Crystal Palace 3 Norwich 0

 CP's Covid shorthanded Eagles, missing several players and their manager, finally found someone they could beat in hapless Norwich. They only got six shots on goal, but made good on half of them. Norwich performed better the 2^nd half, but were already down three and never scored. CP now sits in 10^th on the table, despite their swoon in recent games. Beyond the top seven, most of the league teams are struggling, and even there, West Ham is shaky.

Carrow Road Massacre: Norwich 0 - 5 Arsenal

 In truth, the Canaries looked every bit the bottom side they are--incompetent going forward, ineffectual on defense.  But the ball still has to be deposited behind the keeper into the net, and the Gunners did it early and often today.  The goals were all quite nice, perhaps the pick of the bunch being Tierney's pinpoint hard shot past the keeper, at a tight angle and at distance, that bounced in off the far post;  Odegaard's assist was perfect.  Saka scored two, Lacazette scored on a penalty, and no Arsenal game would be complete without Emile Smith Rowe coming off the bench to put one in.  He's on fire.  Martinelli also had a dynamite game.  It will be difficult to keep up this intensity.  The youth of so many of our best players will help, also that we have no European distractions.  The minimum goal has to be 6th place and Europa League, which won't be easy.  Fourth is not out of the question; we're there now.  Spuds and Man U are on our heels and playing well under new managers, though.

West Ham lost to Southampton 2-3 and Leicester lost to City 6-3, putting those teams further back of us, but Tottenham punked ten man Palace 3-0 to stay close enough to catch or pass us by doing well in their three games in hand.  All we can do is win the games we play, and we're doing that.  Man City in a week will be a stern test, and I'm looking forward to it.  The Wolves game was canceled due to Covid.  The semis against Liverpool should also be a good gauge of how far we've progressed.  It's all well and good to beat up on the likes of Norwich, and it should be unsurprising.  We need to beat the really good teams on our day as well.  So far this season, that has not happened.  We're a combined 0-12 score against the three teams above us so far this season.

All three of our right backs have Covid, so Ben White was moved out to that position and Rob Holding took his place today.  Both did fine.  

Arsenal 5 - 1 Sunderland (League Cup)

 Only Ben White and Martin Odegaard retained their places in the starting lineup as Arteta took the opportunity to rotate his squad against League 1 Sunderland.  The Black Cats are as of today 43 places back of the Gunners in the ladder of English football, and were massive underdogs.  To their credit, they played an open game rather than bunkering in, and the match was a free flowing one with plenty of goals.  Fortunately, most of those goals were Arsenal's.  Eddie Nketieh took the opportunity to impress suitors (he's a free agent this summer) by scoring three times, all nice goals but two of them superb.  We were just too much for our third division visitors, though the 5000 exuberant fans that traveled from the Northeast got some reward when Sunderland capped a lightning counter with an elegant finish to bring them within a goal just before the half.  Sadly for the traveling supporters, it was all Arsenal in the second half.  Our 18 year old debutant Charlie Patino got a goal in his 12 minutes as a late substitute.  That was nice to see. One more starlet in the academy pipeline.  Our semifinal opponent will emerge from tomorrow's fixtures:

There will be no more easy games in this competition.  We've beaten three of those teams and lost to the other three in the league.  I imagine the draw will take place Thursday.  There's talk of making the semis a single game rather than the two-legged affair they've been doing recently, and that suits me fine.

Gunners Dominate Injury-Hit Leeds: Leeds 1 - 4 Arsenal

 Thrashed 7-0 by City last time out, no one was expecting much from the Whites today, and "not much" was what they could muster.  A rash challenge by Ben White (a former Leeds player, appropriately enough) in the second half gifted Leeds a PK which Raphinha buried in style.  But that made it 3-1 Arsenal, the visitors having scored thrice in the first half from two delightful goals from Martinelli and a deflected shot from Saka.  Emile Smith Rowe was put on late and finished the scoring beautifully.  Our offense is finally clicking now that Aubameyang has been exiled from the match day squad for his indiscretions.  

