Arsenal Away Drew 1 – 1
No place for Redmond at Arsenal despite his weekend goal, so Saints were unchanged as they held the upper hand in a near-the-bottom v near-the-top clash. Indeed, if there were such a thing as an in-game table, we’d soon have been at the very top, thanks to an 18th minute strike by Walcott, created by a nice channel ball by Adams and finished with a dink over Leno. It was no more than the team deserved as they dominated the first third against out of sorts opponents. The remainder of the opening half was more even but the closest the Gunners came was when a cross took an alarming deflection towards goal off Bednarek. The pattern continued as the game got underway again, but then a determined run by Saka, a promising young Englishman, continued with the ball finding its way to Aubameyang and ended with it in the back of McCarthy’s net. Suddenly the match dynamic changed and of course that statistic about points dropped from winning positions found its way onto Amazon’s screen – another game, another streaming service. Ralph was seen to be lining up Redmond to come on, presumably for Walcott, when Theo made another telling contribution, this time turning Gabriel Magalhăes who pulled him back to earn a second yellow card. The manager’s substitution plans suddenly became more adventurous with both Walcott and Armstrong off and Redmond and Djenepo on. I don’t suppose any of our opponents fancy a game against Southampton at the moment, and certainly not when a man short, so Arsenal found the last half hour difficult. The nearest to an away winner came when Redmond stretched to get on the end of Romeu’s lob but could only strike the bar. Djenepo took a tumble in the box and to my mind it was in the category of “seen them given by Stockley Park,” even if the commentary team didn’t give his appeal much credence. It had been a game there for the winning, but not losing was important too, although we can close to achieving that unlikely result in added time when Holding, another promising young Englishman, headed a free kick against the bar.
LSSC Man of the Match: Che Adams. It was a fine piece of play that created Walcott’s goal and he was altogether more prominent than Ings – in fact Danny was maybe fortunate not to have been substituted.
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