Another Typical 2nd Half Showing From Villa Deflates Everyone – Match Stats

Moving swiftly on from the last match, today it was time for Arsenal to visit Villa Park and manager Unai Emery would certainly want to win this one given his own history, and he went with an attacking line up.

It was a lively start with both teams on the front foot but five minutes in we broke well, and Matty of the Cash put Ollie Watkins clear and having beaten the last defender, he drove the ball into the back of the net with a lovely strike.

Tom Hanks enjoyed that one if I spied him correctly in the crowd. The game was far from over though and having allowed ourselves to be pinned back, a soft headed clearance from Mings aligned with Kamara losing his man and Saka rifled home from inside the box.

1-1 and game on. It got a bit scrappy for a while but just after the half hour mark, a lovely bit of play saw Philippe Coutinho restore our advantage and you sensed there were more goals in this one.

They wouldn’t come in the first half though as we went into the break at 2-1.

So what did the second half have in store, well, the visitors started more brightly as you’d expect, but we were holding our own. Until we didn’t. With the pressure building, we didn’t close Zinchenko down quick enough and he rifled past Emi to make it 2-2 just after the hour mark.

We had slightly gone to pot at this point and they could’ve had the lead just minutes later but wasted the chance. We slowly got back into it and McGinn had a great chance, but Arsenal were on top and we were struggling and a Konsa slip up almost gifted them the lead, but thankfully they wasted it.

A few more chances arrived for both sides, and Leon Bailey was unlucky with the effort that came his way, and Jhon Duran also had a decent late effort saved and then typical Sod’s Law, Arsenal hit the bar with an effort and the ball cannoned back into Martinez and rolled over the line.

3-2 and from a poor corner, they broke all the way through the middle to make it 4-2 and I’m still not sure where Emi was.

Another tail of two halves.

Aston Villa				Arsenal
Watkins (5), Coutinho (31)				Saka (16), Zinchenko (61) Martinez (og 90+3), Martinelli (90+8)
Martinez				Ramsdale
Cash				White			79
Konsa				Saliba
Mings				Gabriel
Moreno			78	Zinchenko			90+3
McGinn				Odegaard			90+4
Douglas Luiz			67	Jorginho
Kamara				Xhaka			79
Buendia			67	Saka
Coutinho			62	Nketiah
Watkins			78	Trossard			68
Substitutes
Traore				Tierney			90+3
Chambers				Smith Rowe
A Young				Martinelli			68
Duran			78	Kiwior
Digne			78	Holding			90+4
Bailey			67	Tomiyasu			79
Dendoncker			67	Fabio Vieira			79
Sinisalo				Nelson
J Ramsey			62	Turner

Game Statistics
8	Goal attempts	20
5	On Target	5
2	Corners	9
13	Fouls	4
2	Yellow Cards	1
0	Red Cards	0
33	%	67