 minutes to show that Arsenal had scored. This PEA goal took 2 minutes to show. I wonder what causes this?
COYG!
Monreal subbed by Lichtsteiner on 37m. Did he get kicked? Previous injury re-aggravated?
COYG!
Lots of empty seats, what will the media going to say about it?
Nice feeling to be ahead at HT!
Great counter attack goal
Yes, another goal to PEA! How to go Lacazette on that assist.
COYG!
Surely that’s a 2nd yellow and red card
Come on guys, get that goal back (or more than one).
COYG!
How to go Iwobi! And Bulldog’s prediction is now in.
COYG!
Bulldog got it spot on.
How I read the medja, is that Burnley injured Monreal. And there was no point in the commentary I was reading which points to what happened.
In reading about that, the medja mentioned that Rob Holding is out for the season because he ruptured his ligaments. That statement is inaccurate. Rob Holding did not rupture his ligaments. Some player on another team ruptured Rob Holding’s ligaments. Some player who was not disciplined for doing so. Very similar to Maitland-Niles at the beginning of the season.
A good performance by the team. Burnley tried to bully the boys but we gave as good as we got. My impression is that we have men on our team, now. Players like Socratis seem to love getting in the face of the opponent. It’s nice to see.
No mention of Barnes treading on Guendouzis chest? Surely should have been a 2nd yellow for the dirty b*****d.
Before the match Andrew wrote:
“We have Kevin Friend for the first time this season, I regard him as one of the referees least likely to show a rabid anti-Arsenal bias”
After the match the a Sky broadcast declared:
Sky
“If this game had been refereed differently do you think there would have been a different outcome”
Not very friendly towards Mr. Friend.
The reader can understand now why this professional official gets so few big games in the PL and won’t see the arsenal more then twice a season.
Tony that quote from Sky’s post match bias could be a headline!
“If this game had been refereed differently do you think there would have been a different outcome”
Absolutely.
Barnes would have been sent off and we would probably have won four nil.
Thank God that Arsenal won the match to return to the winning ways once again. It wasn’t easy for Arsenal to overcome the intimidating Burnley who attempted to play the thugs game against Arsenal in the match. But Arsenal who have to win this match kept their focus on winning it as Burnley were playing to the gallery by way of intimidating thugery in the game to get a result in the match which Arsenal denied them by playing a superior game in the match as against the inferior game that Burnley had on offer to play on the day.
Burnley come to the Emirates, knowing that they will be allowed to kick us all over the park. And then at the end of the game they accuse Arsenal of diving 3 times?
How does the league become so dishonest?
Exciting time for us Gooners as it’s looking to all happening unbelievably at the Etihad and at the Bridge, or are they not? What am I reading? I think I read something like: Man City 1 Crystal Palace 3 and Chelsea 0 Leicester City 1. All happening at 84 minutes in both matches. Hmmm.
Well done once again boys! A nice tonic to kickoff the Christmas Season for Gooners.
Gord
22/12/2018 at 2:42 pm
The PGMOL ‘baby’ who injured Holding is Rashford. He twisted his leg roung Holdings & pushed him, causing Holdings leg to twist and the Knee ligament to rupture. The incident occured near the touch line and all Arsenal got was a throw in. Typical PGMOL selective vision & the FA doing sweet FA dispite footage of the deliberate foul.
Sokratis was great but Kolasinac was definitely MOTM. No iffs ands or butts.
Ozil was ozil with 2 brilliant assists.
Had Ramsey been there as well we would have won comfortably .
Had to have a big laugh at the malcontents who were on the back of Kola when Wenger bought him and see how he has been for Arsenal since joining. The list of Wenger signing brillant players is getting long now which the Wobs discarded at the first instant but had to change there opinion lately.
The old Gaffer knew something surely.
