Arsenal escape with a point against Crystal Palace after goalscorer Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang sees red
Crystal Palace 1-1 Arsenal: Jordan Ayew’s deflected goal cancelled out Aubameyang’s opener, before the Arsenal skipper was sent off by VAR for an ugly lunge on Max Meyer
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Your support makes all the difference.For all Mikel Arteta’s smooth resurgence at Arsenal, even he couldn’t avoid inheriting the bogeyman status Crystal Palace have so often come to represent for the club. And as he watched his side desperately cling on to a 1-1 draw in the final stages at Selhurst Park, down to 10-men after Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang's straight red card, relief will have been as overriding an emotion as the Spaniard’s frustration.
Roy Hodgson’s injury-ravaged side had started so flatly and yet this is now their fourth match undefeated against the Gunners. They remain in the top half of the table, one point ahead of Arsenal, and still somehow seemed the fresher of the two sides come the final whistle. Despite still showing their evident improvement under Arteta, particularly in the first half, this was a reality check, a return to old mistakes and, ultimately, a reminder that Arsenal’s problems are still too deeply entrenched for any immediate fix.
It had been such a routine and ruthless start for Arsenal, who have so often been guilty of failing to reap the rewards of their dominance. But the goal itself, a brilliantly patient and then incisive 18-pass move, was as much a product of Palace’s own willingness to sit back and be passed into a stupor as it was about the execution of Arteta’s neat triangles.
Afforded time and space to conduct from the centre of defence, David Luiz swept away the entirety of Palace’s midfield with one simple ball to the re-enlivened Mesut Ozil. Alexandre Lacazette dropped deep, sucking both Palace’s centre-halves with him and laid the ball off to Aubameyang, who side-footed home one of the simplest of his 14 goals this season.
It set the stage for Arsenal to scavenge at the bare bones of Hodgson's weakened side and yet a combination of the goal and several over-embellished injuries finally reawakened Palace. The gaps in Arsenal’s defence, although marginally tighter, were still visible, Wilfried Zaha finally began to find space in front of Ainsley Maitland-Niles, while Jordan Ayew chopped in circles around David Luiz.
And if it was Arteta who delivered a “shouting” team-talk like few of his players had heard when Arsenal beat Leeds in the FA Cup on Monday, it was Hodgson who stoked the fires in the dressing-room.
Just seven minutes into the second-half, disorganised and distracted, Arsenal flapped from a set-piece, the ball ricocheted around the box before Ayew’s shot deflected into the roof of the net. The type of messy, mistake-laden goal scripted and conceded by Arsenal so many times in recent years.
Arteta gesticulated manically, desperately attempting to stop his side from panicking into old patterns, and yet it was Aubameyang, so often the Samaritan this season, whose mindless slide tackle on Max Meyer threw Arsenal into irreversible disarray.
The irony too was unavoidable as Palace’s fans, who’d displayed banners calling for the removal of VAR at the start of this game, saw it turn the match in their favour. Initially punished with a yellow card by referee Paul Tierney, a straight red was awarded after an ominous check. There’s no telling how significant Aubameyang's absence in Arsenal’s following three games could be in sucking the wind from Arteta’s sails.
From thereon it was Arsenal who hung back on the ropes, battened the hatches, and hoped to somehow stem the tide. Sokratis hooked away off the line as Maitland-Niles fumbled a clearance off his upper-arm. The stands howled for VAR once again. This time, though, their calls weren’t answered.
Nicolas Pepe, who’s what might have been comparisons to Wilfried Zaha had been a significant subplot in the build-up, almost snatched a winner in the final stages of the match as Arsenal finally regathered their senses.
Ditching his jittering start-stop runs, which had often broken the rhythm of Arsenal’s attacks in the first half, he found space on the corner of the penalty area only for his shot to fizz off the inside of the post. Vicente Guaita then did brilliantly to prevent Lacazette scoring what would have ultimately been a smash-and-grab winner on the rebound.
The finale was feisty and frenetic and, perhaps, Palace had deserved more. For Arsenal, their recent revival under Arteta has been refined on the training ground. Now they return there, still with so much work to do.
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