Arsenal secured a superb 5-1 victory over Sporting Club in the Champions League this evening.
The Gunners needed to make a statement as they faced a Sporting side that had defeated Manchester City in their previous Champions League match.
The Portuguese team also boasted the hottest striker in the world based on current form, but Arsenal took control from the outset.
Bukayo Saka and Martin Odegaard picked up right where they left off at the weekend, seamlessly interchanging passes in front of Sporting’s goal. Their creativity led to an early flurry of chances.
Just seven minutes into the game, Arsenal found the back of the net to open the scoring.
From that moment, Sporting appeared rattled as Arsenal continued to dictate the flow and pace of the game. The dominance paid off with a second goal just fifteen minutes later.
When it seemed Sporting might weather the storm, Gabriel struck with a glancing header on the stroke of halftime to extend Arsenal’s lead to three.
It was a near-perfect first half for Arsenal. Sporting, however, began the second half strongly, pulling a goal back just two minutes in.
Their early pressure bore fruit, but Arsenal remained composed and defended solidly, particularly against the ever-dangerous Viktor Gyökeres.
Saka further extended the lead from the penalty spot, quelling any nerves and dashing Sporting’s hopes of a comeback.
Leandro Trossard joined the scoring late on, sealing a five-star performance and a commanding result for Arsenal to take home
Can’t touch this!!n
5 Star performance indeed in first half
Arsenal were absolutely brilliant tonight. Odegaard’s abilities have boosted our team and Timber was superb on the ground
Gyokeres is a powerful CF, despite having always blasted the ball over the bar. I think he’s still going the be very expensive in the summer, because of his contract length
Gyokeres is a big lad but wasn’t given the best support by his colleagues tonight.
Whether he’s the right fit for Arsenal remains to be seen. He’ll be expensive as you say, but I expect that none of the quality options likely to be available (probably in the summer now) will come cheaply.
Vlahovic will only have one year left on his contract in the summer, if he doesn’t extend it at Juventus
Jonas Wind has the same contract length as Vlahovic’s
We can also sign Jonathan David freely, although his aerial ability is way worse than the towering CFs
Five goals deep deep on enemy territory, hopes this settles the striker haggling.
As this game demonstrates its creativity is paramount and not a brand new striker
We need to vary our attacking method with Giroud-esque hold-up play and flicks when playing against ultra-defensive teams, since creativity alone can’t always open up low-block oppositions
So it’s for that reason why Jesus, Saka and the late addition of Sterling is important to how we wants to play, Arsenal will rely heavily on those three wise men when face with low block situations
Diminutive CFs like Jesus don’t always work against low-block teams and we need a towering player to receive Raya’s long passes when the opposition are pressing us
Giroud, as much as I still love him (e.g. in goal for Milan, the best), was outdated when he was at Arsenal 10 years ago
now football is subject to fashion too, but double denim will make a come back before Giroud 2.0
and please stop going on about Vlahovic, just not an Arsenal player and not happening
Wenger couldn’t maximize Giroud’s strengths, but Giroud’s next managers were able to do so to win major trophies with him
Yes the old lamp post did considerably well after leaving us, this shows that the solution most times than not doesn’t necessarily means the next new shiny toy.
Well, what can you say? An excellent all-round performance by Arsenal. Easily the best of their current CL campaign- and for some time prior to this season as well.
I think it’s fair to say that Sporting was somewhat disappointing overall, certainly Gyokeres didn’t get much service, but nevertheless they did present some threat. Arsenal, however, were just too good in every department.
Arteta and the team must be very satisfied with their night’s work in Portugal.
I say, the proof is in the pudding 🙂
That’s more like it, Our gunners back in high spirits! The chase is well and truly on! Next stop is the London stadium where we take on West Ham. COYG!!!
Finish HIM 💯
Sporting Lisbon were annihilated at home where they have been so, so strong.
