{"id":8896,"date":"2023-12-06T08:25:08","date_gmt":"2023-12-06T08:25:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/?p=8896"},"modified":"2023-12-08T07:03:56","modified_gmt":"2023-12-08T07:03:56","slug":"rice-pops-up-with-a-crispy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/?p=8896","title":{"rendered":"Rice pops up with a crispy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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The first snow of the season made conditions a tad treacherous in these parts so a few hours before the game I was unsure whether to drive across the river to watch Luton v Arsenal at the pub, or stay home to watch. When I got behind schedule playing with my dog in the snow I ended up staying home, thankfully as it turned out because this game was so chaotic I didn\u2019t need additional distractions to be able to describe it coherently. Arsenal\u2019s starting XI differed from North Bank Ned\u2019s predicted team at left back where Kiwior took the place of Zinchenko and at striker where Jes\u00fas was selected rather than Nketiah, but it contained two additional changes compared to Saturday\u2019s team against Wolves, namely White and Havertz in for Tomiyasu and Trossard:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Raya
White, Saliba, Gabriel, Kiwior
\u00d8degaard, Rice, Havertz
Saka, Jes\u00fas, Martinelli<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The referee, Samuel Barrott, had never refereed an Arsenal game before this one.  Luton\u2019s team included four changes from Saturday\u2019s team that lost at Brentford, as follows: Kaminski, Mengi, Osho, Bell, Kabor\u00e9, Mpanzu, Barkley, Doughty, Brown, Townsend, Adebayo. The old-timey atmosphere of Kenilworth Road came into play in the tunnel before the game, where there appeared to be just about enough head room preventing the players from the need to squat to avoid grazing their heads on the ceiling, but I wouldn\u2019t be surprised if the taller ones grazed a hair or two.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After four minutes of constant Arsenal possession the first incident of note occurred when Martinelli went down with a back injury after he was pushed by a Luton defender.  On nine minutes Saka suffered a similar painful reducer of a foul on the right wing.  Gabriel was the next Arsenal player to be on the end of a poor foul on 16 minutes, in what was shaping up to be a disjointed and formless first twenty minutes.  But just then a poor back pass forced the Luton keeper to put the ball out for a quick throw by Jes\u00fas to Saka, our 22 year old who was making his 200th Arsenal appearance at such a young age. He passed to Martinelli who swept it inside the left post for Luton 0 – Arsenal 1.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jes\u00fas sent a right footed effort straight at the keeper from a Havertz pass after the German controlled a high ball near the top of the box, but Luton broke quickly and won a corner on 25 minutes. The left footed inswinger was headed into the net by the unmarked Osho who had never before scored in the Premier League as the Arsenal defense stood flat-footed.  Luton 1 – Arsenal 1. How Arsenal had allowed Luton back into the game so quickly and with such little fuss did occur to me, but worse defending was yet to come. The fans went crazy at this point, and the Luton players visibly raised their game putting pressure on Arsenal in their own half.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Arsenal countered as Martinelli’s quick left footed shot drew a save from the keeper at the near post, after the Brazilian was fed by his countryman Jes\u00fas. Two minutes later Jes\u00fas fizzed a near post shot that was pushed out for a corner that Arsenal squandered. A long diagonal ball by Rice to Saka led to Bukayo\u2019s left footed drive that the keeper pushed out for another corner that came to nought as Luton capably handled the high ball.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On 43 minutes Barkley picked up a yellow card for his foul on Martinelli, one minute before a lovely 1-2-3 by Saka-White-Jes\u00fas led to the latter\u2019s powerful header that made it Luton 1 – Arsenal 2.  White\u2019s lofted cross was the kind of ball strikers must imagine in their dreams, and Jes\u00fas didn\u2019t disappoint with the finish.  Jes\u00fas picked up a yellow card a minute later, but the half ended after five minutes of extra time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Halftime: Luton 1 – Arsenal 2<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The second half began with no personnel changes on either side. Luton won a corner on 48 minutes, and Adebayo outjumped Raya to score a header from another left footed inswinger.  Luton 2 – Arsenal 2. Raya was too slow to the ball to be sure, but where was the Arsenal defense and why were loose players allowed to go unchallenged so close to the Arsenal goal? It looks like the players should look forward to a few long hours on the training ground to work on defending corners.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A penalty shout for an edge-of-the-box challenge by Townsend on Kiwior was waved away before Barkley and Townsend exchanged passes in the Arsenal half and Barkley sent a fierce drive under the helpless Raya, who was unable to stop a shot to the center of the goal. Luton 3 – Arsenal 2. Just a few moments later in this crazy back-and-forth game, Havertz levelled for Arsenal after a drop-off from Jes\u00fas who had controlled a high ball on the left.  Luton 3 – Arsenal 3.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Arteta sent on Zinchenko to replace Kiwior and Trossard to replace Martinelli. In the remainder of the second half Zinchenko\u2019s ball control skills seemed to lend the Arsenal midfield a bit more control of proceedings but the changes seemed to do little to increasing the team\u2019s goal threat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Arsenal won a series of second half corners but were unable to manufacture many decent chances against the packed Luton defense. A decent penalty shout for a foul on Saka was denied, as was an obvious shirt pull on Gabriel in the box moments before. Trossard set up Havertz for a header in the 86th minute but the German couldn\u2019t direct it with enough power and the keeper tipped it over.  Trossard sent a drive wide from the resulting corner as the seconds counted down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Just when it looked like Arsenal might have used up all their tricks, Zinchenko passed back to \u00d8degaard who sent a ball into the box where it was met by Rice who headed it into corner of the net for Luton 3 – Arsenal 4, which is how the game ended seconds later. It was not a scenario that anyone could have predicted, or a performance that felt like the way Arsenal should have handled a relegation candidate, but a come-from-behind three points on the road is always a good thing.  When your goalkeeper gives up two dodgy goals, as Raya did, to be able to come back from such adversity tells me the team has great personality, and it should put them in good stead for the bigger challenges to follow. There is bound to be an even louder call for the reinstatement of Ramsdale after Raya\u2019s pair of howlers, and Mikel Arteta was asked about the implications of Raya\u2019s errors in his post-match presser.  Quite rightly, he completely ignored the question, saying instead \u201cI am so happy for the team.\u201d  Taking a cue from the gaffer, all I can add is that those three points must give the whole team a huge lift as they head back to the training ground to prepare for Aston Villa away on Saturday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The first snow of the season made conditions a tad treacherous in these parts so a few hours before the game I was unsure whether to drive across the river to watch Luton v Arsenal at the pub, or stay home to watch. When I got behind schedule playing with my dog in the snow […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8896"}],"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=8896"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8896\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8915,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8896\/revisions\/8915"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8896"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8896"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8896"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}