I won't lie. I thought Arsenal would win this one comfortably. We hung on at Molineux playing with ten men and won. At home, I figured we should handle them. But a dreadful back-pass after ten minutes put us in a hole. Wolves had not lost a game in which they took a 1-0 lead for three and a half years--44 such games. Their defense is by far the best in the Premier League, and now they could sit back and hit us on the break while we huffed and puffed and tried to score. They were strong and resolute, but with eight minutes left we finally got our equalizer from Pepe. Wolves had been guilty of so much time wasting that we got another six minutes of stoppage time, and in the sixth minute, a fortunate split-second sequence turned a Lacazette close range mis-hit into a goal via two deflections off Wolves players. 2-1 to the Arsenal, and now Wolves are in our rear view mirror for the moment, five points back having played one more game than us. This was a tough challenge, and there will be several more in the next 14 games, but our top four aspirations can become reality with no help from the rest of the league, so long as we keep winning.
Wins like this can really energize a squad. Tomiyasu is still unavailable due to a calf injury, but Cedric is deputising adequately. For me, the really hopeful sign was Pepe coming off the bench and rescuing us, and with an assist from Eddie Nketieh too. Then Laca gets the winner--perfect! We'll need substantive contributions from all of those attacking players. When the fixture list gets crowded, Saka will have to sit out a game here and there, and it's good to know that Nicolas Pepe can still put the ball past a keeper.
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