Arsenal Vs Stoke City: Recap, Highlights And Analysis

Arsenal returned to Premier League duties on Saturday hosting Stoke City. Here’s the full recap, all the highlights and analysis from the 3-1 win.

With domestic duties now calling, Arsenal hosted a dangerous looking Stoke City side, buoyed by the recent form of their star wingers, Xherdan Shaqiri and Marco Arnautovic. A game fraught with danger, danger that was only compounded by the early concession of a penalty, Arsene Wenger watched on as his side continued their excellent attacking form to haul their way back into the game and ultimately finish in relatively comfortable fashion.

The first half started in typical fashion. Arsenal dominated the early stages, enjoying a lot of possession and creating a few chances, while Stoke threatened on the counter, with Petr Cech making a good save from a long range Marc Muniesa strike and Joe Allen skewing a shot wide from the edge of the area after good build up play from Marco Arnautovic.

The first goal, though, came against the run of play and from the penalty spot. With the ball breaking into the penalty area, Allen pokes it past Granit Xhaka before being hit by a flailing elbow as the Swiss international tries to shield the ball away from his midfield counterpart. It was perhaps a harsh decision on the Gunners but the carelessness shown by Xhaka probably merited the foul.

It was Charlie Adam who, on his 31st birthday, stepped up to convert the resultant spot kick, calmly sending Petr Cech the wrong way after a long delay with Allen receiving treatment to the head.

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The equaliser, though, did not take too long to find. With Arsenal continuing with their patient build-up play, Xhaka found himself on the edge of the area, turned wonderfully, played it square to Alexis Sanchez who, in equally excellent fashion, found an overlapping Hector Bellerin, the man who came on for an injured Shkodran Mustafi earlier in the half. Theo Walcott had made a run into the centre, Bellerin duly found him and Theo simply poked home. Excellent goal and crucial that Wenger’s side were able to score before half-time.

That goal clearly changed the game as, early in the second half, Arsenal continued to dominate the game. Their second goal came shortly after the break and it was an outstanding finish from Mesut Ozil. With Gianelli Imbula filling in at left-back with Erik Pieters off the pitch thanks to picking up a slight knock, Ozil made a run from deep in midfield, was played onside by Imbula, who was stood in a far too deep position, found by a lovely dinked Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain pass and simply lofted the header over the stranded Lee Grant.

The second half continued in relatively quiet fashion. Arsenal created a couple of openings, Stoke likewise missed a header through Mame Biram-Diouf and saw Cech save a Peter Crouch only moments after coming off the bench and the game was still in the balance heading into the closing stages.

That was until Alex Iwobi, off the bench himself, played an inadvertent one-two with Sanchez, who was brought down in the process, Lee Mason waved play on and Iwobi placed the ball into the far bottom corner with a lovely finish.

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This was an important win for Arsenal as they look forward to a busy Christmas schedule. After another poor November in which many questions were asked about the side’s capabilities with Santi Cazorla absent, the Gunners have now strung together multiple performances in which their passing and attacking play has been fluid, dynamic and most importantly, successful. With a trip to Goodison Park looming on Tuesday, the games come thick and fast, and maintaining the recent good form with yet another victory is never a bad thing.

Highlights

Another bollocks call...Xhaka not even looking at the bloke. pic.twitter.com/DIlKzGOgal
— 🅾🅻🅳 🅱🅰🅻🅳 🅶🅾🅾🅽🅴🆁 (@OldBaldGooner) December 10, 2016

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