{"id":10252,"date":"2024-10-28T05:23:28","date_gmt":"2024-10-28T05:23:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/?p=10252"},"modified":"2024-10-28T05:23:28","modified_gmt":"2024-10-28T05:23:28","slug":"proud-of-the-team","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/?p=10252","title":{"rendered":"Proud Of The Team"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"getty embed image\" style=\"background-color:#fff;display:inline-block;font-family:Roboto,sans-serif;color:#a7a7a7;font-size:11px;width:100%;max-width:594px;\"><div style=\"padding:0;margin:0;text-align:left;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/2181417231\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color:#a7a7a7;text-decoration:none;font-weight:normal !important;border:none;display:inline-block;\" rel=\"noopener\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><\/div><div style=\"overflow:hidden;position:relative;height:0;padding:70.70707% 0 0 0;width:100%;\"><iframe src=\"\/\/embed.gettyimages.com\/embed\/2181417231?et=ACeysianRLRf5mja4HdLkw&#038;tld=com&#038;sig=EW9oIZoTQ2HBINNP-pPwQHC6i75ABpi3BS2T2HTnE0s=&#038;caption=true&#038;ver=1\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" width=\"594\" height=\"420\" style=\"display:inline-block;position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;margin:0;\"><\/iframe><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, things started well\u2026 there was good news when the team was announced, as Trev\u2019s suggestion that we might see both Saka and Timber in the line-up proved on the money. That meant White lined up next to Gabriel in central defence, with the Dutchman at left-back and Partey slotting in at right-back.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The game began with more effort than quality, both teams full of energy but not settling into their rhythm, until the ninth minute when Saka showed just how valuable he is, chasing a well-timed ball from White, bamboozling Robertson with the cut-back before firing his shot high into the net at the near post past a helpless Kelleher.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The Emirates was rocking. What we needed was to put our foot on the ball and keep the lead for a bit. However, we were a bit cagey and it was clear both sets of players knew how big the occasion was.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Timber looked rusty, misplacing a couple of passes, but he was up for the battle with the evergreen Salah.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Merino let a ball slide under his foot, and we were lucky the talismanic Eygptian curled his resulting effort wide. We did not take advantage of the reprieve as three minutes later they were level.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Partey would not have been thrilled when he got the nod to go toe-to-toe with Luiz Diaz for the afternoon, but he put in one hell of a shift against the skilful Columbian. Not a natural right-back, he was always going to have a few hairy moments though.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Unfortunately, after doing well to put the ball behind for a corner, it was the Ghanaian who got on the wrong side of Van Dyke, who nodded home Luiz Diaz\u2019s near post flick. It is the sort of cheap goal that you cannot afford to concede in a big game, and it was entirely our own fault. It is hard not to think that Saliba would have cleared it though.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We were the better side for most of the half, although Liverpool had a couple of spells were they kept the ball, and they have skilful, hardworking players who have seamlessly transitioned from the tutelage of one excellent coach to another.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Both teams had good positions that they failed to convert into clear chances. Saka looked very dangerous, and the opposition resorted to fouling him repeatedly. Anthony Taylor was lenient in letting the game flow, but his decisions favoured the away side who were on the back foot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Quite how Van Dyke did not get a yellow for not one but two petulant off-the-ball kicks at Havertz is beyond me: he deliberately kicked out at a fellow professional with no intention to play the ball or even gain an advantage, just to hurt him; the ref gestured to show he had seen the incident clearly\u2026 and issued no card.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It was a blatant and spiteful action from Van Dyke. We get punished for every minor infraction; how do other teams get away with stuff which is actually bad?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It was therefore not without a sense of justice that I watched a hugely lengthy VAR check (is there any other kind? And, given it was an offside call and presumably just a matter of drawing the lines, what the hell were they discussing for so long?) eventually deem that Van Dyke\u2019s foot had played on Merino when he stooped to head home his first Arsenal goal from one of a series of excellent dead-ball deliveries from Rice, regaining us the advantage just before half-time. It was well deserved.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We did not come out on the front foot for the second half, and this time it was Liverpool who had the better of proceedings, albeit our reticence was influenced by the fact that we were ahead on the scoreboard.