The commentators kept harping on Arsenal's fourth place position, but there are two teams with enough games in hand to pass us in the table.  Nevertheless, this is about where we'd want to be now, approaching the halfway mark of the season.  I'd be happy with 6th place and a Europa League berth, but let's dream big and hope we manage to pip Man U and the Spuds to 4th.

I wonder why Lokonga can't get a look in.  It's not as though either Partey or Xhaka is all that strong a presence in midfield.  Cedric got 30 minutes when Tomiyasu went off with a calf problem.  ESR came on for Saka (who did not have a great game).  Martinelli yielded to Tavares, who played left wing; I thought it made more tactical sense to replace Xhaka with Lokonga, or if Martinelli had to come off, simply add Lokonga to the midfield and push Odegaard further up.  Well, whatever Arteta had in mind, it worked.

Next game, if it's played, will be and EFL Cup quarterfinal against Sunderland Tuesday.  Arteta will be desperate to win silverware and provide his fringe players with more minutes, so you know he will want to win that and go to a two-legged semifinal.  I don't remember Arsenal winning a League Cup. (I looked it up, and we won it in '87 and '93--it's only been done since 1961.  We lost five finals.)

Four more matches are postponed due to COVID

Pressure mounts to pause season.  Some teams can barely field enough players to even play.  A team must have 14 players to be allowed to play. Leicester is one of those teams.  Crystal Palace is one of the teams affected by the postponements, but insofar as I can tell, still can field 14 players.  

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/sportsnews/article-10318401/Four-games-POSTPONED-Covid-pressure-mounts-Premier-League-pause-season.html?ns_mchannel=rss&ito=1490&ns_campaign=1490

Crystal Palace 2 Southampton 2

CP battled to their 8^th draw of the year in a back and forth match. This team can score, more so than in past years, but its defense is not as solid as in past years, which makes for interesting matches. CP went up early on a Zaha goal, lost that lead on a Free Kick, fell behind 1-2 on a long range snap shot, then equalized with a shot in from an acute angle at the 65^th minute. The last CP goal was Ayew's 1^st in 43 matches. Palace is now in 11^th place, mid-table, roughly where they usually place.

Arsenal 2 - 0 West Ham

 It was a hard-fought, enthralling, and rather weird game.  Officiating was for once favorable to Arsenal.  But mainly, some excellent patches of play from the Gunners were the difference.  The Hammers had their moments, but they did not look as though they were ever going to score.  Ramsdale was that good.  The first goal came two minutes into the second half.  Martinelli made an outside in run from the left that Lacazette spotted, and he fed him a perfect leading pass.  Martinelli took a sublime first touch and when Fabianski (who had a very good game) took his defensive stance, fired it Thierry Henri style past the keeper and just inside the far post.  The game was still mostly Arsenal after that, and an arguable PK call sent Laca to the spot and Soucek off the field for a second yellow.  Fabianski made a great save on the penalty (it's the third in a row missed by the Gunners), but West Ham a man down threatened only rarely.  Still, it takes only one, and cheap giveaways almost resulted in a West Ham goal.  The game was sealed late on by Emile Smith Rowe, who spotted his chance as he dribbled inside roughly 22 yards out.  It was a fine strike to the goalie's left, under the outstretched leg of a defender, which froze Fabianski. The outcome was not in doubt after that.

This puts Arsenal briefly in fourth place, just above the Hammers.  Tottenham have three games in hand, and Man U has one, and winning them would put them both above us.  This was a game we had to win, to restore confidence as much as anything.  This squad took on a good team in front of the Arsenal fans and handled them pretty well.  The trick is to do this away.

