Chapter 76: Victory over West Ham
Arsenal's continuous moves in the transfer market are dizzying, perhaps Arsenal does not have the madness of Manchester City and the excitement of Chelsea's bombshell in the transfer market; But Arsenal's clean streak of transfers didn't give anyone else a chance to react at all, and by the time everything had been made public, Arsenal had already announced a number of squad upgrades to the squad.
In the 23rd round of the Premier League, Arsenal's opponent in this round is West Ham, who are at the bottom of the table. It is a London derby between two teams that could potentially qualify for the final of this season's Carabao Cup. Before the game, news came from the English side that Grant would be relieved of his role as West Ham manager regardless of the outcome of this game. Previously, Grant led the Hammers to successive victories in the FA Cup and League Cup.
West Ham, who have essentially locked up their relegation places, can only hope for a miracle in the next 15 rounds, and only then will they be able to stay in the Premier League. For West Ham at this time, the poor record and the change of manager have made them uninterested in playing now, and they don't have much morale at all.
Arsenal have had some problems at the back, with goalkeeper Szczesny continuing to replace the injured Fabianski, centre-backs Squeerraci and Vermaelen still recovering from injuries and full-back Sagna on suspension. So Julu and Eboue got the chance to start.
goalkeeper Szczesny; Eboue, Djourou, Koscielny, Klich at the back; midfielders Alexander Song, Theo Walcott, Cesc Fabregas and Nasri; Twin strikers Van Persie and Xiao Qing.
Although Arsenal's current strength has been affected by injuries and other reasons, Arsenal is still very confident of winning the game against the vice-captain team. Especially now that Xiao Qing is back in the team. Van Persie is also gradually regaining his form; Arsenal's strongest fireline is basically declaring that it has reached its strongest form. Arsenal are certainly more dynamic in attack right now.
is like a famous quote in the domestic TV series "New Three Kingdoms" in early 2010. "My big axe has been hungry for a long time!"
Although it was a hat-trick in the semi-finals of the League Cup, it was only a match against a Championship team; So now Xiao Qing needs more goals, and he needs to score the first goal in the second half of the league as well. Xiao Qing scored 24 goals in the first half of the game, but he has not been able to score in the second half until now, which has to be said to be an embarrassment.
In the fourth minute, Van Persie competed for a high ball to Xiao Qing, and West Ham defender Fabert scrambled to clear the ball with a beautiful barb. In the eighth minute, Nasri's right-footed long-range shot from 30 yards out was directly confiscated by West Ham goalkeeper Green.
The Arsenal players are full of confidence. They were absolutely sure to win the game, with Arsenal telling West Ham with a ferocious attack from the start of the game; Although it is a team in the same city, Arsenal at this time will not be polite, even if West Ham is now at the bottom of the standings, Arsenal will not have the slightest sympathy. Because Arsenal are hungry for a win in the game, because the Gunners now need more goals.
In the fourteenth minute of the game, the West Ham defenders failed to make an offside position, they only noticed Xiao Qing in the middle to attract the defense, they did not notice that Van Persie had been quietly in the West Ham defense at this time. Nasri sent in a brilliant pass, and Van Persie quickly rushed towards goal; The West Ham players chased back in panic and signalled for Van Persie to be offside. But the referee doesn't think so, it's a clean anti-offside!
Van Persie stepped up. Van Persie hooks the ball back before it goes out of the line; Gently knocking the ball towards the middle, Xiao Qing, who was following up, met the attacking West Ham goalkeeper with an easy cushion shot to help the team open the scoring.
1-0, Arsenal took the lead on the road and they are now continuing their progress; Xiao Qing is also very satisfied, he scored in the league again, and he did not feel like losing his goals because of the ban. Although the opponents in the past two games are generally weak, they are still scoring goals here, and Xiao Qing is still in a very good state now, which is enough for Xiao Qing; He doesn't care about the strength of his opponent, what he needs to pay attention to is to ensure his own condition, he doesn't need anything else at all, as long as he does his job well, it is enough for Xiao Qing, which is also the foundation for the team to continue to improve.
Xiao Qing got Arsenal off to a good start, and the Gunners look set to pick up another league win; It's just that the current scoreline is not enough to satisfy the Arsenal players because they believe they can do better. Arsenal have absolutely sure that they will not be overturned by West Ham.
