By David Hytner,at Amex Stadium, & Louise Taylor, at St. James’ Park
“We’re gonna win the league,” Arsenal’s travelling fans chanted Wednesday night and it was hard to disagree.
Their advantage over City at the top of the table is seven points, albeit they have played an extra game. City drew 2-2 at home to Nottingham Forest,also last night.
Arsenal’s wobble – two wins in seven – looks over. It is three wins on the bounce; Tottenham, Chelsea and this.
Arsenal did not come to see the seaside. There were not at Brighton’s Amex Stadium to make friends – which was just as well. It was purely about the points. Mission Eyes On The Prize. They accomplished it and then some.
There were 78 minutes on the clock when the travelling support got wind of Nottingham Forest’s equaliser at Manchester City. How they belted out their anthems at that point – about previous title-winning glories – and when it was all over, there was plenty more from them.
Saka Scores As Goalie Fumbles Badly
Bukayo Saka got the goal early on – it was a personal disaster for the Brighton goalkeeper, Bart Verbruggen – and, thereafter, Arsenal did what they needed to do. Whatever they needed to do.
Nobody manages a game quite like them. Or so the Brighton manager, Fabian Hürzeler, had suggested beforehand.
Arsenal merely doubled down on their approach. It was not pretty. “Anti-football,” yelled the Brighton fans by the press box. For the first 65 minutes – basically until Mikel Arteta introduced Kai Havertz – Arsenal barely played.
Arsenal Grit Teeth Saka’s Goal
What they did do was hold firm, Gabriel Magalhães leading an aggressive defensive effort in the absence of William Saliba, who was out with an ankle problem. For Arsenal, the ends justified the means and there was beauty for them in that.
Hürzeler’s pre-match comments had framed the occasion, conditioning it. “When Arsenal has a corner and they are leading, sometimes they spend over one minute just to take it,” the Brighton manager said.
He feels that the rules are not firm enough; their looseness invites the taking of liberties.
Hürzeler would rage about how Arsenal took them, pretty much from the moment that Saka scored in the ninth minute. And so did the home crowd. It was whenever Arsenal took a throw-in or a set piece. Whenever their players went to ground.
Hürzeler was extremely animated in his technical area – too much so for Arteta, who pointed angrily at him at one point midway through the first half. Watching Hürzeler watching the game, living every moment, was exhausting.
The Beginning
It was end to end at the outset, Arsenal first threatening when Eberechi Eze released Saka only for his cross to flash across goal with nobody in red there.
They went in front when Saka cut inside from the right and shot from the edge of the area.
It took a deflection off Carlos Baleba, throwing Verbruggen, and yet it was a bad look when the ball went through his legs. For Arsenal, it was half the job done.
Brighton brought the intensity at the outset and they were almost gifted a goal in the third minute when David Raya missed a pass to Declan Rice and found only Baleba.
One-on-one with Raya, Baleba went for the lobbed finish but he did not get enough on it, allowing Gabriel to head clear.
Kaoru Mitoma was denied by Gabriel’s block while Georginio Rutter shot at his own teammate, Ferdi Kadioglu, after a good combination between the pair. That was in the 19th minute and the remainder of the half was largely about Arsenal drawing the sting from the contest, Hürzeler hopping about as though he had been stung.
Second Half
Arsenal were in no hurry to restart the second half, holding a team huddle on the pitch – which obviously delighted the Brighton support.
Brighton set about upping the tempo, regenerating some sort of rhythm. It is not easy against this Arsenal team.
Rutter was lively. He could not get enough purchase on a header when well-placed in the 47th minute and there was the moment when he extended Raya with a side-on blast.
The goalkeeper stayed down after the save for treatment. When he got up, he held his left shoulder. He had dived to his right. It was not the only time that Raya went down, Hürzeler unable to cope with the frustration.
Brighton played on the front foot. They pushed. The substitute Yankuba Minteh almost got a low cross to work while Mats Wieffer misdirected a free header – a big chance wasted.
Arsenal stuck to the gameplan. They knew that a clean sheet equalled glory. If they could pinch something at the other end, so much the better. Havertz almost did after Rice had robbed Baleba. The Brighton midfielder got back to thwart him.
Another Arsenal substitute, Leandro Trossard, got his finish all wrong shortly afterwards while Havertz worked Verbruggen towards the very end.
Arsenal’s celebrations after the final whistle were wild, the dreams running in similar fashion. The Brighton fans jeered some more.
