Everton (0) 0 - 2 (1) ArsenalGoodison Park, Saturday 13th March 1999FA Carling Premiershipsee below for reports by: Rupe, DerekPreview
Everton (0) 0 - 2 (1) ArsenalGoodison Park, Saturday 13th March 1999FA Carling Premiership
scorers: Parlour 16
Bergkamp 17 (pen)
Arsenal:
Seaman
Dixon Adams Keown Winterburn
Parlour Petit Vieira Overmars
Bergkamp Anelka (Vivas)
sent off: Hutchison (Everton) 18
Petit (Arsenal) 61
Hardly a classic, but another game which Arsenal had to win and did.
With Chelsea's loss at home to West Ham this takes us clear in second
place (see table).
Ref Uriah Rennie continued his excellent form and maintained his 100% Arsenal win record (see Refs section). He even managed to squeeze in a couple of fasionably stupid red cards. To be fair, Hutchison's sending off looked, if anything, more dodgy than Petit's. Rennie spotted an off-the-ball elbowing on Keown, but it didn't seem like Keown had spotted it! Petit's red came for 2 yellow cards (but because it's his 3rd red of the season it counts for a 3 match ban, which will keep him out of the FA Cup semi final). Both were for late tackles on fellow Frenchman Olivier Dacourt. The first, in the first half, looked pretty innocuous. But the second, 15 minutes after the break, was a two-footed lunge that was very much deserving of a booking. Wenger said later that it was a case of a not-quite_fit_again player being a bit off the pace and hence a bit late into the tackle. That seems a fair comment. It's a shame that this will blot Manu's record even more, but I don't think anyone seeing the challenges could think there was anything malicious in them. It's been worrying reading stuff about his threatening to quit (we've heard that there are several big Italian clubs interested in him) but hopefully his teammates will turn him round. Whatever negatives sides there are to playing in England, this man has come from obscurity to become one of the best midfielders in the World under Wenger, and is adored by his fans. Even acknowledging the problems of being picked on for being French (actually Manu it's mostly to do with the fact that you're playing for Arsenal), could things really get any better? Sure, a move to Italy could do for you what it's done for Zidane, but hasn't Arsenal already done that for you? And isn't there just as good a chance that Italy what do for you what it did for Dennis? Anyway, the game... Seaman had to make a good save from Weir's 20 yard shot, diving low to his left to turn it round the post. Seaman got the ball from the corner and threw it quickly to Overmars who roasted a defender on the half-way line and crossed into the box for Anelka. It went a bit high for Nicky, but Bergkamp was able to colect the ball by the goal-line on the right and cut it back for Parlour in the box, but his shot blasted over. Shortly after, Overmars found space on the left wing again, and hit a glorious sweeping cross-field pass to Parlour who beat the keeper from a narrow angle on the right. The second goal came again from nice work by Overmars and Parlour, the latter finishing a one-two and carrying the ball into the box where he was tripped for a penalty. The keeper went the right way, diving low to his right, but Bergkamp was too precise for him and the shot went in just inside the post. After that there were a couple more saves, one at each end. Unsworth hit a great shot from left-hand corner of the area which Seaman could only tip onto the bar - but it was just enough. And at the other end Vivas controlled a pass from Parlour superbly and hit a cracker which forced an equally cracking save.
Result : Everton (0) 0 Arsenal (1) 2
Scorers: Parlour 16, Bergkamp 69 (pen)
Arsenal: Seaman, Dixon, Winterburn, Keown, Adams; Vieira, Petit,
Parlour, Overmars; Bergkamp, Anelka
Subs: Vivas (Anelka 63), Upson (Overmars 88),
Diawara, Kanu, Manninger
Booked: Petit, Adams
Sent off: Petit (61, 2nd bookable offence)
Everton: Myhre, Dunne, Watson, Materazzi, Ball, Weir, Dacourt,
Unsworth, Barmby, Hutchison, Bakayoko
Subs: Grant (Dunne 25), Jeffers (Barmby 74),
Cadamarteri (Bakayoko 74), Simonsen, Short
Sent Off: Hutchison (18, violent conduct)
Booked: Dacourt, Unsworth.
Att: 38049
Ref: Uriah Rennie (Sheffield)
Three points, two goals, two sendings off and another referee hogging
the headlines. Amidst it all there was a football match of sorts and
though Arsenal produced one of their poorest displays of the season, it
was still comfortably good enough to see off Everton. The 3 points were
never really in doubt once Ray Parlour had given the Gunners an early
lead, though curiously their worst spell of the match coincided with the
period when they had a one man advantage.
