Arsenal lost 2-0 against Aston Villa at Emirates Stadium on Sunday evening. The match saw both teams compete furiously for supremacy; the Gunners dominated the first half, but Villa dominated the second half.
The game could have ended in a tie, but Aston Villa’s Leon Bailey broke the deadlock in the dying moments, scoring the opener in the 84th minute, sparking wild celebrations among the away fans. Ollie Watkins quickly doubled Villa’s advantage with a superb strike in the 87th minute, leaving Arsenal reeling after the late surge.
Despite Arsenal’s brave attempts throughout the game, including exceptional performances from Bukayo Saka, Martin Odegaard (in the first half), and Declan Rice, they were unable to secure the three points required to return to the top of the league. Arsenal’s setback keeps them second in the Premier League rankings, trailing Manchester City by two points with six games remaining.
Most Gooners believe they may have once again bottled up the Premier League title race, but Gunner Declan Rice remains steadfast, stressing the team’s unrelenting concentration and commitment to fight for league glory.
The record Arsenal signing stated: “It’s not over yet. We’re in an unbelievable position. We’re still ready; we’re still fully focused on what we want to do and what we can achieve.”
“There’s going to be many more twists and turns in the Premier League. Anything can happen.”
🔴⚪️ Declan Rice: "It’s not over yet. We’re in an unbelievable position. We’re still ready, we’re still fully focused on what we want to do and what we can achieve".
"There’s going to be many more twists and turns in the Premier League. Anything can happen". pic.twitter.com/umyICtimIn
— Fabrizio Romano (@FabrizioRomano) April 15, 2024
Although the result is unfortunate, our Gunners must move on as soon as possible. They must win the second leg of the quarterfinals against Bayern Munich on Wednesday at the Allianz Arena in order to advance to the semifinals.
With a Champions League semi-final spot secured, the Gunners have no option but to pull off a perfect run in the league from now until the end of the season; pick six wins out of six. Though it is evident that Arsenal’s title ambitions are dependent on Man City dropping points, failing to drop any on their part is the only way they can capitalise on a City slip.
Daniel O
ADMIN COMMENT
So here are some simple rules which I must insist commenters follow….
You agree not to give any personal abuse to other Arsenal fans. Everyone is allowed to hold their own opinions even if you disagree with them. It COSTS NOTHING TO BE POLITE TO OTHER ARSENAL FANS.
Arsenal didn’t ‘bottle up’ anything Daniel O, and I doubt that you even know what it means.
Enlighten us, please – I don’t think it’s a complex term
I wouldn’t call yesterday “bottling it”, personally, but I can see why some have that opinion. For whatever reason, we faded badly and didn’t put up much of a fight after they scored, or really in the second half overall. I can’t see into the player’s minds, and neither can anyone else, but I’d expect an uninhibited team fighting for the title to have put some serious pressure on any opposition after going a goal down at such a crucial point in the season. Liverpool can at least stay they did that to palace.
In full it’s ‘bottle & glass’, rhyming slang for a*rse, and if your ‘bottle goes’ or you ‘bottle it’ then you’re literally crapping yourself, which I think it would be reasonable to say does not apply to Arsenal.
That’s interesting – I didn’t know that was the origin haha.
Nonetheless, I can still see why that could apply here (of course, it’s commonly seen as being unable to perform as expected due to fear or pressure in this context) – if we were uninhibited, I’d expect us to have applied a lot more pressure to them in the second half. It might have been for other reasons, but none of us can really know. The next games will provide the evidence one way or the other – I expect us to at least put in a performance against Bayern and get back to winning ways in the next league game.
Rice’s words express the right attitude imo.
I prefer choked. Not as messy😃
It’s done and dusted – another season of achieving nothing. As soon as the two ex city players get back in the team it goes downhill. Jesus the attacking player who doesn’t score goals. Useless. Always injured and can’t run or hold up play. What a waste of money.
While the criticism of Jesus is predictable the fact that we conceded two “soft” goals for the second game in a row would suggest that we have gone off the boil as far as defensive solidity is concerned.Apart from White,the rest of our back four and our Keeper can justifiably be held culpable for the Villa goals and our failure to cope with the opposition front three in the second half.The reintroduction of Zinchenko has had an adverse impact on Gabriel in particular who seems to have lost the composure which was a feature of his improvement throughout most of the season.With Kwior at LB we seemed to be very solid at the back and just why Arteta decided to leave him out to accommodate the defensively woeful Zinchenko is beyond me.In the same way to move Havertz back to midfield when he was being effective up front just does not make sense as Jesus is not a central striker and never will be.In my opinion our strongest front three should comprise of Jesus on the RW, Havertz and Saka on the left where he can cross more accurately on his stronger foot whereas, on the right, he simply does not have that ability when he hits the byline.No doubt a large majority of fans will totally disagree with my observations but unless our Manager becomes more imaginative and enterprising in his selection against Bayern, and includes Partey for example I very much doubt if we will overcome the German side despite their disappointing season in their League.
Kiwior may have been left out following his performance against Bayern’s Sane, and the possibility of him having to face Bailey, not that Zinchenko was any improvement.
Re Saka on the left. He was good there some time ago, but he wouldn’t be able to cut in and fire one off with his right foot, the way that he does on the opposite wing with his left, and who would he team up with in the same way as he does with White & Ødegaard?
Come to think of it, Saka does have a quite lethal right foot😃.
No Declan, we WERE in an unbelievable position.