Nineteen Premier League Goals were scored yesterday, and Arsenal didn’t get any of them.
Van Persie plundered 30 league goals last season, and as suspected, the goals dried up yesterday as he completed his switch to Old Trafford.
Lucas Podolski and Oliver Giroud both failed to impress on their debuts for the club, with the latter guilty of a glaring miss from 12 yards.
These are worrying times for Arsenal, with beleaguered boss Arsene Wenger admitting the club may never be able to replace their talismatic skipper.
“I never denied we lost a world-class player.” Remarked Wenger. “Don’t get me wrong. Robin is very difficult to replace.”
And it showed as new strikers Lukas Podolski and Olivier Giroud failed to impress, seemingly unable to find their shooting boots with just four of the fourteen shots the Gunners managed on target.
Substitute Giroud was guilty of a miss from 12 yards which summarised Arsenal’s inadequacy up front.
Sunderland were the fastest team out of the blocks, when a James McClean shot forced Szczesny into the first save of the match with just four minutes gone.
New signing Santi Cazorla then came close a couple of times for Arsenal, with Mignolet equal to his effort five minutes in, before he fizzed an effort from deep inside the penalty wide.
The Gunners seized control of the tie half way into the first half when Sunderland had to deal with two successive corners, the second of which found Theo Walcott who could only contribute to the catalogue of misses as the first half came to a tepid close.
Cazorla again sent a drive wide of the target on the hour mark, whilst Walcott volleyed a sot just over the bar.
At this point, Wenger began to get a bit anxious, and hauled off Podolski for Giruod, whilst Louis Saha made his first appearance for his new club after his switch from Tottenham, replacing Stephane Sessegnon.
The substitution failed to make dividends though, when a through ball from the impressive Santi Cazorla found its way to Giroud, he could only skew his effort from 12 yards wide of the goal on a frustrating afternoon for Arsenal.
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1 Comments
Funny article, if 19 goals were scored against some teams and arsenal got none of them, what is wrong with that? Arsenal definitely conceded none and that tells you arsenal are in a firm pole than teams like liverpool who has the poorest record among the top teams recently. give arsenal some credit as no manager including man u, city, can use the players used for the past years without severing the the top four. by far wenger is the best whether the media like it or yes.