Gunners take advantage of Man City mistakes
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Arsenal FC has further extended its lead over Manchester City in the Premier League. The North Londoners narrowly won 1-0 (1-0) against Brighton & Hove Albion, coached by Fabian Hürzeler. Bukayo Saka (9th minute) scored the goal of the evening early on. However, his harmless shot from the edge of the penalty area only ended up in the net due to a mistake by Brighton goalkeeper Bart Verbruggen.
Hürzeler criticized the league leaders’ style of play after the final whistle. “Only one team tried to play football,” said the former St. Pauli coach. “I’ll ask you a question: Have you ever seen a goalkeeper go down three times in a Premier League game? You can’t control things like that, that’s why the Premier League has to find a rule. I expressed my opinion before the game and I stand by it. Ultimately I think you can only punish such opponents with a win, so I have no arguments for myself today. If I had won 2-1, a deserved 2-1, I could talk about it differently.”
Even before the game, Hürzeler had criticized the sometimes long execution of standard situations. “Nobody notices this, but when Arsenal have a corner and are in the lead, sometimes they spend over a minute just taking the corner. That’s why we have to set clear rules, otherwise we end up with a net playing time of 50 minutes instead of sometimes 65 minutes,” he said.
Premier League: Man City makes a mistake, United cannot take advantage of their superiority
Manchester City only managed a 2-2 (1-0) draw against relegation candidate Nottingham Forest despite leading twice. This meant the gap to leaders Arsenal grew to seven points. However, Pep Guardiola’s team played one game less.
City actually had everything under control against Nottingham. The star ensemble dominated the game, but only led by one goal at halftime through Antoine Semenyo (31′). Morgan Gibbs-White (56th) brought the guests back into the game after a counterattack, but just six minutes later Rodri scored with a header for City. But Forest didn’t give up and came back again, Elliot Anderson (76′) scoring from nowhere.
The lead to third place even increased due to the points gained and the defeat of city rivals Manchester United. Despite being in the majority for more than 45 minutes, the Red Devils lost 1:2 (1:1) at Newcastle United. Jacob Ramsey was shown a yellow-red card for Schwalbe in stoppage time in the first half. Even before the side whistle, Anthony Gordon gave the Magpies the lead with a penalty, which Casemiro equalized (45+9). After the break, United pressed for a long time before William Osula scored the winning goal on the counterattack in the 90th minute. National player Nick Woltemade was missing with a cold.
