Aaron Ramsdale. Got a chance because Raya couldn’t play against his parent club as he is still on loan.
In the 16th minute, Brentford earned a corner which Aaron saved comfortably. He then, took a brilliant throw to set up Leandro Trossard which he should have scored. It was basically a 1v1 but LT took a bad touch and then took too long to recover from that. In just 2 minutes from that, Declan Rice scored off an excellent cross from Ben White. 1-0 to the Arsenal, it seemed like a night for us.
But nope, as we do, we missed some chances after that. In the 24th minute, you would expect Odegaard to take that shot, he missed it and his bad touch didn’t allow the shooting space for Havertz. Again, in the 35th minute, Declan Rice pass through the lines to Havertz, leaving him ahead of the Brentford defenders. Havertz did a Henryesque flick but it missed by few inches. It was a great pass, and could have been the goal of the month.
4 minutes into the extra time, Ramsdale had a brain fog, got the ball from Gabriel and without much pressure, somehow managed to fuck it up. There were options available but he decided to not take that, costing us the goal. 1-1 at half time, we all were sulking.
There were few more attempts. 10 minutes into the 2nd half, Ramsdale was off his line but managed to do a brilliant save to deny a great shot from Toney from 40 yards. There was another brilliant close range stop from him in the 71st minute. I think it was the best of the lot, 9 out of 10 Goal Keepers in the Premier League would not have saved that.
Fortune favors the brave, Ben White crossed again and Havertz made sure it landed in the nets. 2-1 to the Arsenal, Ramsdale was relieved and so does the fans as we reclaimed the top spot even if its meant for a day (Liverpool v City will decide that).
There are 2 things to take from this game. 1st, an upgrade to Ramsdale was required. It’s too early to say Raya is that answer but he has got that errors in him and errors from goalkeepers cost you games. We were lucky last night to recover from that.
2nd, the players involved in both goals were Ben White (2 assists), Declan Rice (1 Goal), Kai Havertz (1 crucial winning goal). I have said earlier that we paid a lot for Ben White, he didn’t let me feel that. I thought Declan Rice on 105 million was too much money, but it doesn’t seem like that. I thought we overpaid for Kai and paying him huge money in wages, and I still do, but at least he is winning game for us so that’s a humble pie in making. I will eat that at the end of the season depending on his performance for the rest of the season.
Some of the gambles Mikel has taken has paid off. No denying in that. 10 more games, and we can judge if Mikel himself lies in the Ramsdale category – good enough to get into the mix but not good enough to win things.
Over to you.
KP-that’s what I meant about the cameras finding him, as they know full-well he will gladly supply them with the type of reaction that will generate the most buzz…I certainly wasn’t suggesting that we should start Ramsdale or have him replace Raya should it go to penalties
I likewise agree with the above sentiments regarding the ridiculous fee we paid for Ramsdale, especially knowing that MA wanted to play out from the back…this tactical flip-flop had already cost us a tidy sum when it came to Leno, as his MV dropped below the Mendoza Line following his year long benching, so why would we overspend on a half-measure alternative…far too often we’ve settled for expensive options that didn’t fit the script and/or were clearly a “rental” option, which left us in a worse financial position when they invariably needed to be replaced
as for Arteta’s assessment of Mart’s injury, minor cut my ass!!!
Match day post is live…though a very short one 🙂