No penalty. A victory for common-sense and persistence? 3 stunning left foot strikes & Ramsey, Nasri, Eastmond impress

Arsenal 2 Liverpool 1 (Carling Cup 4th round)

Hello Gooners. Well that was close as well, just like the previous two games. Where was the 3-1 I predicted? As it turns out we didn’t need that third goal.

You won’t agree but for me Liverpool probably shaded it by virtue of the opportunities they created. Has any other team outdone Arsenal on that count at the Emirates before? And yet we found one extra moment of quality and unlike Rafa’s Reds, we made it count. Goes without saying, but that is all that matters.

At times we appeared nervous when defending. Benitez’s unusually positive squad selection was almost vindicated by his side’s directness in attack. They could and should have been ahead when Degen fired wide when he was put through by Ngog’s pass. We never even got out of gear at that point. If that goes in, we are looking at a totally different game.

Instead fast forward 10 minutes and a combination of a poor pass from Voronin and a great Song-like tackle from Eastmond, stealing the ball rather quietly, presented the ball to Merida. And he promptly smashed the ball in, the first of the stunning left footed strikes!  Cavalieri was beaten at his near post from the shot that hit the post and went it. It actually took me a more than a couple of seconds to figure that out when it occured live!

Something Liverpool have excelled at the Emirates at is replying swiftly. They levelled within 10 minutes. Degen’s ball found Babel who knocked it unwittingly for Insua. His shot gave me unpleasant memories of Bentley’s goal last year. Bendtner’s reaction could have been quicker and it annoyed me but I think tomorrow when he wakes up he will be just as amazed that Insua beat him to a nothing ball. Put it this way, he isn’t the quickest left back you’ll ever see.

The 2nd goal we scored was perhaps the best goal of the match considering it began in our own defensive area. There was swift passing good movement from about half of our 11 players. There was even determination to win and retain possession from Eastmond before the ball eventually landed to Bendtner who at one point in this move was fairly deep in midfield. The Dane was having a quiet-ish game (to put it mildly) before he beat his man with a tidy left foot finish.

Aaron Ramsey had an outstanding game. The comments after the match were that he and Fabregas couldn’t play together. Perhaps not in central midfield but Ramsey had enough skill and control to play on the wings. His passing at times was almost in the Cesc bracket. Towards the end he was tired but that would be a given considering how end to end this game was.

Nasri’s return was impressive. He did nothing new but whatever he did on the pitch today was done with a lot more confidence and purpose. Samir won’t start on saturday afternoon but is definitely a good option to have on the bench.

The debut of Eastmond was a surprise as I expected Coquelin to start. However he had a decent outing and crucially he had a say in both goals. Time will tell how this latest prodigy develops.

A key issue in the game was whether Aquilani’s overhead kick merited a penalty. No. The natural reaction of a human being is to protect himself from any incoming danger. Philipe didn’t want the ball to hit his face so merely tried to save his face from further scarring. And didn’t he try to sort of duck out of the way at the same time?

By the way if that 20 minute cameo is anything to go by, Aquilani is definitely a Alonso clone.

That chance was one of several that Liverpool had. It was too nerve wracking at times but our defence held firm.

And then we even managed to keep possession in the dying minutes of the match. Keep ball in the corner flag is not aethestically pleasing but it helps to get the result sealed. And we won a corner and couple of throw ins so it isn’t all that bad.

All in all a good win. We didn’t outplay Liverpool but psychologically it will do wonders for this team.

And out of the 7 teams that remain, 4 of them are our top 4 rivals. The others are Portsmouth, Blackburn and Spurs. So much for this being the Mickeymouse cup.

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