Key events
GOAL! Tottenham Hotspur 1-3 Arsenal (Eze 61)
Six goals this season, five of them in derbies! Eze snaps in on Dragusin and follows the ball, Gyokeres backheeling Saka through. And, though Van de Ven gets back at him, as Vicario comes out, all they succeed in doing is squirting the ball back to Eze, who punches into the unguarded net.
59 min Solanke is getting ready to come on, but if he’s not quick, the game will be over before he’s in position to affect it. Mosquera, who I’ve just remembered replaced Timber a few minutes ago, robs Spence, unfathomably holding the ball just outside his own box. Saka then finds Eze, whose return pass, with the outside of his foot, puts him through; Vicaruo is out well to smother.
57 min Hincapie surges forward – he’s really starting to express himself – and finds Rice outside him down the left. And, though the cut-back is humped behind by Sarr, the signs for Arsenal are good: they’re pushing for a third goal, and there’s no sense Spurs have the minerals to see them away if they stick at it. Otherwise, the corner comes to nothing.
55 min “Where has everyone who was slagging Gyokeres off gone?” wonders Joshua Keeling. |Silence. He’s a top player – people need to get a grip.”
I don’t know about that. It was a really good finish, but his return of shots and goals is still extremely poor; I’ve seen nothing, at Arsenal or at Sporting, to make me think he’s a top player or anything proximate. But we’ll see.
53 min Gray pursuers a ball to the corner flag and his deflected cross catches Gabriel underneath it. So Kolo Muani applies the shove then lashes home the loose ball, but he was too bait with it and the ref immediately disallows the goal for a foul.
51 min More like it from Arsenal, Eze isolating Palhinha out wide and weaving by him, cutting across the face of the box and things open up. Can he find the finish? He actually has Gyokeres free a five-yard pass away, but instead opts to shoot, a telegraphed effort blocked at source.
49 min Most of us, I think, looked at Gyokeres as a player signed to start almost every game and score loads of goals. But given how much Artetz loves Havertz, perhaps the plan was for him to be another option, one of a stable of attackers with different profiles, able to affect games from the start or off the bench.
WHAT A GOAL! Tottenham Hotspur 1-2 Arsenal (Gyokeres 47)
DO NOT ADJUST YOUR SCREENS! Gyokeres finally scores a goal that really matters, taking a low pass swung infield by Timber, Eze’s run across the defender creating space for him. His first touch gets the ball out of his feet and his second, delivered with minimum backlift and maximum prejudice, sends a shot from the edge ripping past Vicario’s dive. I think he gets tips to it, but they’re not enough to prevent a terrific finish and the most important goal of the season so far.
46 min Finally, football, and when Big Xavi Simons wins a flick-on, Kolo Muania feeds him back in, he shoots from the edge … and Rya dives too low, so must reach up to make his save.
And still, no football. So to Scotland, where Hibs won 2-1 at Celtic and Rangers drew 2-2 at Livingtson. Hearts lead the table by four.
“Ignoring Gabriel’s blatant foul which should have been reviewed by VAR but wasn’t,” returns Alexandra Ashton, “I think we still ended the half in the ascendancy. Yes, we weren’t great, but we were solid: Dragusin and Palhinha especially impressed me. At the very least, we looked much less frail and a touch more dangerous than under Frank earlier this season, although that bar is so low it may as well be on the ground.”
Yup, I imagine Tudor will be pretty happy with his first first half as Tottenham manager. I wouldn’t go as far as to say his side were in the ascendancy, but they were in the game, which is a start.
Ahahahaha, we’ve another technical issue relating to the ref’s telecommunications. Who could possibly countenance football in such circumstances?
Our teams are back with us.
This half we’re about to experience is the biggest of the season so far. If Arsenal don’t end it with three points, you’d fear for them – especially as next weekend, they play Chelsea. Do they know how to sustain attacks against a team sitting in?
Half-time email: “The biggest news for me and, I hope, for all of us,” says Mac Millings, is that, heading into this weekend’s action, Girona’s form the last five games looks like Krusty the Clown.”
In similar vein, the Nottingham Forest crest looks like Elmo.
HALF-TIME: Tottenham Hotspur 1-1 Arsenal
A frantic mess of a game, Arsenal taking the lead only for a Declan Rice’s error to usher them right back into it.
45+7 min “Speaking as someone at the actual game,” says John Tumbridge, “at no point was there any explanation to the crowd as to why exactly the ref spent the best part of six minutes looking for an AA battery.”
Gizuzyamoneyandshutuppeasant.
45+5 min Arsenal haven’t found a way of getting at Palhinha – I’ll say it again, but they need Madueke on for Trossard, I think, who’s a good player but a better sub – and when he concedes a corner, Spurs clear it away easily enough.
45+3 min I do see it again, and Gabriel is a lucky, lucky boy. He steps across Kolo Muani without a thought of playing the ball, and that’s a foul at best, a red at worst. I’ve not a clue why VAR isn’t having another look; perhaps the officials are still reeling from those eight minutes of lost communication. I know I am.
