It was complete dominating play from Arsenal when they took on Southampton at the Emirates stadium as the Gunners looked to bounce back from two consecutive league losses and did well to see off the Saints 3-0 convincingly.
Two goals in the first half from stand-in captain, Alexandre Lacazette and Martin Odegaard saw the Gunners on their way to a comfortable win, before Gabriel Maghaeles added a third in the second half.
Misfiring captain, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang was left out by Mikel Arteta for disciplinary issues as the manager stuck with the team that started against Everton. Gabriel Martinelli passed the fitness test to start after being taken off in the loss to the Toffees due to injury scare, but Emile Smith Rowe is a only able to make it to the bench.
Crisis-hit Southampton gave a debut to emergency signing, Willy Caballero with first team goalkeepers, Fraser Forster and Alex McCarthy both out injured.
The Saints, despite seeing less of the ball got the first shot on target in the 7th minute when Adam Armstrong tested Aaron Ramsdale from the edge of the box, but the England goalkeeper was up to the test and easily palmed it away.
Arsenal required just eight passes to move the ball from their post to score at the other end in the 21st minute. Takehiro Tomiyasu released Bukayo Saka on the right and the teenager ran his way into the Saints' box, before cutting the ball back to Lacazette from about 12 yards out and the Frenchman made no mistake, sending Caballero the wrong way with a strike into the top corner.
The lead was two five minutes later as Southampton failed to clear a ball into their area. Kieran Tierney missed his kick the first time, but had enough time to gather and re-cross but his cross came off a defender and he followed up with a header across the face of goal, which was powered home with another header by Odegaard, his third goal in three consecutive league games.
It could have been three for Arsenal when Caballero's pass from the back was cut out by the Gunners' high pressing line, but he did well to atone for his error by smothering Saka's effort from the chance.
The Saints were forced into an early substitution before the half time whistle as Armstrong looked to have hurt his calf and was replaced by Mohammed Elyounoussi.
After the restart, Ramsdale was called into another rare action from Nathan Tella and he went down well to save, before Arsenal had the ball in the back of the net for the third time, a goal that was rightly ruled out for offside against Gabriel after VAR.
The young Brazilian couldn't take being denied the first time as he went up three minutes later in the 62nd minute to head home a Martinelli in-swinging corner and increase his team's lead.
From there on it was Arsenal all the way and the scoreline could have been more as Saka and Martinelli both hit the woodwork two minutes apart. Tella and Redmond also tested Ramsdale, but the Arsenal keeper came out tops.
Concluding Thoughts
Arsenal have had a frustrating past two weeks, losing away to both Manchester United and Everton, despite scoring first in both games. However, they picked on the positives from both games and returned to their high press game that made them finish off this match in just over an hour of play, which is what they need to do more often.
Another disciplinary issue with Aubameyang is not a distraction the Gunners need right now. It would be recalled he was also left out a North London Derby last season for the same reason. He needs to get his acts together, lead his team and start scoring again.
Southampton were quite unlucky to have started the match with a 40-year old goalkeeper, who was starting his first league game in about 14 months and looked match rusty with some wayward passing. He was arguably culpable for the third goal, having completely missed the ball from his jump.
Comments