{"id":7799,"date":"2023-04-27T05:06:29","date_gmt":"2023-04-27T04:06:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/?p=7799"},"modified":"2023-05-01T17:41:38","modified_gmt":"2023-05-01T16:41:38","slug":"money-talks-at-the-emptihad","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/?p=7799","title":{"rendered":"Money talks at the Emptihad"},"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\/1485522203\" 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:66.66667% 0 0 0;width:100%;\"><iframe src=\"\/\/embed.gettyimages.com\/embed\/1485522203?et=hGVV4uJmROZ5K4R-W2JjqA&amp;tld=com&amp;sig=lHVueIrZcVbNr5FrpWeJjKkhcPCnyR7Eb2jDIo49z8Y=&amp;caption=true&amp;ver=1\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" width=\"594\" height=\"396\" style=\"display:inline-block;position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;margin:0;\"><\/iframe><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>That wasn\u2019t much fun, was it?&nbsp; Arsenal continued their teetering end-of-season form with their fourth consecutive game without a win, as they were thoroughly beaten 4-1 at the Emptihad by the-expensively-assembled-\u20acitzens-of-(allegedly)-Off-Balance-Sheet-FC, as our Texas correspondent rightfully calls them.&nbsp; But regardless of the outcome, a wider perspective is necessary, and shows how far Arsenal have progressed this season, and how much promise this team holds with young stars in nearly every position including Martinelli, Saka and (hopefully) Saliba who would walk in to starting berths for just about every other team in the league.&nbsp; So it was not a good day at the office to be sure, but a wonderful year at the office without any question.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The \u20acitzens came into this game after defeating Sheffield United in an FA Cup semi-final on Saturday, while Arsenal were humbled by bottom side Southampton in their 3-3 league draw on Friday.&nbsp;&nbsp;After Citeh\u2019s home win against Leicester in their last league game, manager Guardiola said his team would have to play \u201ca final\u201d against Arsenal.&nbsp;&nbsp;To be fair, play a final is exactly what Citeh did as Arsenal struggled to stay in the match from beginning to end.&nbsp; Midfield master DeBruyne scored two sumptuous goals while cyborg striker Haaland continued his scoring exploits with his coup-de-grace strike in injury time extending his tally to 48 goals in 40 matches.&nbsp; Haaland also contributed an assist on the first of DeBruyne\u2019s goals after muscling a ball away from Holding in midfield and creating enough space to spot the Belgian streaking downfield.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Not only were the Gunners outclassed on the evening, this was Arsenal\u2019s third loss to Citeh this season.&nbsp; In the reverse fixture, the Gunners fell behind 0-1 on De Bruyne\u2019s 24th minute goal before a Saka penalty equalized matters before halftime but late Citeh goals by&nbsp;Grealish and Haaland clinched the points for the Blue Mancs in a match played two weeks after Citeh defeated the Gunners by 1-0 in the 4th Round of the FA Cup.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I got to the pub at about ten minutes to kickoff, or 5 minutes before the proprietors switched their screens away from Chelsea-Brentford (final: 0-2 amusingly leaving the Chavs 10 points off the relegation places) and I procured my first pint.&nbsp;&nbsp;Sitting next to a guy in an \u00d8degaard shirt, all I could do was to hope for the best.&nbsp;&nbsp;I thought it was a good omen when the crowd seemed to break out in a round of \u201cTottenham get battered everywhere they go\u201d but a few minutes later realized that the room was dominated by Citeh fans so I probably mistook the Tottenham part of that chant for something else.&nbsp; Fewer friendly faces to share the misery of what was to come.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Arsenal XI<\/strong><strong><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">Ramsdale<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">White &#8212; Holding&nbsp;&#8212; Gabriel&nbsp;&#8212; Zinchenko<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">\u00d8degaard&nbsp;&#8212; Partey&nbsp;&#8212; Xhaka<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">Saka&nbsp;&#8212; Jesus&nbsp;&#8212; Martinelli<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Haaland easily could have scored two goals in the first half, and came much closer than Thomas when the two of them had chances from distance one after the other.&nbsp;&nbsp;Both players sent their shots the wrong side of the post and could have done better as you might expect Haaland, possibly the most expensive player in the world, should do, but unfortunately Thomas did not come close to replicating his lovely goal against Spurs from an identical position on Arsenal\u2019s only chance of the half.&nbsp;&nbsp;DeBruyne\u2019s goal, an unstoppable blast from distance, was the kind of stuff you might expect from another of the most expensive players in the world, and it came from a great pass by Haaland who had impeccably controlled the keeper\u2019s goal kick.&nbsp; Stones\u2019 header for their second goal came from a corner just before halftime and drove a stake through every Gooner\u2019s heart when VAR showed an Arsenal foot playing Stones onside.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Xhaka had, I believe, Arsenal\u2019s first shot on goal early in the second half, and for a long time it looked like it might be the Gunners only one of the entire game.&nbsp; Haaland should have scored Citeh\u2019s third on the 50 minute mark when he was alarmingly left alone to run at Ramsdale from the keeper\u2019s long ball, but Ramsdale made his third or fourth big save of the game before DeBruyne, nutmegging Holding, did score Citeh\u2019s third a couple of minutes later after \u00d8degaard\u2019s bad backward ball in midfield.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>On 60 minutes Arteta sent on Trossard and Jorginho for Xhaka and Martinelli, and on 71 minutes the lesser spotted Smith Rowe came on for our Norwegian captain, before Nelson and Nketiah replaced Saka and Jesus with 10 minutes remaining, but those changes had little impact on the flow of the latter stages.&nbsp; When Nelson came on for Saka he looked like a breath of fresh air, as he often has this season when called upon, and he made a great midfield run feeding fellow substitute Nketiah on the left but the latter\u2019s effort went past the far post.&nbsp; Nelson then won a corner and Trossard bungled it but the lads stroked it around a couple of times before the Belgian fed Holding who knocked it home making it 3-1.&nbsp;&nbsp;Cue the Citeh fans in the bar singing \u201cIt should have been ten\u201d and to be honest it felt like they weren\u2019t far wrong.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Haaland unfurled his abundant hair in the 94th minute, seconds before scoring Citeh\u2019s fourth on the stroke of Michael Oliver\u2019s final whistle.&nbsp;&nbsp;The truth is, Citeh pummeled Arsenal from start to finish, but on a variation of what the Citeh fans sang in the bar, if you spend that much money it probably \u201cought to be ten\u201d on a weekly basis so there\u2019s no shame in it for the valiant young Gunners.&nbsp; I left the bar thinking about what the last four weeks might have been like if Saliba had not been injured, but right now the end of this season feels remarkably similar to the end of the last one, unfortunately.&nbsp; Thank Dennis the first 30-odd games went so well.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Embed from Getty Images That wasn\u2019t much fun, was it?&nbsp; Arsenal continued their teetering end-of-season form with their fourth consecutive game without a win, as they were thoroughly beaten 4-1 at the Emptihad by the-expensively-assembled-\u20acitzens-of-(allegedly)-Off-Balance-Sheet-FC, as our Texas correspondent rightfully calls them.&nbsp; But regardless of the outcome, a wider perspective is necessary, and shows how [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"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\/7799"}],"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\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7799"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7799\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7818,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7799\/revisions\/7818"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7799"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7799"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7799"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}