{"id":21109,"date":"2022-05-02T07:11:55","date_gmt":"2022-05-02T07:11:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/?p=21109"},"modified":"2022-05-02T07:11:55","modified_gmt":"2022-05-02T07:11:55","slug":"arsenal-win-at-west-ham-to-stay-in-fourth-place","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/2022\/05\/02\/arsenal-win-at-west-ham-to-stay-in-fourth-place\/","title":{"rendered":"Arsenal win at West Ham to stay in fourth place"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two goals from central defenders, both following corners, and an overall performance that was unconvincing. Mikel Arteta did not care. To the\u00a0Arsenal<\/a>\u00a0manager it was not about how the victory came or in what kind of style. It was simply about the result.<\/p>\n

Arsenal could feel the pressure, with Tottenham having beaten Leicester earlier in the day to jump above them into fourth place. Arteta\u2019s team had to react and they did so, keeping the dream alive of a first Champions League qualification since 2016. The north London derby at Spurs\u2019 stadium on 12 May looks increasingly like a potential blockbuster.<\/p>\n

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Rob Holding, in for the injured Ben White, had not scored since September 2019 but he capitalised on loose West Ham marking on a Bukayo Saka delivery to make it 1-0.<\/p>\n

With one eye, surely, on Thursday\u2019s Europa League semi-final return at Eintracht Frankfurt \u2013 West Ham are 2-1 down from the first leg \u2013 David Moyes had mixed and matched, starting Tomas Soucek and Michail Antonio on the bench. The manager would lament that they were missed on defensive set pieces as much as anywhere else. Moyes was also without three of his key centre-halves.<\/p>\n

Jarrod Bowen\u2019s equaliser before the interval was merited on the balance of the first half, with Arsenal flat for long spells. But the game turned when the home team could not defend the second phase of another Saka corner. When Gabriel Martinelli crossed, Gabriel Magalh\u00e3es was all alone to power home the header. And that was pretty much that.<\/p>\n

Arsenal might have had more through Eddie Nketiah, who led the line with drive and attitude, albeit without end product. But for Arteta the smooth outweighed the rough. Arsenal had brought an incredible record against West Ham into the game \u2013 20 wins from the previous 27 league meetings, with only two defeats. There would be nothing to blemish that here.<\/p>\n

Moyes asked Aaron Cresswell to play on the left in a central defensive two, with Ryan Fredericks away from his preferred flank at left-back and Bowen filling in up front. With West Ham\u2019s top-four hopes effectively over, there were not the same do-or-die imperatives for them, although they shaded the first half.<\/p>\n

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Jarrod Bowen watches his shot beat Aaron Ramsdale to score West Ham\u2019s equaliser.<\/span>\u00a0Photograph: Katie Chan\/Action Plus\/Shutterstock<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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For Arsenal it was another of those slow starts that so frustrate Arteta; the movement telegraphed, the decision-making \u201csloppy and imprecise,\u201d to quote him; the basic oomph missing.<\/p>\n

The visitors did little until the 38th minute. That was when Martin \u00d8degaard released Nketiah, whose low shot forced Lukasz Fabianski to tip behind. The effort might have been more precise, although Arsenal did not mind because, moments later, they were in front. It was strange to see Holding up against Manuel Lanzini on the corner. He duly brushed him aside and glanced into the bottom corner.<\/p>\n

West Ham had been more proactive up until then. Kurt Zouma had a header blocked while Lanzini saw Holding throw himself in front of a shot after Vladimir Coufal\u2019s cross had deflected. Holding emerged with honours at both ends. Declan Rice also side-footed weakly at Aaron Ramsdale. The equaliser had been signposted. Ramsdale threw up a hand to keep out Rice\u2019s near-post flick from a Pablo Fornals corner and it came when Rice picked out Coufal, who cut back for Bowen. The striker\u2019s first touch set up the shot and the technique on it was excellent, conjuring power, the ball flicking off Magalh\u00e3es and beating Ramsdale. It was his 16th goal of the season \u2013 and 10th in the league.<\/p>\n

West Ham felt that Ramsdale got away with one on 53 minutes when he tore out of his area to stretch into a high challenge on Bowen, who had chased a ball forward and got there first. Moyes called the tackle \u201creckless\u201d and it unbalanced Bowen, who went down. The referee, Mike Dean, felt there was no contact and harshly booked Bowen.<\/p>\n

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Saka, as ever, rarely wasted the ball. He thought that he had put his team back in front, jinking inside and unloading for the near corner, only for Fabianski to turn it behind. But Arsenal did score from the corner when West Ham again caved uncharacteristically.<\/p>\n

Up went a posse of bodies, with Moyes complaining that Holding had led with his arm and handled. When the ball ran through to the far side, Martinelli returned it towards the back post. No one went out to Martinelli and, even worse, nobody tracked the run of Magalh\u00e3es, with Lanzini especially culpable. The header was too strong for Fabianski.<\/p>\n

West Ham had nothing left and they were fortunate that Nketiah did not add to the scoreline from any of three breakaways. \u201cWe won ugly,\u201d Arteta said. Nobody was about to argue.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Two goals from central defenders, both following corners, and an overall performance that was unconvincing. Mikel Arteta did not care. To the\u00a0Arsenal\u00a0manager it was not about how the victory came or in what kind of style. It was simply about the result. Arsenal could feel the pressure, with Tottenham having beaten Leicester earlier in the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":21110,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_post_source_name":"","_post_source_url":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3295],"tags":[285,10632,8587,1911,169,5262,2311,10319,12635,10505,6029,3830,8240,306,8123,746,5247,11638,12377,11111,301,3684,12791,4807,6831,12287,7964,11973,8900,8045,2103,11259,1935,8840,7419,723,6219,10885,6218,6571,594],"class_list":["post-21109","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world-sport","tag-arsenal","tag-attitude","tag-bukayo-saka","tag-champions-league","tag-chelsea","tag-cut","tag-david-moyes","tag-declan-rice","tag-delivery","tag-die","tag-eddie-nketiah","tag-eintracht-frankfurt","tag-europa-league","tag-everton","tag-eye","tag-feel","tag-football","tag-forced","tag-gabriel-magalhaes","tag-injured","tag-leicester","tag-london","tag-manager","tag-mikel-arteta","tag-missing","tag-movement","tag-north","tag-one","tag-pablo","tag-rice","tag-richarlison","tag-shot","tag-spurs","tag-strong","tag-the-game","tag-tottenham","tag-upton-park","tag-victory","tag-west-ham","tag-white","tag-who"],"blocksy_meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21109","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21109"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21109\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21110"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21109"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21109"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21109"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}