Aston Villa 1 Arsenal 2
Ominous vibes going into this one. Villa were 11/3 to win with some bookmakers, after beating Blackburn for their fourth win on the trot.
Arsenal, a sequence team, facing the first game after a loss and with doubts over Fabregas were being heavily backed in some quarters to lose.
Villa look a physical outfit, with Laursen, Melberg, Bouma, Barry. Carew, has damaged Arsenal in the past -he got the better of Tony Adams in Valencia, 2001 to knock them out of the Champions League. Reo-Coker the physical breaker in midfield, however was banned for this one.
Main tactic – get the ball up to the Norwegian who would either spread it wide or knock it on for Young or Agbonlahor.
Arsenal had a good start. Eboue had a shot over.
Villa replied, with strong physical stuff, with Young firing wide from the edge of the area on six minutes.
Hleb who looked in sparkling form dribbled to set up Adebayor who offloaded to Rosicky who shot wildly wide.
Rosicky sent a ball through the heart of the Villa midfield to Hleb, who should have shot, but dawdled.
Adebayor’s touch was letting him down with three or four mis-controls or mislaid passes.
However – the hit and miss forward set up a one-two with Flamini who drove wide.
On 14, Carew ran down the left channel, his cross deflected off Toure, bounced up, Gallas knocked it into Gardner’s path who stole a march on Clichy and sidefooted it home.
Arsenal, undeterred, carried on playing their way. Most of Arsenal’s play was coming down the right and on 24, Eboue found himself with space and cut it back into theVilla area. It was behind Rosicky, who touched it into space. Flamini‘s will power enabled him to get to the ball ahead of Laursen, and he fired a left foot piledriver past Carson.
Hleb set up Flamini in the area. But instead of hitting it first time with his right, waited for his left, as Laursen slid in to clear.
Eboue cut in from the right and set up Rosicky, who fired straight at Carson.
Hleb was running the show, by now. There were flashes of dominance similar to the Reading game. And a neat triangle between the Beloroussian, Eboue and Sagna, saw the Frenchman hang a cross.
Adebayor hung in the air above Laursen and Melberg and powered a header past Carson. A real centre forward’s goal, with precision and power. A wierd, Togo influenced head touching celebration with Eboue, followed.
Toure then set up Diarra who fired over.
Villa upped the ante, after O’Neill‘s half-time team talk, which wouldn’t have done his England chances any harm. They certainly got more aggressive.
Arsenal reacted to some flashpoints, with Eboue appearing to raise an elbow at Bouma.
Gallas got yellow carded for “saying something out of turn”.
Then Carew sliced down Helb who was bearing down on goal. A cynical foul, deserving of yellow. But Hleb – Arsenal’s best player had to withdraw. Walcott came into the left with Rosicky moving to the middle.
Carew was winning high balls against Gallas and Toure with worrying and consumate ease. From one cross he outjumped Gallas and smacked a firm header against the bar.
Soon after, a scramble in the Arsenal area, created by the Norwegian, saw Laursen slide it wide.
Gilberto came on for Rosicky to protect the increasingly beleagured defence – and did make a diference, mopping up some loose balls. Diarra was getting caught out more and more.
Some of the poor first touches and miscontrol from Eboue, Walcott and Adebayor was worrying in the later stages, but Toure, Gallas, Clichy, Sagna, Flamini and Diarra were dogged to the last and held out for all three points.
Arsene Wenger said: “The first half we were amazing. We were classy and played the game we want to play. Quick, sharp. In the second we were resilient and showed commitment and calm. We dealt dealt well with the pressure we had to take.
“We were tested today. We were one-nil down against a team of quality, and came back.
“Helb was stunning in the first half. We missed him in the second. I don’t know how bad the injury is. He’s got a kick on the achilles. He will be short on Wednesday.
“It was a bad tackle by Carew. Our behaviour was quite good. We put no unfair pressure on referee.”
Martin O’ Neill said: ” We’re disappoined. We totally dominated the second half. We deserved to get something from the game. We gave them plenty of problems. We showed character and spirit. We hit the bar. Arsenal haven’t been under that pressure for a long time.
On what he said at half-time: “The players just has to have that belief. Players have to get to grips with it – at the top. It is relentless. They have to have that real belief.
“In the second part of first half, it was reminisent of Man U game where we lost self belief.
“I felt if we got the equaliser we would have won it.
“We put them under pressure. You can do it in various ways. It was relentless, non-stop. Arsenal made changes to accomodate us. We were really unlucky.”
One major point from this game was that Arsenal showed they are by no means a one-man team. They showed it in the first third of the season. And with Fabregas missing, other players, most notably Flamini, stepped up to the plate.
Arsenal: Manuel Almunia, Emmanuel Eboue, Kolo Toure, Gael Clichy, William Gallas, Bacary Sagna, Lassana Diarra, Mathieu Flamini, Alexander Hleb (Theo Walcott 60), Tomas Rosicky (Gilberto 73) Emmanuel Adebayor (Nicklas Bendtner 90) Subs not used: Jens Lehmann, Philippe Senderos
Aston Villa: Scott Carson, Zatyiah Knight, Olof Mellberg, Martin Laursen, Wilfred Bouma (Patrik Berger 76), Gareth Barry, Stilian Petrov (Shaun Maloney 31), Craig Gardner, Ashley Young, Gabriel Agbonlahor, John Carew Subs not used: Stuart Taylor, Curtis Davies, Marlon Harewood
Referee: Chris Foy