*PHOTO CAPTION: Not my fault that I’m this good: Saka seems to say after scoring the only goal of the match.
Osula Damages Man U
Manager Eddie Howe accepts his Newcastle side are at their best when they create chaos and no one in black and white is better at conjuring it than Will Osula.
The maverick Denmark Under-21 striker is, to say the least, unpredictable. No one, least of all Osula himself, ever seems quite sure what he will do at any given moment.
At St. James’ Park though, he stepped off the substitutes’ bench to score a fabulous, virtuoso 90th-minute winner for a home team reduced to 10 men by Jacob Ramsey’s controversial 45th-minute sending off for a perceived dive.
Although Bruno Fernandes enjoyed a fine game in Michael Carrick’s midfield, even he could not quite prevent Ruben Amorim’s interim successor suffering a first Premier League defeat in charge of Manchester United at the ground where he cheered Newcastle from the Gallowgate End as a child.
Coaches’ Comment On Match
If it made a mockery of any title talk at Old Trafford, Manchester United remain third, 12 points clear of Howe’s 12th-placed team who ended a damaging run of three consecutive home league defeats.
“I’m bitterly disappointed,” said Carrick. “We’re not happy with the way we played. It hurts me to say that Newcastle deserved to win. We can’t make excuses. The quality wasn’t good enough.”
Howe did not demur. “Will’s delivered an amazing moment for the supporters here, let’s hope it’s a turning point for him,” said Newcastle’s manager who saw Osula struggle horribly against Qarabag in the Champions League at the same stadium ast week.
“And it’s a big moment for us. We showed we’re competitive against any team. With both 11 and 10 men we deserved to win,” he added.
Matheus Cunha, Bryan Mbeumo and Benjamin Sesko were three names that loomed large on Howe’s shopping list last summer but that trio appeared on Manchester United’s teamsheet. Significantly they would all prove peripheral figures.
How Game Was Played
Indeed with Sandro Tonali at his best in Newcastle’s central midfield and Lewis Hall advancing seamlessly from left-back a visiting team that arrived having collected 19 of a possible 21 points with Carrick at the helm began on the back foot.
Nonetheless Fernandes had ensured that by the end of the first half, they had rallied to the point where Aaron Ramsdale – preferred to Nick Pope and impressing in the home goal – was required to save well from Kobbie Mainoo and then Cunha.
Senne Lammens though was beaten by Anthony Gordon’s latest penalty conversion in first-half stoppage time.
Gordon, Howe’s first-choice centre-forward these days, had been sent tumbling by a sneaky nudge on the back of his thigh from Fernandes’s knee. The England winger, hitherto well minded by Harry Maguire, revelled in striking his kick straight down the middle.
That penalty had been awarded in the aftermath of Ramsey being shown a second yellow card for simulation. “I thought it was incredibly harsh,” said Howe. “Jacob didn’t dive.”
Newcastle Concede Quickly
Newcastle’s players have developed a horrible habit of conceding almost immediately after taking leads and they were at it again before Peter Bankes could blow for half-time.
Sure enough in, contentiously, the ninth minute of added time, Fernandes curled a free-kick in and Casemiro’s glancing header proved too good for Ramsdale.
Howe, who, justifiably, believed nine extra minutes to be excessive, responded by instructing his players to make the game much more direct and force their guests to play long balls.
Meanwhile Fernandes’s attempts to pick Newcastle’s defensive locks were being undermined by his at times unhelpful irritation with the apparent inability of Mbeumo and Cunha to operate on his wavelength.
Fernandes created virtually all the best visiting moments and from one of his prompts Leny Yoro’s header prefaced Ramsdale making an excellent save. An even better save, from Joshua Zirkzee this time, would follow before Osula replaced Gordon and promptly scored his first goal since September.
How Osula Scored
Howe’s wild card had barely stepped on to the pitch before he chased a long ball down in his own half, skillfully kept it in play before cutting inside, dodging Tyrell Malacia and sending a shot curving imperiously beyond Lammens.
With Maguire’s frame blocking his view, the goalkeeper saw it late but the finish was of such high calibre it was suddenly possible to see precisely why Eintracht Frankfurt bid £30m for Osula’s raw talent last year.
ENGLAND: Premier League
Aston Villa – Chelsea 1:4
Brighton – Arsenal 0:1
Fulham – West Ham 0:1
Manchester City – Nottingham 2:2
Newcastle – Manchester Utd 2:1
GERMANY: Bundesliga
20:30Hamburger SV – Bayer Leverkusen 0:1