Crystal Palace 3 Everton 1

 CP got back on a winning track in a game more exciting than the score indicated. Everton seemed down and out when the score was 2-0, but fought back to make it 2-1 and made the ending interesting. CP ended a long string of home losses to Everton. Another stellar performance from loan player Gallagher, whose 2^nd goal of the day sealed the win in stoppage time.

Arsenal 3 - 0 Southampton; Arsenal Women 0 - 4 Barcelona Femeni; Notts Romps over Southend

 After a hesitant start, the Gunners turned on the style and turned up the heat, and the Saints could not stay with them.  A lovely flowing move saw a slick cutback from a driving Saka finding Lacazette, whose emphatic finish made it 1-0.  The lead was doubled six minutes later when the red hot Martin Odegaard scored a rare headed goal.  It was all Arsenal in the second half, though they added only one goal from a lovely header off a corner by Gabriel, assisted by Odegaard.  They needed this one after losing three of their last four.

Arsenal Women were blown out at home by Barcelona in Champions' League.  It's a rough patch for them, having been skunked in the FA Cup final 3-0 by Chelsea last time out.

Notts County put the Shrimpers to the sword 4-1, to stay in the mix near the top of the National League.  Wootton scored twice.  Juve was held 1-1 at Venezia.

Aubameyang did not make the Arsenal roster due to unspecified disciplinary reasons.  This is a second offense for him, and combined with his poor form this year, it asks questions about his captaincy.  I'm not sure who would succeed him were he ousted.  Lacazette will not be offered a new contract, Xhaka may not be with us much longer either, Partey has not really led by example, and everyone else who starts is 23 or younger.  They may settle on Partey by default, and it may give him some much needed confidence.

Season Unravels at Goodison: Everton 2 - 1 Arsenal

 Once more, Arsenal scores first and then dares its opponents to score, and they do.  Richarlison had the ball in the net three times for the Toffees, but was marginally offside the first two times.  Arsenal had a 1-0 lead at the half thanks to a lovely finish from Odegaard from a very nice cross from Tierney.  The first half was played in terrible conditions and most of it was indeed dreadful as a spectacle.  The second half was far livelier.  On balance, it was a fair result, but one that leaves the Gunners floundering mid-table instead of challenging for a top four spot.  Everton has been hit by injuries and did not look great, to be honest (except for the goals, which were superb), but we gave the ball away far too many times.

Saka was clearly hurt and needed to come out.  I'd have put Pepe in.  But instead we got Nketieh for Martinelli and the former put a sitter off the post and knocked the rebound over the endline for a goal kick when it should have been 2-1 Arsenal.  Well, I should not have watched this one.  Arteta needs to get more out of these guys if they are to have any chance of Europe next year.  There's plenty of season to go. 

Manchester United 1 Crystal palace 0

 Manchester United continues to stick it to faltering Crystal Palace, a 3rd loss in a row for the Palace, but a great week for MU.    

Man U 3 - 2 Arsenal

 The scoreline was an accurate assessment of the game.  Man U was better on the night.  Some of this may have been tactical, but mostly they were a bit quicker or more skillful than we were.  They got the second balls most of the time.  We were always in danger trying to play out of the back, and we lost the ball more often (though United had problems with the press too).  The goals were all legit and well taken.  Both teams could have had more.  It was a fun game to watch, hard play but never dirty.

Aubameyang has to sit for some games.  He is not the player he was two years ago, not even close.  He gets chances but he seldom does well with them.  Martinelli had a good game in place of Saka, and is playing his way onto the lineup card. Nketieh was brought on too late to assess, but he should have been sent a few crosses.  Partey was a disappointment again, Elneny was just a passing wall, Odegaard had little influence.  Tavares got caught upfield again on the second goal.  White is sometimes a worry.  

The men have to put this behind them, learn what they can from it, and prepare for Everton on Monday.

Leeds United 1 Crystal palace 0

 Another loss of points from a goal in stoppage time.  This, the third such costly goal this season,  is getting old fast.