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Arsenal booked its spot in the Carabao Cup semi-finals with a 3-2 win over Crystal Palace, and Mikel Arteta credits second-half adjustments as the reason for the win.
Mikel Arteta's Arsenal has punched its ticket to the Carabao Cup semi-finals after a 3-2 win over Crystal Palace, thanks to a Gabriel Jesus hat-trick.
In a first half that saw the Gunners concede a sloppy goal after Jakub Kiwior was caught out by a simple long ball that Jean-Philippe Mateta punished him for, it wasn't the best of starts for Arsenal.
With ample possession, and without Martin Odegaard and Bukayo Saka on the pitch, the Gunners struggled to get into a groove...but after half-time, Arsenal emerged a different beast.
The introduction of Odegaard at half-time and Saka with 25 minutes left, gave the Gunners life, and three goals followed as the home side clicked through the gears in impressive fashion.
For Arteta, while the team didn't start in the right way, the second half was a completely different performance.
"Really happy, we’re in the semi-final," Arteta said via arsenal.com. "The game started in a way that we certainly didn’t want to with a very simple goal and then our team had to react and I think we did in a great way, showed a lot of character, so much desire to turn things around. In the first half we lacked some threat, we created two or three big chances but didn’t score and with a few adjustments in the second half we got a grip of the game again and we looked a threat."
The Gunners were cruising until Eddie Nketiah's header brought Palace back to within one, but Arsenal steadied and booked its place in the semi-finals.
What we did learn from the contest is that if we could only bottle that thing called confidence, then the world would be a better place.
Jesus, who was having a seriously rough time (just one goal in 20 appearances in all competitions prior to the Palace clash), slammed home three goals in authoritative fashion to give life to his career.
With the Gunners struggling in the league, getting Jesus back to somewhere near his best will be just the tonic for Arsenal to begin reeling in Liverpool.
It was a good start against Palace, as the Gunners seem to get their groove back after a poor first half, with a little team talk and some key substitutions proving key in the win.