Gunners turn on the style to crush Reds’ top-4 hopes
Print Edition
ARSENAL delivered a brutal lesson in fast-paced Premier League football to beat Liverpool 4-1 yesterday, maintaining its faint title aspirations and almost certainly dashing its opponents’ hopes of a top-four finish.
While Liverpool’s defending at the Emirates was catastrophic at times, Arsenal fizzed with intent and three goals in eight first-half minutes from Hector Bellerin, Mesut Ozil and Alexis Sanchez and a late curler from Olivier Giroud secured a 10th Premier League win in 11 matches.
That moved it above Manchester City into second place on 63 points, four behind leader Chelsea, which will be looking over its shoulders at its in-form London rival even though Jose Mourinho’s side has two games in hand.
Fifth-placed Liverpool, whichnetted a penalty through Jordan Henderson before Giroud’s effort, now look out of the running in the battle for Champions League qualification after a second consecutive defeat.
A miserable afternoon for the visitors was capped off by a late red card for Emre Can and the result meant the gap to fourth place could be extended to eight points if Manchester United beats Aston Villa later in the day.
While much of the pre-match debate had focused on Liverpool forward Raheem Sterling’s on-going contract impasse, within minutes of kickoff it was clear that more pressing issues lay with the visitors’ defense.
Liverpool’s back-three spent the opening minutes regularly gifting the ball to the hosts in dangerous areas and its only chance of the half was inexplicably wasted by Lazar Markovic, who tried and failed to pass to Sterling when through on goal.
The breakthrough came after 37 minutes when Bellerin was allowed time to cut inside the Liverpool box before curling a superb finish past Simon Mignolet.
Clean sheets
Given its defending on the day it seemed remarkable that it was the first goal Liverpool had conceded on the road in more than nine hours after keeping six successive clean sheets.
Arsenal doubled the lead two minutes later when Ozil stepped up to curl a free kick around the wall and into the net and Sanchez smashed home from outside the box to make it 3-0.
The hosts would have increased their lead but for a stunning save from Mignolet to deny Giroud’s header at the start of the second half before Liverpool was given a faint lifeline when Sterling was felled in the box. Henderson squeezed his penalty past David Ospina with 14 minutes left.
Any hope of a comeback was extinguished, however, when Can received a second yellow card for a foul on substitute Danny Welbeck and Giroud added a coat of gloss when he curled in from 20 meters in stoppage time.
Meanwhile, James Rodriguez will return to Real Madrid’s starting lineup for today’s La Liga game at home to Granada after being out for two months with a broken bone in his foot, coach Carlo Ancelotti said yesterday.
The Colombia midfielder, who has had a fine debut season since joining from Monaco in July, sustained the injury in the league game against Sevilla in early February and will come back into the side in place of the suspended Isco.
“James is fine and will start the match tomorrow,” Ancelotti said.
The return of James is a welcome boost for the European champion which has lost three of its last four matches in all competitions.
After winning last month’s ‘Clasico’ at home to Real 2-1, Barcelona is four points clear of its arch rival at the top with 10 games left and visits Celta Vigo today.
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