Despondent Gunners fans reacted with a mixture of confusion and anger to Sunday night’s unexpected 3-0 defeat to Dean Smith’s in-form Aston Villa side with a Bukayo Saka own goal and Ollie Watkins brace securing the three points.
The Gunners were hoping for a fourth straight win in all competitions after thumping Dundalk by the same scoreline in the Europa League on Thursday night, preceded by a landmark win at Manchester United on Sunday, for it was the first time since 2006 that they had won at Old Trafford in the Premier League.
Unfortunately, victory was far from their grasp as they failed to back up their early performances and succumbed to a regalvanised, magnificent Villa side who obvously found their stunning form after back-to-back defeats to Leeds United and Southampton at Villa Park.
Arsenal were immediately put on the back foot from the first minute, when John McGinn saw a goal harshly ruled out for offside against Ross Barkley.
Villa continued to pile on the pressure and were not perturbed by the McGinn offside ruling with Mahmoud Trezeguet forcing Bukayo Saka into an own goal before half-time.
This was followed up with Ollie Watkins’ brace to secure the win for Villa and got them back on song ahead of the international break.
The claret and blue faithful were merrily buzzing, but definitely not their Arsenal counterparts.
“Worst performance under Arteta by a country mile,” one fan said. “Terrible attack, missing midfield and defense carved open again and again.”
Another added: “An absolute joke! Well done to Villa, they played well! We were shambolic and two games in a row lost at home.”
“Shocking!” a third said. “We don’t look like scoring any more. Arteta needs to change something. I’ve not been angry after a game in a long time! Today was just a joke!”
“Really need to figure out what went wrong because this was tragic,” another added: “No creativity whatsover.”
“I’m so upset,” a fifth fan said.
Hey, that’s football, mates!
Credit: Football Tribe Malaysia
