In a sublime night of football, Arsenal rode their luck before annihilating Leicester 3-1.
The win makes it 10 wins in a row for the Gunners, seven on the spin in the Premier League. It was such a nice display on Arsene Wenger’s 69th birthday, but who were the winners and losers?
Winner: Mesut Ozil
Tonight, Mesut Ozil said no more. Tonight he took aim at the critics and haters and bludgeoned them all with that beautiful brain of his. Leicester City were his unfortunate victims; not through any malice or vendetta, they were just the unlucky souls placed in the bath of a force of nature, a genuine phenom.
Mesut Ozil was magnificent against Leicester. In many ways it’s as though this current squad has coalesced, through Arsene Wenger’s late scrambles to add quality and Unai Emery’s love of attacking right-backs and tactical intelligence, into an ideal team for the German.
He first illuminated the game with an extended one-two with Héctor Bellerin, playing the ball out wide before pushing forward into the box and scoring with a deft finish that could only be described as Messi-esque in its effortless elegance, not so much shooting a low cross from Bellerin in, but simply deflecting it, using a seemingly superhuman understanding of angles to just know where to put his ball. And with a blink of an eye, it was 1-1.
His second magic act was perhaps his most mundane, picking the ball up about 30 yards from goal he looked up and threaded a pass behind the brilliant Ben Chilwell. The English left-back had been one of the game’s standout performers but Ozil paid no attention to that and made him look like a rank amateur. Héctor Bellerin collected the pass and squared it for Aubameyang, 2-1.
Then his crowning glory, halfway up the pitch Ozil flicked the ball back and then with Bellerin out on the right looking infield, Ozil made a darting run forward. The Catalan played the pass in but, rather than control it, Mesut Ozil – as though he could see the future – stepped over the ball and continued running forward into the box. Alexandre Lacazette was stood behind him, and knew just what to do. He played the ball back into the path of Ozil and the German, with the outside of his left-foot, clipped the ball across for Aubameyang to score his second.
Pure, molten genius. The deftness of touch to move it across with that technique was just so good if you didn’t like it you have to either be a Spurs or Leicester fan. Or maybe certain members of the German national set-up. Ozi even put it on a plate for Lacazette only for the striker to miss. He left the field with 10 minutes left to a standing ovation. Captain Mesut Ozil, Arsenal’s greatest artist since Thierry Henry.
Loser: Referees
It’s becoming a running joke, but why on earth doesn’t the Premier League have VAR? This isn’t even a criticism of referees for making mistakes; every official makes mistakes they’re only human and their job is very hard. That’s why any chance to aid them with technology should be embraced, not neglected.
Tonight Leicester were the ones left seething as a frankly blatant handball from Rob Holding went unpunished in the first-half. If given, the spot-kick (surely a goal given Jamie Vardy’s record vs. Arsenal) would allowed the first-half to tilt almost wholly in Leicester’s favour, which given that the Gunners equalised and then blew Leicester away in the second half, seems pretty significant.
The 2018 World Cup showed exactly what was possible with VAR. Is it a perfect system? No, not yet. But is it a superbly well thought-out tool that can and does make referees lives easier and allow for games to simply progress on their own merits rather than be propelled forward by errors in officiating? Yes. Yes it is.
Winner: Héctor Bellerin
The handsome Catalan has long been ridiculed for his poor defending and general lack of game intelligenc (and alright tonight he could have defended better for Leicester’s goal, although he was so unlucky with the deflection) but it has always been clear that Bellerin is a superb talent who simply needed better coaching. Enter Unai Emery.
Bellerin has spent just three months with his new coach but already the difference is apparent. Bellerin’s forward runs now come with more frequency and also better judgement. He directs his pace into better zones and, more impressively, uses the ball with minimalist precision. All three goals tonight involved his touch and he ended the night with two assists.
Unai Emery made Aleix Vidal, a player about one third as talented as Bellerin, into a top-class right-back at Sevilla. Just imagine what he can do with a talent like Bellerin. The sky is literally the limit for this sartorial master with a superb grasp of social issues and a delightfully weird accent. A footballing Wes Anderson character. #iconic
Loser: Kelechi Iheanacho
It seems weird given that the match ended up being an artistic bloodbath worthy of Mandy, with Mesut Ozil in the starring role, but when the match began it looked like Kelechi Iheanacho could, perhaps should, have been the one to define the game.
The Nigerian looked like he had too much physical power and intelligent movement for the Arsenal defence early on. He would bully them whenever he had the ball, but whenever he had a chance to shoot on goal he absolutely fluffed his lines. Had he taken his early chances, Leicester could have been well ahead by the time Mesut Ozil began his magic act.
Winner: Unai Emery
For the first hour of this game, Leicester gave Arsenal one hell of a fight. In fact one could argue that Leicester should have been ahead, having been denied a penalty by a bad refereeing decision. But on the hour Unai Emery made a bold couple of changes, bringing Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang and Matteo Guendouzi on, moving Granit Xhaka to left back(!)
The switch paid off; with the pace of Aubameyang as a weapon off the ball as well as Guendouzi moving the ball with more speed, Arsenal began to cut through Leicester at pace. Within six minutes of coming on, Aubameyang had scored twice and the game was virtually over. The match petered out from here, and his players will obviously take the credit, but Unai Emery’s impressive coaching and bold substitutions turned the game in the Gunners’ favour.
Loser: Spurs
Spurs have made their best-ever start to a season, winning seven games and losing just two. They have scored 16 goals and conceded 7. They haven’t played well, but they’re getting it done and that’s all that one could ask for, right?
Well, their eternal rivals Arsenal, the team that started the league season with two straight defeats and often defend like a collection of drunk toddlers trying to tapdance, are ahead of them in the table (albeit just on goal difference thanks to their impressive 22 goal scored).
That’s gotta sting, right?
The post From Ozil to Iheanacho: The major winners and losers as Arsenal beat Leicester 3-1 to extend winning run appeared first on Squawka News.
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