Crunch Time

Saturday 23^rd February. Arsenal play host to a desperate Aston Villa in the battle to avoid relegation. Arsenal however in their own battle to recover from their worst season in years and secure a place in the champions league next season. Despite the positions of these two teams Wenger was taking no chances with some fans calling for his sacking, following their departure from the FA cup last week to Blackburn and their disheartening mid-week loss to Bayern Munich.

You could tell what the game meant to both sides by the teams put out. Wenger (with the excuse of Lucas Podolski) put out the most attacking team at his disposal, similarly for Paul Lamberts Aston Villa side.

Right from the first kick neither team were willing to settle for a point. Attack after attack at both ends of the pitch. It was Arsenal who took advantage of their chances first though with a rebounded shot falling to Santi Cazorla and some nifty footwork and a powerful shot saw the gunners take the lead in the 6^th minute.

The rest of the half was reasonably quite, and waiting until the 67^th minute before another sight of a goal. This time a long clearance from an Arsenal corner by Weimann to the half way line forced a panicky defensive header back into Weimann’s  path. He then took the ball to the edge of the Arsenal box and a powerful shot paired with a goalkeeping shocker from Wojech Szczesny saw Aston Villa back on level terms in the 67^th minute.

From an Arsenal point of view this was an absolute disaster and a sight we are all becoming sick of seeing.

For another fifteen minutes Arsenal seemed to dominate possession and create chance after chance, however not capitalising on any. Just as I was giving all hope of three points Nacho Monreal Chipped the ball into the box towards his old Malaga team mate Santi Cazorla who wasn’t one to waste a good chance. He didn’t fail to keep up this reputation by slotting the ball into the goal in a FIFAesc cut-back manner to put Arsenal 2-1 up in the 85^th minute.

This goal proved enough to see the game out, and in a week where he hasn’t had much chance to, this gave Arsene Wenger a chance to smile at last.

But from an Arsenal perspective this doesn’t in still a great amount of confidence in the team. Only just managing to beat a team who are on the brink of relegation, with two important games to Everton and Tottenham coming up as well.

However credit where it is due Aston Villa put up a brilliant fight and showed great spirit and tenacity against “the 6^th best team in the world” according to FIFA’s statisticians.

All in all a great nail biting contest between two well worthy teams.

Giles Robinson (@Giles_robinson)