During the first half, I was expecting the Hammers to pot the first goal on one of those long balls, and they nearly did a couple of times. We looked fairly abject. We started strongly after the break and got the go-ahead goal, but when West Ham put Lanzini and Hernandez in, they piled on the pressure and got a deserved goal. Replacing Iwobi with Aubameyang had an almost magical effect, considering how poorly Alex played. We dominated after that and I'm surprised it took until the last ten minutes to get the winner. Truth be told, two of our goals were partly the result of defensive howlers--on the corner they had a guy on the post who made no effort to keep Nacho's shot out, and their CB ducked under Ramsey's cross, fooling everyone and leaving Auba and Hart watching it bounce into the goal.
It was great to see Lacazette rewarded for his industry, and I hope he's fresh enough to run like that on Thursday. No Mikhi, no Elneny, and maybe no Ozil or Wilshere means tough sledding against Atletico. They lost 0-3 on Saturday; did they rest starters? They will be fresher and they will be going for away goals. Our starters will all be on four days' rest and we'll be missing some important guys. Hmmm.
AMN did well enough in midfield, but he wasn't under tremendous pressure. Our center mid options are extremely limited, especially if Ozil is unavailable. Danny looked pretty good, I thought. Aaron was great.
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