Alexis is back with a bang! And he was badly missed! by KM
Hello everybody. How have you been? Have you missed Alexis? I know I sure have, and Arsenal have too. It was another classic FA cup day, but with this season’s talk of the title, the competition which we’ve won for the past 2 years has kinda fallen to the background of things.
We played a Burnley side who are doing not too bad in the Championship looking for promotion back to the elite. They started off with a 1:1 chance with Ospina which he managed to save. After 10 minutes we got the game under control and after some pressure, we opened the scoring.
We had them close to their box where Sanchez found Iwobi, who slipped it into Chambers who delivered a fine goal with the outer side of his boot. It looked like we were cruising but as you can imagine with Arsenal it’s never that easy.
We conceded a corner which didn’t see the best of clearances, afterwards we had Gibbs take out Giroud and in the mean time a cross from the wing found both our defenders outdone by Vokes. It wasn’t Ospina’s fault, but he also didn’t do a very good job of going out than going back and not making anything in the end.
I couldn’t see much of the second half, but I saw a match report and we scored a second through Alexis, let them have one or two half chances and Theo missed one on one with their keeper in the dying minutes.
I don’t think this game is enough to draw any conclusions but a few things I liked. The changes made us look fresh. We had Coquelin and Alexis back which is, well, two of the most important players in our squad back. We also gave some players a well deserved rest – namely Ozil and Ramsey, Bellerin and Monreal.
The game also saw Elneny make his debut. From his first touch I could see that he’d need some time to adjust to the league. He comes from a lower league so it is normal. Rosicky made an appearance in the second half too and Welbeck is on the road to recovery so we will be having everybody back except Wilshere and Cazorla.
With the pressure on us mounting to finally get that league title, we’ll need players who step up and Alexis was the best against Burnley. We face a difficult Southampton side next and it’ll be another mental challenge after what happened when we went away there.
Now is the time to start a new series of wins, that will reignite our chances. We have to break out of the typical winter collapse and finish strong. Hopefully with the squad back to full fitness we will do it.
Enjoy.
Konstantin