I was completely wrong about the Gunners. Arsenal have won their third in a row over Wolves by a score of 2-0, giving them a crucial 5-point lead atop the table going into the World Cup pause.
Arsenal have become title contending giants again. Gone are the days of the Gunners lying down and getting rolled over by the likes of City, Liverpool, and Chelsea, along with the embarrassing nights of getting humbled by lower ranked, inferior teams. Arsenal is legit once again…and it’s all down to the perseverance and dedication of one man: Mikel Arteta.
Only a year ago, this man was getting lambasted by every single pundit and ‘football expert’ in the media, as well as by most Arsenal fans (to be fair), as the Gunners constantly underperformed and failed to live up to the lofty expectations of the past. Whether by playing uninspired mercenaries, incompetent journeyman, or players that were jjust not good enough to compete at the highest level, Mikael Arteta’s Arsenal was a joke…until now.
With the introduction of fresh, young, hungry players, such as Bukayo Saka, Martin Odegard, Emile Smith Rowe, Aaron Ramsdale, William Saliba, Gabriel, and Gabriel Martinelli, and the smart acquisitions of experienced, veteran players, such as Gabriel Jesus, Thomas Partey, and Oleksandr Zinchenko, this Arsenal team has transformed from a pathetic excuse for a Top-6 side into a title challenging powerhouse.
And this game against Wolves proved it.
From the first minute of the game to the last minute, Arsenal dominated bottom of the table Wolves. Everything about this game, such as the stats, the chances, the half chances, the momentum swings, etc., all went in Arsenal’s favor as they were the superior team by a mile.
The Wolves players did their best to hold off the Gunners for as long as they could with new manager Julien Lopetegui watching on from the stands, and they did pretty well in the first half as they keep Arsenal at bay. They even had a few chances through Gonçalo Guedes, though he missed both of them by a fraction.
But they weren’t able to keep Arsenal out of their net for long in the second half as only six minutes after the restart, Gabriel Jesus and Fabio Veira connected down the left side of the Wolves defense to get in behind. Then, from a deft dink by Veira into the middle, Martin Odegard blasted Arsenal home into an empty net to suck all the air and hope out of the struggling Wolves side.
To be honest, even though all of Arsenal’s success has surprised me, the emergence of Martin Odegaard as a legit superstar has been the most shocking. After failing to make a name for himself at Real Madrid and Real Sociedad in La Liga, I thought Odegaard had lost his chance at becoming a superstar player as it seemed like his development had stalled out.
Yet, Mikael Arteta has proven me wrong once again as he was able to turn Odegaard from a perineal underachiever (considering his enormous talent) into an inspiring leader for this young Gunners side. It really is great to see Odegard finally live up to the massive hype all of Norway put on him when he was a teenage coming through the ranks.
Nevertheless, another Odegaard blast in the 75th minute sealed the deal for Arsenal as they won this game 2-0, pushing themselves now 5 points ahead of Man City and dooming Wolves to spend the World Cup break adrift at the bottom of the table.
Starting with Wolves, I still believe they will be able to get themselves out of the mess they are in as they not only have brought in an extremely talented manager in Lopetegui, but they also have more than enough talent to stay up.
Having a midfield of Ruben Neves and Joao Moutinho and an attack consisting of Daniel Podence, Pedro Neto, and Gonçalo Guedes should be more than enough for Lopetegui to work with when he takes over, though he might want to upgrade the defense and goaltending positions to solidify their Premier League status.
Simply put, those guys that played back there today just aren’t good enough.
As for Arsenal, they are on FIRE! This is now their 12th win of the season and has risen their points tally to 37, which is the best start ANY Arsenal team has had in the Premier League era. Yup, not even The Invincibles title wining side had as good of a start as this Arsenal team has had.
Now, it would be easy for Gunners fans to get carried away with Arsenal’s title chances with Brentford beating Man City today to create a 5-point gap, but I think they would actually have a point. Out of all the other teams in the Premier League era who had as good a start as the Gunners, none of them finished the season without securing the title.
History is on Arsenal’s side, though they need to keep up their incredible determination and perseverance after the World Cup beak if they have any chance at overcoming the Manchester City juggernaut to win their first Premier League title since the 2003-04 season.
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