I'm starting this as the second half begins. The first was horrible, like a poor MLS game. Auba must be wondering why we bought him. Clearly, we've forgotten he's out there. Stoke gets a few free kick opportunities which they waste. Back later...
At about the 70th minute, a football game started. Shaqiri almost got a goal Olympico from a corner, then Arsenal started piling on the pressure. The breakthrough came when Ozil was tripped from behind for a penalty (clear cut for me, but the commentators didn't like the call). Auba put it away in the 75th, then a few minutes later he volleyed smartly past Butland off a corner. Lacazette, who came on late, finished things off by tucking away a PK he won by being shoved to the turf from behind--stupid. Stoke looked like a relegation team, but then so did we until the last 15 minutes.
There were just too damned many misplaced passes. Had we been playing Swansea or Leicester, we'd have been punished. But Stoke was really bad, and eventually also really tired. They made mistakes and that was that.
CSKA should not be afraid, on today's evidence. But Lacazette seemed pretty sharp to me and Mikhi looks ready to pick up where he left off in Europa League. We'll have Koscielny in the back, which is always good. Fingers crossed for Thursday.
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