(1) 2 - 0 (0) ArsenalHillsborough. Saturday 22nd November 1997FA Carling PremiershipPreview
Please note: Report and result etc will be later than usual I'm afraid, as I'm away for the weekend. It should be done Sunday evening sometime.(1) 2 - 0 (0) ArsenalHillsborough. Saturday 22nd November 1997FA Carling Premiership
scorers: Booth 42
Whittingham 86
Not many details yet I'm afraid as I've just got back and haven't
even had time to read the papers. I'm going to have a look at
AFCi and the
Other Arsenal sites and
suggest you do the same!
On the news I saw their first goal and it looked like an extraordinarily bad back-pass from Grimandi gifted Booth the chance. Let's hope we can follow up this loss, away to a lesser club, with as good a home performance as we did when beating Man Utd after the Derby defeat. Next match: Liverpool at Highbury next Sunday.
We've dropped a few points off the lead now, in third behind
ManUtd and Blackburn. See
table.
FA Carling Premiership
Sheffield Wednesday vs Arsenal Sat Nov 22 1997
Result : Sheffield Weds (0) 1 Arsenal (0) 0
Scorers: Booth 42, Whittingham 86
Arsenal: Seaman, Dixon, Winterburn, Keown, Adams, Grimandi; Platt,
Parlour, Mendez, Overmars; Wright
Subs: Hughes (Parlour 38), Marshall (Grimandi 51),
Wreh (Mendez 54), Upson, Manninger
Booked: Grimandi, Adams, Platt
Sheff Wed: Pressman, Atherton, Nolan, Pembridge, Newsome, Walker,
Whittingham, Magilton, Rudi, Booth, Di Canio
Subs: Carbone (Di Canio 79), Hyde (Magilton 84),
Clarke, Blondeau, Humphreys
Booked: Nolan, Atherton
Att: 34373
Ref: K W Burge (Tonypandy)
A 2nd successive away defeat for Arsenal, disappointing in that it was
against a team struggling near the foot of the table. In mitigation
though, Wednesday were bound to be highly motivated by their first game
under a new manager, and Arsenal were without Bergkamp, Petit, Vieira,
Bould and Anelka. I also felt the Gunners were a little unlucky not to
have scored in the 2nd half, and the 2-0 scoreline somewhat flattered
the home team, but nonetheless I came away feeling that we should have
done better.
With Bergkamp and Anelka both unable to play through suspension and injury respectively, Wenger chose to play Wright on his own up front, with Overmars and Mendez, in his first league start for Arsenal, presumably supposed to be giving him support on either flank. Keown returned to the defence as Wenger decided to start with 3 centre halves for the first time this season. The result in the first half at least, was a game virtually devoid of clear cut openings, as Arsenal struggled to keep hold of the ball in the attacking third of the field with Wright on his own much of the time, and the Wednesday attack similarly struggled to make any impact on Arsenal's 3 man central defensive wall. For the home team, Rudi had a shot from the edge of the area and carefully placed it a couple of yards wide, and Di Canio tricked his way into space for a couple of dangerous crosses which didn't quite find a colleague in the middle. At the other end a tremendous long ball from Adams (I think) sent Overmars away down the left, but as he checked back to wait for support, Nolan clattered violently in from behind to earn himself a booking. Arsenal's most effective player in the early stages was Parlour, but midway through the half he was also hacked down late from behind by Atherton. The foul earned the Wednesday captain a booking and Parlour knee ligament damage which forced his substition a few minutes later. Ironically it was the substitute Hughes who had the first really noteworthy attempt on goal seconds after coming on. Wright did well on the left, getting to the byline before chipping over a left foot cross which Hughes, running into the box, met with a thumping header from 12 yards. Pressman though, was equal to it, arching to tip the ball over the bar. From the corner there was a bit of a scramble but the ball was eventually hacked clear for another corner. A couple of minutes later and the Owls were in front, courtesy of a terrible mistake by Grimandi. Magilton played a ball forward which Grimandi seemed well placed to intercept comfortably. I think he actually tried to play a first time pass square to Adams, but the ball sliced off his foot and went between Adams and Seaman, turning into a perfect pass for Booth to run onto. He slotted the ball into the net underneath Seaman as the keeper belatedly charged out. The second half was somewhat more lively, as Arsenal made two early substitutions. Marshall replaced the luckless Grimandi after he dislocated his shoulder, and Wreh came on for Mendez. The effect was to give Wright more support and helped Arsenal to apply some sort of sustained pressure on the Wednesday defence for much of the 2nd half. Some of Arsenal's better attacking play came down the right through Dixon as the old boy consistently got forward in support. Arsenal's best effort came from one of his crosses, as he was put in by a nice pass from Platt, which he clipped in low and hard. Wreh, running in met it on the volley from