Arsenal were back at full strength as Petit was in the starting lineup for the first time in 7 games, while Everton took to the field with two defenders in midfield and Hutchison pushed up front with Bakayoko. The game started off quite brightly with Arsenal immediately assuming control. Early on a lovely pass from Bergkamp found Parlour beating the offside trap on the right, but with only Anelka in the box his ball into the middle was cleared. Then a superb quick break should have given Arsenal the lead. A brilliant throw from Seaman found Overmars on the left and he hurdled a desperate challenge on the halfway line to leave himself clear. Anelka and Bergkamp were both making runs unmarked with only one defender in a position to cover, but Overmars' ball into the middle was just too high for Anelka. Bergkamp collected beyond the far post and played it back to Parlour who'd made a late run into the box. It came to him at an awkward height though, and by the time he'd brought it down he had to rush his shot and blazed it over the bar. At the other end, the Arsenal defence were looking a little uncertain at times, Bakayoko's twisting and turning causing a problem or two. Dunno who won the toss, but if it was Adams I think he made the wrong decision because in the first half the Gunners' defenders were obviously having problems with the sun in their eyes when dealing with high balls. Everton's best early chance though came when Winterburn's sloppy clearance went straight to Hutchison, he rode a challenge from Keown, but his attempted pass to Bakayoko was cleared by Adams. The ball however deflected off Petit to Weir, and he carried it forward a short way before striking a shot from 20 yards which had Seaman scrambling to palm it round the post. A couple of minutes later Arsenal took the lead with a brilliantly conceived and executed goal. Overmars played a superb 50 yard cross field pass to pick out Parlour's run into the right side of the area. He took the ball down well with his first touch, and with his second lashed it into the net, beating Myhre at his near post. Not long after that it seemed that the game was virtually over as a contest when Everton were controversially reduced to 10 men. It seemed nobody else in the ground saw the off the ball tussle between Hutchison and Keown which led to the ref Uriah Rennie showing the Everton man the red card for an apparent elbow. In fact I at first thought it was Keown who'd been sent off. However, once the furore had died down, it seemed to be Arsenal who were most affected as they failed to really take advantage, and seemed to become rather slapdash with passes going astray all too regularly. At one point Everton were down to 9 men for about 5 minutes when Dunne went off injured, but Arsenal still couldn't press press home their advantage. Parlour did again get free on the right, but his whipped ball across the 6 yard box was just too far in front of Anelka. Overmars also had a couple of good runs down the left, and Bergkamp had a 20 yard shot which went close, but otherwise the most significant event of the rest of the half was Petit's booking. It was a fairly innocuous trip on Dacourt which was made to look a lot worse than it was by the blue shirted Frenchman's salmon-like leap into the air. He got enough height to have executed 3 and half somersaults with twist and pike, a dive with a high degree of difficulty if I'm not mistaken. The 2nd half started off in similarly scrappy fashion, but ironically improved as a spectacle when Rennie evened things out by sending Petit off for a second bookable offence. No question that the yellow card was deserved this time though. Perhaps it was because Everton relaxed a bit, or maybe that their earlier energetic hassling had tired them out, but Arsenal assumed greater control after Petit went off. Vivas had come on to replace Anelka, and went onto the left side of midfield with Overmars moving forward to support Bergkamp. It was the flying Dutchman who played the supporting role as Parlour won the penalty which increased Arsenal's lead. A brilliantly angled return pass from Overmars gave Parlour a clear run into the area which was stopped when Unsworth slid in to trip him just inside the area. Bergkamp cooly slotted the spot kick just inside Myhre's right hand post, out of the keeper's reach as he dived the right way. That was more or less it, though Everton did gamely press forward. Ball got away down the left and his ball into the middle was diverted inches over his own crossbar by Adams. In the final few minutes Everton were also unlucky to hit the crossbar when a ball in from the left deflected to Unsworth just inside the area out on the right. He hit a tremendous volley which Seaman did well to get a slight touch to and the ball crashed back off the crossbar, and I think it was Weir who screwed the rebound back across goal. At the other end Arsenal nearly added gloss to the scoreline a couple of minutes from the end, following another good run from Parlour. A lovely flick by Overmars released him down the right, and he cut in along the edge of the area before spotting Vivas in space in the left of the area and whipping a pass across to him. The Argentinian controlled it well and lashed in a volley which seemed goalbound until Myhre somewho got a hand to it to make a fantastic tip over the bar. A good result for Arsenal, but not a terribly satisfactory performance. They seemed to take the match for granted once Hutchison was sent off and the last thing we needed was another red card, particularly for Petit. Admittedly he was unlucky with the first booking, but the second tackle was rash in the extreme, and both came about after he'd failed to control slightly overhit passes from Winterburn, and I suspect his reported disillusionment after the match was borne out of frustration as much with himself as the ref. Seems like I'm alone in thinking the ref didn't have that bad a match, at least in terms of decisions purely on fouls/tackles, etc., though admittedly his decisions over when to use his cards was somewhat random. Adams was also booked for an innocuous looking obstruction, but escaped later for a bad lunge from behind on Bakayoko. Dacourt also got away with a couple of fouls and a clear handball after being booked, and Unsworth only got booked for his trip when Parlour was through on goal (though to be fair Watson might have been judged to be in a position to cover). Rennie was under a lot of pressure from a crowd (being mischievously provocative) who haven't exactly been noted for being racially tolerant in the past. Don't think I've ever seen a home crowd get so irate over decisions that more often than not were clearly correct. Perhaps it's been so long since they've seen real football that they've forgotten what it's all about.
Seaman 7.5 Couple of good saves, but otherwise little to do.
Winterburn 7.0 A little sloppy and uncertain a couple of times
defensively, but at others a committed as ever.
Dixon 7.5 Reasonably good game overall.
Adams 7.0 Also looked a little uncertain on occasion.
Keown 7.5 Reasonably solid, despite being loudly booed every
time he got the ball. Didn't help his cause by waving
ironically at the Everton fans though.
Vieira 7.0 Quiet and in & out sort of game.
Parlour 8.5 Easily Arsenal's best player.
Petit 6.0 From the sublime of Tuesday to the ridiculous. Stupidly
sent off, but otherwise looked very rusty with his
first touch repeatedly letting him down.
Overmars 8.0 Had a pretty good game overall, and set up both goals
with superb passes.
Bergkamp 6.5 Rather frustratingly peripheral again.
Anelka 6.5 Also fairly quiet again, apart from a couple of good
runs in the second half.
Vivas Did reasonably well on the left side of midfield.
Upson Only on for the final few minutes, but strangely went
into the left of midfield as well, rather than defence.
Derek
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