It was scintillating to watch and played like a team of pinball wizards. No sideways and backwards passing and slow progress up the pitch; it was awesome
Credit to SL for making Raya pull off some acrobatic saves and for the 5 different goal scorers for making it a night to remember. It’s hard to single out individuals on a night when they all played their part. Brilliant!
Sue, I made Raya MOTM for the eight saves he made. Eight!!! He was faultless throughout.
Completely agree! Has anyone else noticed how we have really started to even change the way we throw the ball in? Rarely to someone just standing…always looking for someone moving to take it in stride!
Did anyone notice what Diamande got his first yellow for? It was very early in the game while Timber was taking his time over a throw-in, so possibly waving the imaginary card to the ref. He should have gotten a second for the foul on Ødegaard that gave us the penalty.
What.A.Win.
A foul I thought Jax followed by mouthing off. He might have got a second yellow for that and should have done later on
The fact that we were so dominant in the match diluted the offences but if the game had been on a knife edge, I can imagine we’d be ranting about the injustice of it all
Think you guys are right, the lad deserves a second yellow card, but overall I think the referee did a good job, I didn’t detect a hint of biasness.
Agreed
It was the only obvious leniency
This type of decision making should be referenced whenever people defend referees by making such claims as “the referee had no choice”.
Fair comment
Odegaard has increased the pace of our team. The passes and movements are now faster.
Great win tonight. Now unto Sunday. Let’s give Westham another hammering.
Partey was immense, And this team is a different monster when Odegard plays , they really impress me with the pressing. Its not a coincidence that with his return we have already scored 8 goals in two games.!
Every Arsenal player on that pitch had a great game. But I thought Thomas Partey stood out. Never seen him play with such assured calm, skill and strength
Great all round performance from the lads, with no injuries to my knowledge, which is a bonus. The team looks so much alive and balanced with Odegaard and Calafiori back. Let’s go and burst some bubbles at WHU!
Definitely a red letter day with our strongest line up. Long may they stay fit.
Great performance!
We were just letting Sporting know that not all teams in England are Man City.
Its been a while coming but at last a very good away performance in the CL. Sportings weakness was exposed expertly by Arsenal and blew them away. It has to be said the two CB, Partey, Odergaard and Saka were the standout performers. The rest did ok but they topped them. Partey it has to be said, back in his rightful place was supreme in midfield and looked like the best midfielder in Europe tonight. Great win.
This is what happens when you play player like Partey in his natural position rather than wasting him at RB
A fantastic and resounding win. Odegaard is simply phenomenal, he is the heartbeat of the team from front to back. I think he is amongst the top 3 in the world in his position. Saka was superb and Timber was great both offensively and defensively. Raya made some great saves and is truly world class. Great win to back up the PL win against Forest and the momentum is building up towards the form of last season. If we continue like this, surely we are winning trophies this season.
What crisis?
We’ll, we’ll, we’ll,
I didn’t see that coming. Well done lads on what was a top level performance from start to finish.
Every player performed to a good level, the fans sang their heads off, a few lost voices maybe today I suspect.
Now they’ve got two home games coming up in the CL, now they need to make them count. If they can play to that level, they’ll give themselves every chance.
Well done again lads.
We should realise that this is the first time we have had a near fully fit squad since the season began. Apart from Ben White and Takehiro, all our first team players are now fit. A fully fit Arsenal squad is a nightmare for any team, whether in England or Europe. We hope and pray that the boys stay fit. With a full squad, we can launch a successful run of games.
On the other hand. There is a massive problem when (and these are the excuses why we fail to win anything) everything fails, when either Saliba or Odergaard are out. The system, should not be that flimsy.
How can a team prepare to loose two to three key players at a time……. Just take city for example
Last night imo has to go down as one of the best away performances in Europe from an Arsenal team
Professional
Measured
Clinical
Not getting carried away with the display or result but we can see with a fully fit team and some still have a way to go before they are deemed as fully fit we can give most teams a run for there money
Consistently is what we nee to have