about 12 yards, but his cracking shot flashed narrowly wide of the near post. Later Dixon himself was put in again, I think by another pass by Platt, but running in on goal from an angle he sidefooted a shot narrowly wide of the opposite post. On the other flank his effort was matched by his opposite number Winterburn. Wright and Wreh combined well to send Overmars into space down the left. He checked back before rolling a pass into Nutty's path as he charged into the area. He took the pass well to work himself some space for a shot which he hit with the outside of his left foot. It was on target and would have seriously troubled Pressman, but the ball took a deflection off a defender and shaved the near post and went into the side netting. Dixon had a goalbound effort blocked by the ref, and put another shot from the edge of the box narrowly over. Overmars was sent racing clear down the left by a good early pass from Wright, but support in the middle was very slow arriving and the Dutchman lost the ball as he tried to hold it up. Hughes had a good run into the area on the left, but his cutback was just nicked away from Wright by a defender. As far as I recall that was pretty much it for Arsenal's attacking efforts, while at the other end Wednesday occasionally looked dangerous on the break. From one of these the ball pinged around the 6yd box but somehow a home player failed to get a significant touch and Seaman eventually gratefully grabbed the loose ball. And the game was effectively up for Arsenal 5 minutes from time. Hughes was muscled off the ball by Rudi whose quick pass sent Carbone away down the left. He played the ball early and square to pick out Whittingham's run into the middle. All on his own he had a fairly simple job of sidefooting a shot past Seaman from 15 yards. Towards the end, having been earlier booked for a trip on Di Canio (which brought on the physio to give treatment to the apparently mortally wounded Italian for the 63rd time, who needless to say was skipping around unaffected seconds later), Adams was extremely lucky to stay on the field after a very late and rash lunge at Booth. The ref had already blown for an earlier foul and I can only assume neither he nor the linesman saw the incident. After the final whistle Wright, as usual, came over to applaud the away fans and was rewarded by being jeered by a few and being given a wanker sign by at least one. Not surprisingly he took exception to this and offered to see the guy outside, but I don't know whether his offer was taken up. Overall a pretty poor performance from an admittedly depleted Arsenal side. I don't know whether Wenger's tactics were right, but I must admit I'd have preferred to see a more attacking lineup. Maybe it was partly that the personnel on the day didn't perform up to scratch, but on his own up front Wrighty was always going to struggle against Walker's pace with scant support from Overmars and Mendez, and I thought Arsenal looked better when Wreh came on to partner him. Individually I don't think I could point to any player and say he had a spectacularly bad game (though obviously Grimandi made one spectacularly bad error). It was more a collective lack of confidence and team work, particularly going forward.
Seaman 7.0 The first goal did go through his legs, but it would be
very harsh to blame him for that, and he had little
chance with the second. Otherwise had little to do.
Winterburn 6.5 Got forward as enthusiastically as ever in the 2nd half
but also gave the ball away several times in dangerous
areas late in the game.
Dixon 7.5 Probably the pick of the team, going forward.
Keown 7.5 Again looked pretty solid.
Adams 7.0 Also reasonably solid, though it must have been
frustration which caused him to risk a red card late on.
Grimandi 6.0 I didn't think he played all that badly, apart from that
one horrendous error which basically cost Arsenal the
game.
Parlour 7.0 Looked in pretty good form and was Arsenal's most
effective player early on, but this obviously marked
him out and Wednesday's hatchet man put him out of the
game with a disgraceful late tackle.
Platt 7.0 Like most of the rest, pretty quiet in the first half,
but had a reasonable game in the second, being the main
controller in midfield.
Hughes 6.5 Didn't think he played too badly, but too easily knocked
off the ball before the 2nd goal.
Mendez 6.0 Looked a bit overawed and largely ineffective, though he
did have a couple of promising runs.
Overmars 6.0 Also pretty disappointing on the whole, though he did
have a spell in the 2nd half where he looked a threat.
Wright 6.0 He did have a pretty poor game overall, but for most of
it he was playing a role to which he is not well suited.
His tendency to sulk when things aren't going well
doesn't necessarily mean he's trying, so I think the
so-called fans who abused him at the end were out of order.
Wreh 6.5 Again I thought he didn't do too badly, and he does
look like he's trying his best.
Report by Derek
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