Arsenal are now more and more of a strong team, and now they are more and more confident about the game; They are now not arrogant against weaker opponents, and they are confident against strong teams. Now Arsenal is slowly giving more people confidence, and now when Arsenal takes the lead, fans have the confidence to believe that the team can continue to be strong; Even if Arsenal fell behind for a while in the game, the fans still believed that the team could make a comeback in the game.
In the second half, the battle was renewed. In the 48th minute, Van Persie deceived Bridge with a right-footed shot from the right side of the penalty area, and Green saved the ball. In the 55th minute, Arsenal's continuous team cooperation was at the feet of Walcott, and Xiao Qing's long-range shot from the outside was confiscated by Green.
Arsenal intensified their onslaught and continued to play strongly in the second half; Xiao Qing still maintains enough desire to score goals now, although Xiao Qing has scored in the game, although Xiao Qing is now far ahead of the scorer list. But Xiao Qing still wants to do better, and he hopes that he can score more goals.
West Ham, who were pushed to the limit, were also trying to counterattack at this time, they were unwilling to be beaten by Arsenal in this game, and they were not willing to be humiliated by Arsenal at home in the game.
West Ham, who had been unable to touch the ball for a long time, found Specton in the 61st minute through Barella, but the attack of West Ham's two midfielders was quickly intercepted by Arsenal defender Koscielny. Two minutes later, West Ham midfielder Shears' cross from the right was flown straight for Arsenal goalkeeper Szczesny.
Just when West Ham looked to be picking up in attack, they were hit hard by Arsenal; Arsenal, who launched a fierce attack, hit back at West Ham at this time, and their most direct way was to break West Ham's goal again. These are things that must be done for Arsenal and the Arsenal players are confident that they can do it.
In the 68th minute of the game, West Ham, who counterattacked, was cut off by the Arsenal midfielder; Cesc Fabregas split the ball wide, and the terrifying speed of the little tiger Walcott was once again on display, and he frantically sprinted down the flank, and it was difficult for the West Ham players to stop Walcott who was already running.
Walcoat sent a bocce ball to the defense of Bridge on the right side, and Xiao Qing, who followed up in the middle, did not choose to attack himself at all in the face of this goal that was not fast enough, because the current West Ham defense is more focused on him, because the current Xiao Qing's forward partner Van Persie has a good chance, even better than himself. Xiao Qing picked up his right foot to shoot, but just when the West Ham players panicked and prepared to face Xiao Qing's shot, they suddenly found that Xiao Qing actually spared a corner, Xiao Qing created more opportunities for his teammates.
Xiao Qing deliberately missed the front point, and Van Persie scored with his right foot from 10 yards in the middle!
Two to zero! Van Persie's goal helped extend Arsenal's lead, with both of Arsenal's two strikers scoring in the game; The performances of the two strikers also seem to be proving the quality of Arsenal, they are proving that Arsenal can do better!
Arsenal's goal is desperate, and now West Ham can't see any hope of turning around, and even at this time, West Ham's players have almost given up the game, because they know that it is really an almost impossible task to make a comeback on Arsenal, so they naturally lost a little fighting spirit at this time.
West Ham fans left the stadium in droves, and although this is their home stadium, they will not be able to find the Arsenal goal when they see that the team has no chance to fight back against them. So a large number of West Ham fans left the stadium because they knew that this game was a lost game, because they knew that there was not enough trouble for Arsenal at this time.
West Ham's morale has reached a low point, but Arsenal haven't stopped there; The attack that really gave West Ham the real lethal blow was not long in coming, and the goal appeared to be a replica of the previous one.
In the 78th minute of the game, Arsenal broke the ball in midfield again; It's Cesc Fabregas's ball, or the little tiger's quick dribble break. After cutting inside, Xiaofa once again knocked on the middle, and Xiao Qing firmly clung to the West Ham defender Bridge behind him and was about to shoot.
But at this time, Bridge's nervousness was excessive, although Xiao Qing's liliang was very good, but when Bridges pushed hard behind Xiao Qing; Even Xiao Qing didn't react, Bridge, who had completely lost his position, was eager to make amends, but he made a mistake in his busy routine and fouled Xiao Qing to push Xiao Qing down, you must know that this is a forbidden area!
West Ham were completely desperate, and they gave Xiao Qing a penalty! Although Bridge's lack of a red card was considered merciful to the referee, Xiao Qing easily scored in the upper left corner of the goal with a penalty shot.
3-0, Arsenal beat their city rivals at Upton Park to win the game again! (To be continued......)