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Anthony Taylor seemed to give every 50-50 Liverpool\u2019s way, and persistently failed to give us free kicks for the same things he was giving them to Liverpool. Havertz was kicked and pulled but got nothing from him. I really don\u2019t mind letting things flow in these big games, but it has to be consistent for both sides, and it did not look like that to me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We were not aided at all when Gabriel had to go off barely five minutes into the half, being replaced by Kiwior. Timber lasted barely twenty minutes more, Lewis-Skelly coming on for him. Perhaps it was always a big ask for him to play the full match (especially up against Salah) but we getting a rough run of luck with injuries at the moment. A back line of Partey, White, Kiwior and Lewis-Skelly is not even close to first choice and in the end it cost us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>With less than ten minutes of the ninety remaining, we broke forwards and the ball came to Martinelli on the left. I love him as a player, but today there were a few times when he received the ball in great positions and failed to make it count. He lost the ball too easily and Pool had it up the other end in seconds, Kiwior sucked towards it but unable to make an interception, leaving Salah alone to run into the space and receive the pass inside before firing past the despairing dive of Raya.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This felt a bit like the kind of goal we used to concede in Europe, one born of leaving too much space as we attacked without caution, but perhaps it was not as tactical as all that and the simple truth is that Liverpool would not have scored that goal against our usual defence because they are just better defenders. Hardly rocket science to suggest that the second-string aren\u2019t as good, and to be fair, they were all decent on the day and worked hard, but we will have to hope that Arteta has a full complement to choose from more often than not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We took off a tired Saka (much quieter in the second half) and Martinelli for Nwaneri and Jesus, and we found new impetus going forward.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We had a couple more half-chances but nothing worth recounting until we reached injury time, when we had a goal disallowed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Kiwior made a clumsy challenge, which I can absolutely see could be a foul, except for the fact that it was exactly the sort of challenge that Taylor had been letting Liverpool (especially Nunez) get away with all match. My problem is that he clearly sees the foul, does not blow his whistle, waits until Havertz wins the next challenge to go through one-on-one with Kelleher, and then blows his whistle and points back to the first challenge. Why the delay?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Look, maybe he is just taking a moment to make up his mind. But after the run of decisions we have had lately, I think all Gooners watching this sequence of events, seeing the referee not award a free kick until the moment that the move has developed into a goalscoring opportunity for us (especially after the way he had refereed the match until that point) are going to be wondering quite why we are seeing actions that go against our team refereed differently to ones performed by our team?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I just don\u2019t know what the rules are or how they will be applied game by game. All I know is that however they are applied and regardless of how unjust it appears, the referees will be justified and vindicated in all they do in the media. This is making PL football tough to watch at the moment, especially when the quality of the refs in our Champions League matches this season have provided such stark contrast with their competence and professionalism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>However, despite the lingering sense of injustice, the thing that has most stayed with me is how proud I am of our players. Despite the injuries and suspension, they put in a shift, to a man, against a top side with a referee helping them out, and still didn\u2019t lose the match.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Saka was quality. Trossard played some lovely stuff under pressure. Rice worked his socks off. Merino is improving with every game. Kiwior may not be quite as good as some of his colleagues, but it took a lot of nerve to come into that backline, especially after a mistake last week, and he made clearances and showed character to put his foot on the ball and pass it out. Lewis-Skelly impresses greatly, as does Nwaneri. Raya was good, getting fingertips to one Salah cross that made all the difference. Every player pulled their finger out, and if we keep doing that then we will have a great season.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Right now, it seems like things are going against us, but it will get better, and we will look back on this tough period as the making of this group this year. This may yet be a vital point.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Victoria Concordia Crescit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Until next time, \u2018holics.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Embed from Getty Images Well, things started well\u2026 there was good news when the team was announced, as Trev\u2019s suggestion that we might see both Saka and Timber in the line-up proved on the money. That meant White lined up next to Gabriel in central defence, with the Dutchman at left-back and Partey slotting in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10252"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10252"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10252\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10254,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10252\/revisions\/10254"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10252"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10252"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10252"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}