Arsenal Stutter As Standard Lowered
Sep 16th, 2009 by 'holic
An eventful start to the season continued in Belgium as Arsenal came back from a horrific opening five minutes to beat Standard Liege in a gripping, if technically horrendous, performance. The recovery from two down to win owed a bit to Lady Luck, and a lot to the hosts unwillingness to cash in on their own good fortune in the opening minutes.
The game was barely started when Eduardo attempted a suicidal backheel in the defensive third, and Mangala, having swatted Fabregas away with a flying left arm, produced a superb finish from the edge of the box. A couple of minutes later Eboue carelessly lost the ball near the halfway line and from the resulting break Jovanovic hit the deck after a Gallas challenge near the eighteen yard line. He netted the resulting penalty as sixty thousand Celts screamed ‘Karma’! You had to feel sorry for Vito Mannone, blameless but beaten twice before he had even touched the ball.
What followed was gripping entertainment, but must have had both managers and the neutrals screaming in frustration. Standard’s response to scoring with their first two attacks was to withdraw into a defensive shell. Arsenal contrived to make this look a pretty good tactic for nigh on forty minutes with a string of misplaced passes and inability to work a clear opening against the massed ranks of red shirts.
Diaby, guilty to this point as anyone of surrendering the ball cheaply, finally turned the game around when he beat his man in the inside right channel and fed Bendtner as the defence came to close him down. The Dane’s cool finish through the ‘keepers legs was certainly no more than Liege deserved for their retreat from a position of strength.
The second-half produced more of the same, but Standard were bound to tire as the Arsenal pressure mounted, and so it proved. However, if we were hard done by for their second goal, we certainly enjoyed our own moment of fortune for the equaliser. Song clearly controlled a Fabregas free-kick with his arm before Vermaelen scrambled the equaliser in front of his countrymen.
Just minutes later the second crazy spell of the game saw Eduardo, who else, fill a lot of ‘holics pockets as he kneed in the winner from a corner. You did back the ‘holic pound, didn’t you? No? Oh, sorry. Can’t blame you really as it doesn’t often come in.
The profit from the evening does little to gloss over the performance. I’ll say again, this is not the Arsenal that surrendered so tamely at times last season. I really believe we have made some considerable progress in terms of attitude, application, and team spirit. However, the performance tonight was probably the worst of the season, technically. If the mark of a good side is one that wins when not playing well, then we were fantastic tonight!
Enough of that for now. We have lost the last two games when we should have got something out of them, so the recovery tonight is welcome. Now we look forward to the visit of Wigan, and hopefully a return for one or two from the overcrowded treatment room, (and maybe even Almunia will be allowed to come back from the naughty step!).
Cheers ‘holics.
18 Responses to “Arsenal Stutter As Standard Lowered”
Bendy saved the day!
Well it wasn’t great, but I’ll take an ‘ugly’ win any day. Potentially the most difficult of the 3 away games, so not too bad.
Fair point that, Fin. We would have taken any win beforehand. Chuffed for Bendy too, bloodred. He needed that goal tonight.
Arsenal play well against Man U, well(ish) against Man City and come away with nothing. They play badly creating very few chances against Liege and score 3, coming away with a confidence-building 3 points.
An issue here is belief – Arsenal feel they should get something out of the game against Liege because they’re a lesser team. It would be good to see that character against Man U and Chelsea. Even the game against City at 4-2 I thought they were making enough chances to get 4-4, but there seemed to be an acceptance of the result which is worrying. Hopefully this is the start of a bit more resolve when going behind in games.
Poor poor performance. Great result and I agree that it shows great application to come back. But we will face far tougher competition than that. I would say that West Brom next Tueday will be more of a threat.
What disappointed me was that with so many missing that it was time for the big players to step up. In my opinion none did. How many more silly errors are we going to make to gift teams goals this season??? I have started to lose count on many that is now. Basics really.
Positvies were Vermaelen and Rosicky. The later I thought was our best player by a country mile whilst he was on the pitch. Great to see him get another 70 mins football under his belt. Hopefully he will now get stronger and stronger.
