Giroud seals Arsenal victory
Print Edition
OLIVIER Giroud scored the decisive spot kick as Arsenal beat Chelsea 4-1 in a penalty shootout to win the FA Community Shield at Wembley yesterday.
After the English Premier League and FA Cup winners were locked at 1-1 following an evenly contested 90 minutes, the Frenchman stroked home after Alvaro Morata and Thibaut Courtois missed for Chelsea, in a shootout that trialled the new ‘ABBA system’.
Chelsea’s Victor Moses opened the scoring when he reacted fastest to smash a loose ball past Petr Cech in the 46th minute before Arsenal substitute Sead Kalasinac equalized in the 82nd, heading home to cap an impressive performance.
Chelsea’s Pedro was dismissed for a nasty lunge on Mohamed Elneny which led to Arsenal’s equalizer while Arsene Wenger’s side also handed a debut to record signing Alexandre Lacazette.
Chelsea begins its title defense when it hosts Burnley on Saturday, while Arsenal entertains Leicester City on Friday to kick off the EPL season.
At a sun-kissed Wembley Arsenal, which beat Chelsea in May to win the FA Cup, started brightly with Lacazette, Danny Welbeck and Alex Iwobi all having early half-chances. Arsenal’s fluid front three continued to cause the EPL champion problems and midway through the half France forward Lacazette saw his curling effort cannon off the post.
Chelsea, which cantered to last season’s league title, grew into the game and Spanish winger Pedro drew a save from Cech with a fearsome drive following a swift counter-attack.
The second half was less than a minute old when Moses, sent off in the FA Cup final defeat, reacted fastest against a static Arsenal defense to thrash home Gary Cahill’s header.
In response, Courtois had to be alert to beat away a fierce, goal-bound cross from Elneny and then a rasping long-range drive from Granit Xhaka before the impressive Kolasinac, a close-season signing from Schalke 04, nodded home a deserved equalizer.
Morata was brought on in the closing stages and the 24-year-old headed narrowly wide late on in what would have been the perfect introduction following his summer arrival from Spanish giant Real Madrid.
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