Arsenal vs Everton: 3 Down, 83 To Go

By Our Correspondent
for Arsenal New Today

Published: August 15, 2009

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Arsenal thrash Everton 6-1 to get off their 2009/10 Premier League season to a great start.

Written off by the media and the pundits even before a ball was kicked, Arsenal produced a stunning display today to demolish Everton in their own backyard. Arsenal were without Emmanuel Adebayor and Kolo Toure, both sold to Manchester City for a combined total of £45 million. In return, Arsene Wenger spent just £10 million on Belgian defender Thomas Vermaelen. With Manchester City spending oil cash to bring in other quality players like Gareth Barry, Carlos Tevez and Roque Santa Cruz, doubts were raised about Arsenal’s capacity to remain in the top 4, let alone winning the league. Wenger’s men had to respond to the doubters and the criticisers. And respond they did, humiliating Everton in the process.

Arsenal started with the expected 4-3-3 formation – Sagna, Gallas, Vermaelen and Clichy making the back four, with Fabregas, Song and Denilson in the midfield. Bendtner, Van Persie and Arshavin were the attacking trio.

Arsenal found their rhythm and took charge from the first minute. The midfield and the attacking trio connected well, however, the final touch was missing. It all changed in the 26th minute, when Bendtner dodged two defenders on the right channel and played a square ball to Fabregas, who in turn fed it to Denilson. The Brazilian met the ball first time and curled a spectacular shot into the top left-hand corner. The little Brazilian made an even more important contribution six minutes later when he cleared Marouane Fellaini’s goal bound header off the line.

Arsenal doubled their lead in the 37th minute. Vermaelen, reading the game exceptionally well, showed great positional sense to sneak into the back post to powerfully head home from a Van Persie freekick. Arsenal were never renowned for scoring from set pieces and in this game they scored two!

Five minutes later, Arsenal were awarded another freekick, which Fabregas whipped in into the box. William Gallas stole away from his marker to head home and make it 3-0 for Arsenal.

Arsenal were well and truly on their way to victory when they scored their fourth within two minutes of the start of the second half. Arshavin stole the ball deep inside his own half and played the ball to Denilson and the Brazilian took two touches before playing the ball into Van Persie’s path on the left channel. The Dutchman squared the ball to Fabregas, who neatly tucked the ball between Tim Howard’s leg and into the net.

Fabregas scored his second in the 69th minute, when he collected Almunia’s throw inside his territory and ran unchallenged all the way to just outside the Everton box and struck a low drive into the bottom left corner to make it 5-0 for Arsenal.

Wenger took off Fabregas and Van Persie and sent on Aaron Ramsey and Eduardo. The Croatian got in on the act with two minutes left, as he tapped in an Arshavin shot that had rebounded off the post.

Louis Saha scored a consolation goal for the hosts in the 90th minute.

Commenting on the game later, Wenger said, “We showed cohesion, attitude, team spirit and desire to play together, all these things were the reasons that we won.” “People have been writing us off. But what is important is not what others say, but what we do. From being told we were not competitive before the game to now being told we are super-favourites is strange. But it is right to say that this is just the first game and we aim to continue to give our best,” he added. He further said, “We have matured and this is a good basis to continue like that and to show what we want to do. We are told we do not have the squad, well we want to show that we do have the squad.”

Given the ‘open’ race that many people expect this season to be, a point tally of 86 should decide this season’s champions. Arsenal have a goal difference of + 5 and have 3 points in the bag. There’s 83 more to go…

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Arsenal vs Everton: 3 Down, 83 To Go

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