Arsenal’s Premier League title hopes were dealt a heavy blow on Saturday evening as Mikel Arteta’s side suffered a 2-0 defeat at Bournemouth.
The Gunners were reduced to ten men for the third time this season on the half-hour when William Saliba was shown a straight red for a last-ditch challenge. Bournemouth made good use of it in the second half, with Ryan Christie opening the scoring before Justin Kluivert made it three points from the penalty spot.
Defeat gives Manchester City and Liverpool a huge opportunity to create a gap between them and arsenal Sunday in the title race.
How the game developed
After a combative opening 27 minutes, in which the two teams looked fairly evenly matched across the pitch, a sloppy back pass from Leandro Trossard and an equally sloppy save from William Saliba gave Bournemouth the lead of the match.
Saliba’s final tackle on Evanilson, who was clean on goal, was initially booked with a yellow card, but after a VAR intervention the centre-back’s punishment was increased to a red card, leaving Arsenal to play 60 minutes at the Vitality Stadium. up to ten men.
Although he was a man down, it was Arsenal who created the first real chance of the game in the 35th minute. A loose ball in the box fell into the path of Mikel Merino who, after controlling a low effort on goal just wide of the post.
After that chance, it was expected that Bournemouth began to dominate proceedings. Antoine Semenyo was the architect of this dominance, which caused the Gunners’ defense to be a boatload of trouble. The 24-year-old forced David Raya into a smart stop at his near post after slotting past Ben White, then gifted Marcus Tavenier the best goal-scoring chance of the first half three minutes later : Raya overcame again. circling his effort off the post.
Semenyo continued to cause problems in Arsenal’s backline at the start of the second half, and really should have given his side the lead in the 47th minute. The Ghanaian found himself completely unmarked by Dango Ouatarra 14 yards from the Arsenal goal with a high cross on the halfway mark, and he couldn’t keep out his subsequent volleyed effort on goal, seeing it fly over the crossbar instead of into the back of the net. .
Gabriel Martinelli’s introduction for the rather woeful Trossard sparked the Gunners into life at the other end of the park. The Brazilian should probably have given his side the lead just ten minutes after his introduction, with Kepa Arrizabalaga (yes, that Kepa Arrizabalaga) diving quickly to his left to prevent his side-footed effort climb to the bottom of the net.
Martinelli and Arsenal rue this missed opportunity in the 70th minute when a smart save put Bournemouth 1-0 up. A short corner into the near post area was cleverly flicked on the edge of the box by Justin Kluivert and into the path of Ryan Christie who fired superbly first time into the top corner of the net.
Another defensive calamity from the Gunners would give Bournemouth the chance to double their lead in the 77th minute. This time said calamity came from Jakub Kiwior, whose horrendous effort back at Raya was cleared by Evanilson. After being rounded by the Brazilian forward, Raya proceeded to knock him down, resulting in a penalty kick.
The penalty was scored with aplomb by Kluivert, with the substitute cold-footed at the back of the net.
GK: David Raya – 6/10 – Made a few decent saves. He gave away a penalty, but Kiwior had hung him out to dry before the foul.
RB: Ben White – 5/10 – He struggled to contain Semenyo in the first half in particular.
CB: William Saliba – 2/10 – Expelled within the opening 30 minutes. A poor week for the centre-back, who was also quite poor during his last international games with France.
CB: Gabriel Maghalaes – 4/10 – Saliba’s sending off meant he was out of the job at the Vitality Stadium. He only managed to win one duel and didn’t make any successful tackles in the loss.
LB: Riccardo Calafiori – 7/10 – Despite Arsenal’s defensive struggles. Calafiori played quite well. The Italy international won 100% of his tackles, made six clearances and won five duels during an intense 90 minutes.
CM: Thomas Partey – 4/10 – He lost possession too many times, forcing his team to get on the back foot on several occasions.
CM: Declan Rice – 6/10 – He threw himself into the middle of the park to relative effect, winning nine duels.
CM: Mikel Merino – 4/10 – As evidenced by his 68% passing accuracy, he was a bit all over the place in possession.
RW: Raheem Sterling – N/A – Sacrificed when Saliba was sent off.
ST: Kai Havertz – 5/10 – He worked hard without ever receiving a semblance of service from his colleagues.
LW: Leandro Trossard – 2/10 – His mistake got Saliba kicked out, and he did very little to redeem himself after that. A regrettable performance.
Substitutes
SUB: Jakub Kiwior (37′ for Sterling) – 2/10 – A bit of a disaster class. The Poland international’s horrendous error led to Bournemouth’s second goal, and Arteta was immediately substituted shortly afterwards.
SUB: Gabriel Martinelli (64′ for Trossard) – 5/10
SUB: Ethan Nwaneri (81′ for Merino) – N/A
SUB: Gabriel Jesus (81′ for Kiwior) – N/A
Manager – Mikel Arteta – 5/10 – It was not his fault that William Saliba saw red in the first half, but many Arsenal fans may have been disappointed that it was the lively Sterling who was then sacrificed instead of the desperate Trossard.
