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West Ham 1-3 Arsenal
By Tom Humphrey
Arsenal came from behind to beat West Ham 3-1 in Saturday’s London derby at Upton Park. The Gunners started promisingly with French striker Olivier Giroud looking dangerous early on, forcing a good save from Jussi Jaaskelainen who tipped his shot round the post. Andy Carroll then blocked Giroud’s goal-bound effort as Arsenal continued to create chances.
Like so many times in years gone by, Arsenal were punished for their failure to find the net. Mohamed Diame went past Aaron Ramsey with ease before curling in a lovely effort into the far corner. Arsenal were behind in a game they had dominated. Could they come back and win it, or would they continue to do what they’ve done for many years now and lost games they should have won?.
West Ham’s goalscorer Diame was lucky to be on the pitch not long after his goal. He was booked for his celebration and not long after a nasty foul on Mikel Arteta went unpunished.
The visitors deservedly got themselves back in the game with a few minutes to go until half time. Lukas Podolski crossed in for Olivier Giroud to tuck in his first Premier League goal for the club. The Frenchman couldn’t hide his delight and relief after going 303 minutes in the league without a league goal for the club. He’d been getting the chances, just hadn’t been taking them.
Giroud can’t hide his delight after getting his first Premier League goal for the club.
Arsenal didn’t start the second half as brightly as they ended the first. Andy Carroll headed wide having beaten Mannone to the ball in the air. Kevin Nolan then wasted a golden opportunity to give the hosts the lead when he was clean through on goal.
Theo Walcott was brought on with half an hour remaining to inject some energy into Arsenal’s attack, replacing a tired Gervinho. With 16 minutes to go, Giroud played a delightful ball through to Walcott, who improved his chances of playing as a striker by scoring his fourth goal of the season when clean through on goal.
Walcott celebrates giving Arsenal the lead.
Nolan missed another good chance to score for West Ham and he was punished when Santi Cazorla’s dipping effort went past Jaaskelainen to seal an important win for the Gunners at a difficult ground to visit.
Cazorla and Andre Santos embrace after the Spaniard’s goal seals all three points for the Gunners.
One sad note on this game is that Kieran Gibbs is a doubt to play for England after picking up a thigh injury in this game and he had to be taken off in the 56th minute to be replaced by Andre Santos. Next up for Arsenal is Norwich away after the international break.