The two points Arsenal lost to Liverpool at Anfield after blowing a two-goal lead against them might be the difference between them and Manchester City in the fight for the Premier League championship. For the best sports betting casinos of April 2023, make sure you visit CasinoDaddy!
Gabriel Martinelli and Gabriel Jesus scored goals in the first half to put the Gunners in command and on track to regain their eight-point advantage atop the standings. Though the Liverpool striker missed a second-half penalty, Roberto Firmino’s 87th-minute header gave the home team a 2-2 draw after Mohamed Salah had pulled one back for Liverpool before halftime.
Nevertheless, if goalkeeper Aaron Ramsdale hadn’t made two incredible saves in injury time to thwart Salah and Ibrahima Konate, it may have been worse for Arsenal.
Arsenal let it slip, giving Manchester City the opportunity.
At Anfield, Arsenal lost two points rather than earned one, and the effects of their inability to cling to a significant victory won’t be apparent for some weeks.
Arsenal would have maintained the edge over Manchester City by knowing they were in control of their championship aspirations had they been able to play out the game and win at Anfield for the first time since 2012. The same can now be said of City, who will defend their championship if they win their next nine games, even though it still holds for Arsenal, who will win the title if they win all eight of their remaining games.
With a game still to play, City can overtake Arsenal and go to the top of the table by defeating the Gunners at the Etihad later this month. Pep Guardiola’s club is known for being ruthlessly effective at this time in the season when they have a game in hand.
After being so dominant in the first half, Arsenal’s failure to end the game will be their main source of worry, according to manager Mikel Arteta. The teams who maintain composure and hold onto lead situations under pressure win titles, and Arsenal failed to do so at Anfield.
The Gunners will be aware of how expensive this draw may be given that City is more than capable of winning every game from this point until the conclusion of the season.
Thus Arsenal’s task is straightforward. They merely need to avoid losing at City later this month. But since they threw away two points at Anfield, they have already lost their margin for error. That will be harder said than done.
Salah continues to struggle when given a penalty shot.
For Liverpool, Mohamed Salah is struggling to find his rhythm while taking penalties. The forward’s failure against Arsenal marked the second time in a month that he has failed to score from 12 yards, and both times he missed the goal.
The Egyptian international missed his penalty attempt against Bournemouth last month as Liverpool fell to a shocking loss against the relegation-threatened team.
After falling behind 2-0 against Arsenal in the first half, Liverpool had an opportunity to tie the game, but Salah missed the right post with his penalty kick, giving the Premier League leaders a major letdown.
Jürgen Klopp, the manager of Liverpool, evidently thought Salah would score based on his celebration on the sidelines before realizing Salah had missed.
Salah has been one of the Premier League’s most dependable penalty-takers in recent years, despite not having a spot-free penalty record for Liverpool. He had scored 18 goals and only missed three of his 21 attempts before his miss against Arsenal, but before his mistake against Bournemouth, he had only squandered two Premier League penalty shots in six years.
Yet Salah’s record has lost some of its lusters due to two misses in a month, and if Liverpool is awarded another penalty this year, it could be time to give someone else a chance to shoot from the spot.
At Anfield, Arsenal’s game management crossed the line into unscrupulous time-wasting, but Mikel Arteta’s team suffered as a result.
Arsenal did everything they could to slow down the clock and disrupt the flow of the game, adding 10 minutes of stoppage time to the game’s 90 minutes. This included goalkeeper Aaron Ramsdale taking longer than necessary to take goal kicks and players collapsing following minimal if any, contact in challenges with their opponents.
Two of the worst offenders were Gabriel Jesus and Gabriel Martinelli, however, despite the evident intention of deflating the tension and preventing Liverpool from gaining momentum, Arsenal’s strategies ultimately had the opposite impact by energizing the audience and Jurgen Klopp’s team.
Referee Paul Tierney should have seen and dealt with the players’ repeated attempts to stall the game by requesting medical attention from the physios, but he could not control the situation.
It was too late for him to exert any power over the game by the time he booked Bukayo Saka in the 84th minute for waiting too long to take a corner.
