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Newcastle v Arsenal

Ally

Active Member
Newcastle 1 (Robert 53) - Arsenal 1 (Henry 35)

It's a game of two halves, y'know. Andy Gray said something (Painfully scripted) like "QC - quality and class". Quality in the form Thierry, for six first half seconds and class, in Roberts' equaliser. Apart from that...I don't know. If I were a neutral I'd be happy, but as I take the more partisan approach I tend to be a lot harder to please. The first period was generally scintillating, the second slowly turned into a shoddy battle on the wings. Both were disappointing in various ways for each of the teams involved.

Newcastle came out the traps like a greyhound on speed - Arsenal sat back and absorbed everything in a cocky and self assured manner that looked a bit too risky against such a powerful attack for my taste, and on the break Shearer slid in and forced a miraculous, clawing save from Seaman who scooped the ball out from behind him at full stretch.

Still, we seemed to be getting the measure of the Toons' makeshift defence (Bramble, at one moment reliant on Given to bizarrely head over the bar his own diving back header that was going in the roof of the net, alongside O'Brien) and a Thierry corner, straight onto the head of Vieira was deflected by Solano on the far post onto the underside of the bar and out. From the rebound Pires headed over when it might have been more appropriate to make it 1-0.

1-0 it was a few minutes later when in a carbon copy of the opening goal in Birmingham a few weeks back, Wiltord flicked Henry through on the back of some static Toon defending, to round Given and slot neatly.

And that was that. Thierry decided, instead of sprinting through the middle to take on Bramble, to hang around on the corner flag to take passes from Pires, step over the ball a few times and then lose possesion to the corresponding full back. At the other end, Lauren was busy destroying any theories he had lost confidence, while Campbell did a fine job shutting down Shearer.

Pity that no-one bothered about Lauren Robert, though. A few waltzing runs through the entire Arsenal midfield and defence served as shots across the bows which were obviously ignored - after the break, Newcastle emerged and promptly became better than us, more hungry and actually using their speed to do something (Take heed in future, Titi?).

Inevitably, Robert levelled things, getting a break off Sol and cracking a lovely drive just past Seaman's right hand. Remember the goal by the same player in the FA Cup tie last year? Exactly the same. Amongst the adulation, nobody noticed that Keown had ducked out of the way.

Immediately, Lauren side-stepped the mercurial Frenchman inside his own box and was taken out from behind with a leg-breaking lunge. Yellow card. Arsenal go upfield and win a freekick. Bergkamp tries to take it quickly. Robert pops up to block the ball, and then smacks it against Lauren.

What Newcastle players have got to learn is that it's no use crying as you walk off having been dismissed. This red card was probably the most stupid I've seen recently, maybe since that Valencia forward was sent packing for elbowing Cygan two meters away from the referee. No excuse.

Robson later lost his temper while being interviewed, citing that no common sense was being exhibited. He's a fine manager, but he does tend to speak whatever comes into his head and often ends up looking like a clown. The referee was fine, he followed the rules and Bobby is simply trying to use Neale Barry as an excuse for the behaviour of his own player.

What difference did the extra man make? F all. If pressed, you'd have named Arsenal as the team at a disadvantage. We simply had no imagination to unlock Newcastle's back line, and some baffling substitutions didn't help. (Jeffers in a game like this? He thrives off service. Today if anybody wanted to score, they would have to make chances, do the work themselves and not expect immaculately weighted through balls and crosses).

There was one more incident of note - Bellamy tried to cross and his delivery took a deflection off Ashley Cole. Christ. It started to loop into the far corner. Ronaldinho again. "Seaman's past it." "Sensational winner for Newcastle". Far from it. Seaman, on the back foot made a quite extraordinary tip over to preserve the point.

After all this, I'm not sure how happy I am. We're still 3 points ahead. On the other hand, this was a chance to go 5 points clear. On the other hand, we soaked up an impressive Newcastle attack really well. On the other hand, how many chances will we get to get a gap opened up? On the other hand, we've ended Newcastles' winning run at home. On the other hand...

Man of the Match

On a day of disappointing performances (Thierry, Pires, Dennis - is that Fabian Caballero in disguise?), David Seaman dominated his box, made two astonishing saves and ultimately was the difference between one point and nothing at all.

Moan of the Match

Having one more man is supposed to be an advantage. Maybe it's just me, though.

Moment of the Match

Seaman's save from Bellamy. Utter brilliance.

Ally Winford
 

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