{"id":12893,"date":"2026-02-22T20:23:42","date_gmt":"2026-02-22T20:23:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/?p=12893"},"modified":"2026-02-28T21:00:15","modified_gmt":"2026-02-28T21:00:15","slug":"are-you-tottnum-in-disguise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/?p=12893","title":{"rendered":"Are You Tott\u2019num In Disguise?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Sunday afternoon saw The Arsenal vanquish our old rivals to take what could turn out to be a massive three points. After City beat Newcastle yesterday, they were only two points behind us when the match kicked off and most of the media had the knives out for a team who have faltered in the league recently. The pressure was well and truly on, so to come through the game with a top performance and a thoroughly deserved win feels big. By full-time I was feeling much better about our trajectory. This seemed a game where we turned the mood around. Let us hope so.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I think it is only right to focus on the many things that we did well today, but there were plenty of moments that showed where we can still improve and those should not be swept under the carpet. We were profligate. Frankly, four goals was a poor return from the outright chances we had, to say nothing of the countless situations we should have turned into chances. Gyokeres cut in and lashed a shot wide from an almost perfect chance; Saliba headed wide from six yards after Gyokeres headed down a Saka corner; Trossard ignored Saka\u2019s run and blasted the ball high and handsome after Simons gave it to him on plate playing a risky pass in his own half; Saka went through one on one with Vicario but the keeper saved his shot; a deflected Trossard shot rolled just wide. By half time we could have been out of sight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Instead, we just had the one goal, scored by Eze (who else?) after Saka squirmed past Sarr and crossed for our number 10 to flick the ball up and snap a quick-fire volley into the back of the net. His first touch wasn\u2019t perfect but he just rolled with it and took the shot stretching his foot to shoulder height \u2013 that instinct is such a valuable asset for this team.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

No matter how often we concede right after scoring, we just don\u2019t seem to learn our lesson and recognise the danger. We are so vulnerable after we score and better teams than this ramshackle Spuds outfit will punish us at full time, not just half-time. On this occasion it was Declan Rice who intercepted a Spuds through ball and made the poor decision to try to take the ball round Muani instead of passing it. He got dispossessed in our box and the Spurs striker lashed it low past Raya. The crowd went wild. I was fuming.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After battering them all half, to go in level, and with only ourselves to blame (again) was a pisser. We had a big second half ahead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fortunately, we responded to that challenge with, well, a big second half. It took Gyokeres all of two minutes to put us in front with his best Arsenal goal (yes, better than Inter). His first touch from a Timber pass was perfect and the finish from outside the box was consummate. That\u2019s the player. Our Dutch right back would have been happy to get an assist from a pretty simple pass, but truth be told he had a tough day. The man is absolutely running on fumes and we need to sit him down. His passing level is dropping, he got a yellow for a foul after the double error of giving the ball away by poorly executing a poorly chosen pass and having to pull Spence down as he broke. After we underplayed White whilst he was available, he was not even on the bench for a game I\u2019d have started him in. Presumably he is injured, but it is very frustrating that we ran Timber into the ground instead of using our brilliant alternative, and now we need him more than ever, he is not available. Arteta made an excellent substitution after a mere 57 minutes to bring Mosquera on and I want to see more of him at right back. Timber is probably the best right back in the league, but he cannot play all the time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Neither can Eze, but today he made a bid for more minutes than he has been getting recently with that most vital of contributions \u2013 end product. He won the ball high up, Gyokeres flicked it back to him, he played in Saka, and Van der Ven\u2019s last-ditch tackle squirted free for Eze to slot home his second goal of the game. Very nice. It could have been his hat-trick goal after he breezed past some Spurs muppet on the wing and slalomed into the box but saw his shot blocked. He also put Saka in, but Vicario saved his right foot shot from eight yards out as we continued to make chances but not finish them. Still, tidy from Eze, who mixed attacking flair with hard running and positional awareness. His productivity dropped from his time at Palace while he adjusted to the off-the-ball work required by Arteta. There were a few games where he was solid defensively but not particularly threatening. I always felt he\u2019d add back the attacking stuff once he was more positionally secure in this system. Today was a template performance. Keep it up young man.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We were lucky when Muani scored a second moments after the ref had blown his whistle for a push in Gabriel\u2019s back. Correct decision, but only just. Gabriel bought it by collapsing after he felt hands in his back. For me, he has to stop doing that. It has cost us already this season (can\u2019t remember the match, maybe someone in the drinks will know) and the percentage play, by a long way, is just to make the headed clearance. Both him and Saliba had a couple of dodgy moments and sloppy passes which they need to cut out. For all we were much, much better in attack today, there were still some very loose balls spread amongst our side that we got away with.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Richarlison came on and bundled a flicked backheel towards goal only for Raya to claw it off the line. Top reaction to get to it and he did well today, dealing with crosses with the habitual assurance that has been somewhat less noticeable in the last couple of games.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Saka turned his ankle when Xavi Simons fell on him and I was seriously worried. He got up and walked off, to be replaced by Noni, but I hope he\u2019s okay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We had time for one more. Gyokeres, looking fit and strong into injury time, took a pass from Odegaard and held off Archie Gray (good player) to finish convincingly past Vicario. Two really good centre forward goals from the Swede who was fouled all day by the Spurs centre halves yet penalised every time he did exactly what they were doing to him. He responded in the best way possible and is becoming more and more what we all hoped he might be.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Arteta got everything right today and deserves his flowers. The team looked strong. We needed a reminder how good we are, why we are top of the league. We got it. Now to look forward to Chelsea, not back over our shoulders. We\u2019ve got a title to win.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Until next time \u2018holics.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sunday afternoon saw The Arsenal vanquish our old rivals to take what could turn out to be a massive three points. After City beat Newcastle yesterday, they were only two points behind us when the match kicked off and most of the media had the knives out for a team who have faltered in the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","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\/12893"}],"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=12893"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12893\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12899,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12893\/revisions\/12899"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12893"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12893"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12893"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}