We need to learn lessons. We got out of jail free tonight. Next time we may not be so lucky. Pass the ball like that in the Premier League and we will get stuffed.
Keep the faith.
Nice title. Even I got it 😀
Bendtner has clearly marked a case for a role in the center. One worrying aspect was that some of the players switched off the moment we got the third. Cesc seemed uninterested again. Rosicky is clearly quite a way from being fully fit but his class shows through.
Nice summary ‘Holic.
It was hard to feel confident after 20 minutes, not only were we 2 goals down but the team looked spiritless. And then they picked themselves up. It wasn’t a great day with many players playing poorly by their own standards but in the end they managed to win and this is what differentiates champions from also-rans.
BTW congrats to the home support, they were intimidating for such a (relatively) small crowd.
After all this stress I need something to relax. A glass of port, I think.
I see you decided to zap Paulie. I can see why but at the same time I’m among those who take (perverse?) pleasure to see all the doomongers seethe when we win 😉
Matt! I need half à bottle of that port, if it’s alright. Cheers!
First of all, well done holic for getting the bet right. Secondly im still happy and laughing for the win (what else can you do about the second goal that should have been disallowed for ten different reasons. Marvelous! Fantastic! Finally for US!). Thirdly a 2-3 win must be the ultimate result. Better and it would be confidence without belief, worse and it would have been a loss. This is the belief and the wakeup call we nerred, all in one game. Perfect. Fourth, it’s hard to write on an iPhone that tries to correct you, in swedish, when you are drunk and on a buss.
Best win of the season, ladies and gents, not pretty but just what we needed, a hard fought win. You wont see us give up again this season arter going 2-0 down!
Im just waiting to get home for that last drink now…
Cheers gooners!
What a roller coaster ride its been thus far. Hope Denilson is back on the weekend to provide the stability that’s been lacking since he was taken off at Money City.
Shockingly, I fell asleep at half-time, and missed the come-back.
Well, it was 3am over here and I’d had a busy day…
Actually I’m not that bothered I missed it, I can’t take much pleasure in the victory when we played so badly.
Imagine if Defour hadn’t been injured.
I totally agree with Boris – the first 5 games of the season show that we seem to be motivated by pride rather than simply existing to beat every team put in front of us. If we think we’re better than you, we’ll be ruthless. If it’s excusable to lose, we’ll relax a little. This is the attitude of a mid-table team. There are some fighters in the squad like Arshavin, Vermaelen and Gallas, but I dearly wish others would step up.
I don’t accept that we were unlucky in Manchester, I think the other teams wanted it more.
As everyone else notes, fingers crossed Rosicky is back, and he looks angry. This is awesome.
Couldn’t agree more about Rosicky looking the best player on the pitch last night. That really is a huge bonus to have one of my favourite players back and firing. Do you think we will ever see Rosicky, Arshavin, Theo, Nasri and RVP all together? I really hope so.
On the downside, all the problems this season have come down our left flank and last night was no exception. Clichy has not hit his best form for about a year now – possibly time for Gibbs or Traore to be given a few games I think.
I will say this – it’s not been dull!
Denilson offers us a lot more stability – him and Song are dependent on each other.
Diaby was not that poor last night. He runs at defenders (something they hate) rather than always playing the pass and move game. His confidence and brilliant skills led to our first goal and the start of the fightback. He offers us something else when going forward.
Special mention to Ramsey who impressed when introduced. The lad looks hungry for games. I really hope he gets some starts soon.
What a pun. Hmmmm.
And I would give a mention to Tomas Rosicky, who seemed to be our only decent player in the first half. Please please please stay fit.
Anything except a Jupiler now please, ‘holic.
I miss Paulie
Jackster
I miss Paulie
Mmm, rubs chin. Whereabouts over the water is your family exactly, Jackster?
Gritty, shitty, and a pity we played like we did, but echoing most peoples comments about a ‘win is a win’ etc.
Feeling rough at the moment ‘hoilc, so just a Horlicks for me!