Sporting - on the bus. Return of the captain
Arsenal builds a solid foundation for the second Champions League semifinal in a row.
The two main questions before kick-off were “Can Arsenal bounce back from that Cup fiasco?” and “Who starts at right back after White’s absolute disasterclass in Southampton?”, as the rest of the XI basically picked itself. (I don’t think anyone sane expected Dowman to start after he played the full ninety at the weekend).
The answer was Benjamin White again, which, to be fair, didn’t give me much confidence. Sporting are known in this Champions League for their nippy wingers and White definitely didn’t look in the form to handle them. Lo and behold, after a small spike of initial activity, it was White’s vis-a-vis running on an early date with David Raya.
The Spanish keeper (who sparked a right old debate among the Gunners faithful with his proper chill response about handling the defeats) showed us straight away why he’s a class above our second-choice keeper. Honestly, his claims for being the world’s best number one looked spot on here. Elsewhere on this same night, in another city, a more serious claim was being made, but we can have a look at that a bit later on.
Raya’s save was absolute quality, but it was a bit of a worry how easily our backline was sliced open by Sporting early doors. While it’s easy to point the finger at Whitel, it was Saliba leaving a massive gap that let the pass cut right through us.
Any right-back is going to lose a foot race to that Sporting winger who has got serious pace, so that situation should never have happened in the first place. Luckily, we had our keeper there as the last line of defence to bail us out.
For the rest of the first half, we looked much more up for it than in the cup, and for me, most of the credit goes to Martin Odegaard. I’ve seen a fair bit of the usual criticism after the whistle, but I’m not having any of it. In Lisbon, Odegaard played like a proper captain again: he was popping up all over the middle, dictated the tempo, and kept the ball moving nicely. His delivery from set pieces was dangerous and caused a bit of chaos in their box. The biggest plus he brought was the pure energy across the pitch. Too often our attack looks a bit sluggish because we don’t play at a tempo that bothers the other lot.
On Tuesday night, Martin was the one really making us tick. And his passing wasn’t just the “safe” stuff we’ve seen a lot of this season. The pass map shows plenty of progressive balls—even the ones that didn’t come off, but at least he was trying them, which has often been missing from his game in winter.
I was very impressed with his shift. One player I did have questions about, though, was Zubimendi. The stick Norgaard was getting after the Southampton match was way over the top and unfair in my book. All the talk about “that’s why Zubimendi plays every minute” didn’t sit right with me at all.
Once again, I was left wondering what exactly Zubimendi brings to the engine room. His best bits in an Arsenal shirt have always been when he pops up near the box—clever passes, late headers, or goals from range. And once again he went and scored from a difficult, static position. It was a cracking strike, only for it to be chalked off a few minutes later.
It’s always a gut punch when goals like that are disallowed, especially when the offside player didn’t actually give us an advantage in the buildup. It wouldn’t have changed a thing if Gyokeres was level with the defenders. But back to Zubimendi—I still don’t quite see what he offers in that number 6 role, which is supposed to be his natural home.
He reads the game well enough, but he isn’t great at snapping into tackles to stop counters, and he doesn’t really convince me when he’s trying to build a dangerous attack. I suppose playing a long time for Real Sociedad means he isn’t quite used to the timing needed to break defensive lines on this level.
Sporting were very well drilled, to be fair. They pressed us man-to-man in the middle very aggressively. Basically, only Madueke and Odegaard could find a way through that press; the rest were forced to play it backwards to keep hold of the ball, and Zubimendi was no different.
Arteta swapped out the attacking mids for Havertz, Martinelli, and Dowman (all for different reasons), but it didn’t give us more chances straight away. In fact, Sporting had two massive chances in the 82nd and 86th minute, where Raya had to show off his top-tier skills again. The game was on a knife-edge where the whole tie could have swung their way, so those saves were massive for us.
One man who did change the game from the bench was Gabi Martinelli—he came on looking electric, playing like a proper confident Brazilian winger. Gabi is a player who thrives on confidence; his performance depends so much on his head being in the right place. Yesterday, even with the Sporting defenders all over him, he looked like the player we all hope he’ll develop into at Arsenal.
Two of his runs ended with poor finishes, but the third time he skipped past three defenders and put in a lovely chip for Havertz to run onto, giving us that vital winner.
Havertz’s touch was world-class and the finish was tucked right into the corner. If I’m being picky, it was the exact same predictable finish he tried against Trafford in the Carabao final. The difference in quality between the City and Sporting keepers was the main reason he’s on the scoresheet this time.
But that’s ancient history now. What matters is we turned a tough away day into a 1-0 win—the kind of result the pundits call “winning on pedigree.” This game always looked like it wouldn’t have more than a couple of goals in it, a total contrast to the other quarter-final between Real and Bayern. Over there, both sides were trading big chances that didn’t go in because of poor finishing or a brilliant Manuel Neuer.
Just like David, the 40-year-old German carried his team to an away win and was arguably even better, saving two one-on-ones. He got right into the head of Vinicius Jr, who panicked and shot too early. Imagine the stick our strikers would get if they bottled a chance like that! Raya still holds an overall mouthwatering Champions League record in the last two seasons.
I’m not sure which type of football is better for us fans. The end-to-end stuff is great to watch, but it isn’t sustainable and it’s bad for the nerves. It’s tough on the players too, because you can go from drawing to being two goals down in a matter of a few minutes. The performance we put in, while a bit more boring, might be easier for the fans and players to handle because of the superior individual quality we have over teams like Sporting to navigate those tight margins.
While an away win is brilliant for morale, this low-margin football will be hard to turn into a result against Bournemouth. It often ends in a draw, just like it could have on Tuesday night, and a draw is no good for us in this title race.
Bournemouth will be playing their first game back after the internationals, so their players will be fresher than farm-bought eggs. For us, it’ll be the third game in a week. The good news is some players might be back (though we need to be careful with their fitness) and we’ve got a super talented kid who hasn’t been scarred by the intensity of Bournemouth over the years.
This match is probably the second most important in the title charge after the trip to the Etihad. Dropping points now would be a massive blow to our confidence. If we lose two or three points to the Cherries, we risk the gap shortening by five or six, which is a serious morale damage.
Bournemouth is a proper cup final and I hope Arteta can get that message across so the lads leave it all on the pitch. They’re a relentless side and won’t forgive five minutes of being off the pace. The players and coaches have worked all season to get us here; five minutes of “taking it easy” isn’t worth it. We’ve also got a score to settle after that defeat last May that I was lucky (or unlucky!) enough to see in person!