Brondby vs Arsenal

20th October 1994, Brondby Stadium Copenhagen

Brondby 1 (0) Arsenal 2 (2)
Strudal 53    Wright 16, Smith 18

Arsenal:
  Seaman, Dixon, Adams, Bould, Winterburn, Schwarz, 
  Jensen, Parlour, Smith, Campbell, Wright.

I haven't had a report from someone who was there yet. I'm putting the following on because of the shameful lack of TV coverage of the game. It's from Marc Eld's view of the match as seen on (Danish) telly, plus some (italicised) comments of my own, drawn from the Radio 5 commentary.

In the first minute Brondby had their first shot at goal. Tipped over the bar at full stretch by Seaman when it looked to have him beaten. For the next ten minutes the midfield was the battle arena. Both Arsenal wingers did well, in particular I was both surprised and impressed with Parlour (who the danish commentator insisted calling Parloor for first 30 mins). Wright did very well to get to a cross from the left but headed just wide with keeper possibly beaten. Shortly after Parlour reached a ball just inside the line on the right, crossed well and Wright slotted home when the Brondby defender in front just jumped right up and down with the no real wish to get contact. Wright's header described as a powerful jacknife-style affair. At this stage it seemed to me that Brondby was scared of Arsenal. This was around 20mins. Brondby having been on top right up to when Wright scored, this turned the game totally and Arsenal dominated the rest of the first half. A few minutes later Smith pounced a ball played back from Rieper (Everton is considering paying 1m for him Mike Walker was not at the game, but Dalglish and another manager, maybe Keegan, were there apparently to look at Rieper. ) into the box, the keeper tried to kick away rather than block Smith, and the ball got a toe from Smith and ran slowly into goal. 2-0 to the Arsenal who now stopped pressing Brondby as energeticly as they did in the start.

In the 2nd half Brondby scored following a free kick inside the Arsenal half. It was played long to the left where Dixon was beaten, Bould didn't follow Strudal into the box, 1-2. Brondby generally dominated the half creating a number of opportunities, showing what they could have achieved had they been better mentally prepared and had they won the midfield battle from the start. Parlour was rubbish in the 2nd half spending most of his on telly time waving his arms around in frustration.

A good result for us, but we did get a few bookings which we should have avoided. Dixon got booked for sliding in on a player who had just fouled Parlour. Dixon was also lucky later not to get his second yellow. the commentators seemd to think he'd lost his cool rather for a long spell towards the end of the match. They also commented on how hard Adams was working on calming the Arsenal defence down in face of fierce pressure.i Looked to me that Dixon got it as the ref wanted to quite things at the time. Schwarz got one for not walking away from a free kick. Really stupid. On this incident: the commentators thought that the Brondby player was guilty of a little "gamesmanship" - taking the free-kick early in order to get the booking for Schwarz rather than because it was to their advantage. Schwarz now misses the second leg at Highbury through suspension.

Report by Marc Eld with additions by Rupert Ward.

Report on the Second Leg now also available.

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