Arsenal 2 - 0 Leicester

 Arsenal has a very challenging last stretch of the season.  "Games in hand" are not points in the table.  At home against mid-table Leicester, you'd expect the Gunners to prevail, and this time, our play matched out point haul and a dominant performance saw us through.  Ramsdale did not repeat his dodgy kicking performance against Watford, and indeed the whole team played a step quicker.  Ramsdale had to make a fantastic save early, but the worst of it afterward was getting hip-checked by the Foxes' forward as he came down with the ball.  He milked it for a minute's delay, though, so he was probably happy to take the punishment.

I was expecting a win, but Leicester has been hot recently and there's always the chance that a few unlucky bounces make the difference.  But this was a case of Arsenal being too much for Leicester all over the field.  These are the games we have to win to maintain the upper hand for the 4th place spot.  We have to play our three closest rivals before the end of the season, as well as Chelsea and Liverpool.  Accumulation of points from the likes of Watford and Leicester is a must.

I watched two former Arsenal #2s, Fabianski and Martinez (the latter joined by Chambers), face off in the earlier game.  I was hoping for more dropped points by the Hammers, but they beat Aston Villa convincingly at the London Stadium.  Both keepers were great, but Lukas was better protected than Emi.  Calum spent at least eight minutes on the ground after two blows to the head.

A remarkable Champions' League encounter between PSG and Real Madrid, at the Bernabeu, saw Real mount a late comeback to win with three goals (all from Karim Benzema) in maybe 15 minutes.  It was an epic PSG meltdown.  The refereeing played a role, and the co-owner of PSG chased down the officials after the game and made quite an ass of himself.  But PSG, which had been playing with a swagger after Mbappe's opener made it 2-0 to Paris on aggregate, fell apart on attack and defense.  The entire second half, Real was on top, and it's a fair result, considering a modicum of good sense from the manager or his players would have seen PSG safely through.  Pochettino needed to take Neymar and Messi off and put in fresh legs, on more defensive-minded players.  But no.  GK Donnarumma could have gotten the ball away before Benzema charged him down (and yes, I'd have blown the whistle for a foul there).  Good show.