
Arsenal locked horns with Aston Villa in the Premier League after the derby win over Tottenham with the hope of keeping the pace with the runaway leaders, Liverpool. Arne Slot’s side garnered all three points against Brentford following last gasp strikes from Darwin Nunez and knowledge of this game must have preyed in the minds of the players, as the pressure was on to deliver the goods.
The game started well with Arsenal on the ascendancy against Aston Villa and got a well-deserved lead when Gabriel Martinelli reacted well to a Leandro Trossard cross and toe poked the ball goalwards and even though former Arsenal goalie, Emiliano Martinez, made a save, the ball crept beyond the line and the goal-line technology did its thing, with the man with the whistle signaling for a goal.
Arsenal doubled their money when Trossard crossed a lovely cross that was side-footed first time by Kai Havertz, bringing an end to a rut has been having in front of goal. Despite his shortcomings in recent weeks, he remained Arsenal’s top scorer with 13 goals. Sadly, Arsenal failed to defend well, allowing Aston Villa back in the game. Both goals came in rather similar circumstances from cross field balls that were defended horribly by Mikel Arteta’s men.
To make things worse, Arsenal went into this game without William Saliba, and there is no timeline on his availability based on Arteta’s post-match press conference. This has put Arteta under pressure and with the January transfer window available, more work has to be done to make things work.