45+2 min Ball over the top, Muani under it, and Gabriel introduces him to grass. There are shouts for a foul, and it didn’t look entirely innocent, but I’d need to see it again.
45 min Dragusin crosses and Raya floats out to claim; we’ll have eight additional minutes, primarily because of that broken headphone or whatevz.
44 min Spurs win a corner down the left and Arsenal have Timber marking Van de Ven. That’s what I’d aim for were I Simons … who instead curls on to Raya’s knuckles.
42 min “Declan Rice dribbling out of his own box happens when he can’t think because his whole body is shutting down because of all those Carabao Cup games he played,” thunders Drew Lundgreen. “Arteta should be fired. He has no idea how to guide a team through a season. But hey, love that performance against Inter when we played our strongest possible side in a dead rubber.”
I don’t think we can say one is a consequence of the other, but I agree he’s not used his squad well enough this season: I was also surprised by the team he sent out against Inter and also think he’s extracted as little as possible from Eze.
41 min Saka’s cross is blocked so Timber collects the loose ball, squaring for Trossard who helps it towards the far post … and Gyokeres is on his heels when, had he hurled himself at it, he might’ve been able to slide home.
39 min Gray, who must have a nose bleed given the cotton wool chilling in his nostril, concedes a corner, Spurs clearing the immediate danger before Bissouma is in quickly to put the ball into touch.
37 min Lovely ball over the top from Hincapie, and Saka’s in! But Vicario is out smartly to block his shot, then the flag goes up … but a replay shows that he was on, which means that if he’d scored, the goal would’ve stood.
36 min Gray was, apparently, booked for chucking the ball away. Thanks for coming, old mate.
GOAL! Tottenham Hotspur 1-1 Arsenal (Kolo Muani 35)
Oh Arsenal! An error from the most unlikely source as Rice, just outside his own box, right-hand side, looks to dribble between Muani and Xavi; Muani robs him, breezes away from Saliba’s wimpish challenge, and whacks low just past Raya’s hand
GOAL! Tottenham Hotspur 0-1 Arsenal (Eze 32)
Saka draws in Sarr and skips at him bundling by on outside, hits the line, pulls back, and though Eze’s first touch is poor, it sends the ball into the air, allowing him to wallop into the net from close range. That’s his fourth goal against Spurs this season, with his first shot on target in the league since then.
30 min The home crowd are getting into it now. Arsenal need to find a way of getting players around the edge of the box able to combine with one and two-touch play – we don’t see much from them in the way of feints, dummies and tricks, but that’s one way low, narrow blocks are beaten.
28 min Timber gives it away to Sarr, so pulls him down and is booked.
27 min “About to take to the stage in a production of Candide in Germany,” writes Paul Curievici “and won’t be able to check this again til just after half-time, so if you, Saka, Eze and co could please somehow manufacture something positive to come back to the dressing room to, I’d be very grateful.”
Funny you say thar, I could use a £7 tub of Losely ice cream.Break a leg!
26 min Spurs will be fairly happy with how this has gone. They’ve shown no attacking threat, but they’ve not conceded many clear-cut chances and are turning the game into the kind of mess that serves the XI Tudor has sent out.
24 min Declan Rice, then. A fantastic player, no doubt about it, but I have a but: he’s not good enough on the half-turn or passing through the lines to be a six, and doesn’t have the quality on the ball you’d want from an eight. So any team he’s in needs to build around those missing bits – he’s not someone you can simply put in any team without having to think about it.
22 min Saka burrows towards the heart of the Tottenham defence so Spence buffets him and is unfortunate to be penalised. Free-kick Arsenal, on the right, 30 yards from goal; Rice swings out, and the ball is headed clear easily enough.
21 min Arsenal were in charge early on but Spurs have improved a little, Sarr getting, er, in and around Zubimendi, robbing him and looking to work a shooting lane, quickly filled and his effort blocked. I’m certain Tudor thinks this is a route to joy for his team.
19 min “Dani Alves before either Puyol or (you gotta be kidding) Pique,” admonishes G Salorio, and he’s right. Alves is one of, if not the best right-back I’ve ever seen.
18 min Deep inside his own half, Simons looks to spread from left to centre and picks out Trossard, who was there all along. He intercepts, advances, eschews the first shooting opportunity, then leathers miles over the top.
17 min Saka swings in and, at the back post Gyokeres peels away to nod down and back, Saliba is there … and heads wide.
15 min The game hasn’t got going again following the pause. But Eze looks to inject pace, sliding another ball into the channel for Gyokeres; again, Dragusin is there to intercede then, shortly afterwards, Arsenal win a corner. Here we go…
14 min A long ball down the left, and Dragusin easily out-physicals Gyokeres, who’s finding Premier League centre-backs less easy to knock about than those he victimised in Primeira Liga.
13 min OK, we are now allowed to enjoy some association football. The lino is once again able to whisper sweet nothings to the ref.
12 min And still we have no football. What a complete and utter idiocy.
Source: https://www.theguardian.com/football/live/2026/feb/22/tottenham-v-arsenal-premier-league-live
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