The Wobs have no place to hide. Hahaha.
menace gord, the Holding assault was absolutely disgracefull. Rashford was obviously riled up mourinho/pulis style. absolutely despicable! I know it will have no repercussions and it saddens me. Today I thought the ref Friendly was not so bad. The first yellow for Barnes I thought was a bonus, pigmob considering. off course he could have doubled up on that but imo he did a rather decent job.
then sean dyche went completely Trump, twisting reality in a way the pussy grabber in chief would be proud of. read this and be very affraid that these sick clowns are taken seriously and soil and spoil the premier league https://www.theguardian.com/football/2018/dec/22/sean-dyche-accuses-arsenal-dives-absolute-cheating
Sean Dyche seems to be learning about PR tactics from Donald Trump. Projection and lies. Disgraceful for media outlets to give him a platform without fact checking.
Sean Dyce has gone down in my estimation. He sent his team out to kick and foul our players, then has the cheek to accuse us of diving. Ozil, Guendozi and Maitland-Niles were clearly targeted. If we had had a decent referee, they would have had at least one red card.
The danger is that teams will now regularly come to kick us knowing they will get off with it. More players will get injured, the commentators and pundits will continue to ignore it, and other managers will know if they make ridiculous accusations about diving, the commentators and pundits will make that the story. The fact that Guendouzi was clearly kicked was shown at the time but then never mentioned in the discussion afterwards or on Match of the Day. It is all very frustrating.
Anyway, we won!
I fear that too Pat. I don’t know whether I’ve just been missing a lot, but it definitely feels like the last four or five matches have seen a massive increase in dirty play, generally unpunished and uniformly underpunished. The media has always been quite astoninishgly bad at telling the truth, but if I’m now going to have to watch Arsenal be decried as a team of divers, I’m going to lose it. The media acted cheerleader as Leicester won the league by significantly thanks to their ability to win penalties by manufacturing contact, and blithely ignores that every single one of the players in Tottenham’s much lauded attack is expert at winning freekicks and penalties from thin air.
Teams coming out to kick Arsenal has been a theme for a long time. It was probably a theme before 😈 Mike Riley at ManU; but it has become a mainstay since 😈 Mike Riley started managing PGMO.
It is hard to imagine that The (sweet) FA, the Premier League and the PGMO are not colluding; but it is possible. As near as I can tell.
The (sweet) FA and Premier League have a policy about the officials being right (almost all the time). And to present anything to dispute this is charged with bringing the game into disrepute (or something to that effect).
So, let’s take Burnley’s claim of diving. Arsenal.com mentions nothing about officiating problems, as any mention brings the disrepute charge. Arsenal.com could provide evidence of contact (cuts, bruises) and show that those incidences only came from particular “collisions” in a game. But to present such evidence brings a disrepute charge from The (sweet) FA.
How does one break the cycle?
Man$ity: we are the most expensive team in the EPL. We want protection (and no discipline when we hack other teams).
ManU: we have been the most successful team in the EPL. We want protection.
Liverpool: we are the most successful team in the EPL this season. We want protection.
Spuds: we are the most successful team in London. We want protection.
The PGMO tilts the field during play. and The (sweet) FA tilts the field after.
How do you break the cycle?
With respect to ManU, Mourinho is an asshole. So that needs to be part of their PGMO performance this year.
Daily Vomit has an article with praise. But every issuance of praise must come with at leas tone slap.
Why both reading this shit?
Good-bye.
indeed Rodelero, couldn t agree more with all the points you make, for Arsenal it will be very very tough to break the cycle…
but we won !!!
WOO HOO, HOO !
A deserved 3 points against a team allowed so much of liberty to foul at will and inpunity.
But this season we are difficult to bully.
Good on yer guts.
Up the Gunners !
The Barnes knee in the back of Guendouzi is a straight red & it was seen by the assistant -clearly. Friend the PGMOL selected cheat for this match was his appalling self allowing the Burnley players carte blanche to wrestle, elbow, foul and abuse their positions on & off the field of play.
Barnes has to be investigated by the FA for serious foul play with intent to injure a fellow professional.
Sean Dyche should be done for bringing the game disrepute. His approach to everything football is physical contact and brute force. He does not have anything but hate for all things skillful.
Friend should be awarded December SpecSavers Man of Selective vision.
The knee in the back of Guendouzi can cause a serious injury. Such a foul on Neymar caused him to be taken to hospital with a fracture in his back at the world cup in Brazil