Arsenal dropped 3 more points away to Manchester United, but Everton could only gain a point from their weekend fixture, leaving Arsenal needing only 3 points from their remaining 4 matches to secure a spot in next season's Champions League qualification round.
Arsenal's buildup play against United was good, they were carving open lots of chances, but the finishing was woeful. Adebayor is great in the buildup, but his strikes today were mostly tame shots to the keeper. Van der Sar eventually gifted Arsenal an opener, carefully avoiding a cross that Adebayor and/or a United defender bundled in, but Gallas immediately returned the gift, using his arm to deal with a harmless ball in the box. Ronaldo converted the penalty.
It's easy to theorize that the pressure of being Arsenal captain has unnerved Gallas. He's made a real mess of it in the league run in - shocking stuff.
The highlights for Arsenal were Cesc and Clichy. The one-touch football from Cesc is brilliant to watch, and Clichy is so heavily involved, winning the ball and pushing forward - was Clichy the best player on the pitch today? Hleb played well again, and Van Persie put in the cross for Arsenal's goal, but he's nowhere near his top form after coming back from an extended injury layoff.
The Hargreaves winning freekick was brilliant.
Representative of some of the recent discussion on this site about United's strength in depth, Alex Ferguson was able to bring on a double substitution of Tevez and Anderson. Ridiculous. The quartet of Rooney, Ronaldo, Anderson and Tevez is imposing; those lads are a handful.
But Arsenal, for a team in the midst of an ongoing implosion, do play some good stuff, and their Champions League qualification will be fully deserved.
1 hour ago
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3 deflections:
Arsenal don't have the finishing necessary to take advantage of the many chances created. And the defensive frailties are ridiculous compared to earlier in the season. I wonder what has been going in the dressing room.
Overall, I think Arsenal played a good game. United just had too much for us. C. Ronaldo was well contained but Rooney had a typical good game. Hargraeve and Carrick both did very well. The winning free kick was very excellent; it was next to unsavable although Lehmann could have done better in his positioning to give himself a better chance at having a go at that ball.
Strangely enough, yesterday I felt a bit more calm whenever MU won a corner kick with Lehmann in goal than I had been for a few weeks. The defensive organization was marginally better. But conceding that penalty was bordering on criminality on Gallas' part.
Clichy, Flamini, Sagna, Fabregas, Hleb...thats my order of best players of the season so far...Hleb was poetry in motion :)
I feel scared with the thoughts of not seeing Hleb and Flamini in the team next year if they decide to leave...Wenger should prevent that.
Let me leave you with two articles
http://theoddsandsods.com/2008/04/13/the-song-remains-the-same/
and
http://arsenal-mania.com/articles/3105301/Arsenal-bow-out-gracefully.html
oops...how do i post links on this?
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