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MOTD- Arsenal 2-0 Tottenham Hotspur

By on January 4, 2014

Andre Villas-Boas may have left Tottenham Hotspur eight points off the top of the Premier League in seventh, but the Portuguese manager kept a much more satisfactory cup record.   In twenty-six non-league competitive matches Villas-Boas only lost four matches during his Spurs reign, a record his successor Tim Sherwood is looking lose hold of as Arsenal defeated Sherwood’s side a little over two weeks after they were knocked out of the Capital One Cup at the hands of West Ham United.

In other words, Sherwood has lost the first two of his cup matches in charge of Spurs.  However, the more worrying thing for the Englishman will be the fact that they weren’t up to par with the level of football Arsenal was playing at the Emirates.  In fact, far off.  The vast majority of the better chances fell to Arsenal, who were unlucky not to end up with a three or four goal cushion by the end of the game.  Christian Eriksen came close in the ninth minute when his goal-bound effort from the tightest of angle on the left bounced wide off of Arsenal goalkeeper Lukasz Fabianski’s legs, but just three minutes later Arsenal came even closer to finding the opener.  Theo Walcott broke with the ball down the middle on an Arsenal counter-attack, and after taking the ball slightly towards the left flank the winger dragged a low

shot from twenty-five yards towards the bottom left corner of the net, where Hugo Lloris just managed to tip it wide.

In the fourteenth minute Serge Gnarby latched onto an Arsenal corner from the left before curling a wonderful effort just over the bar at the far post.  Ten minutes later is was still all Arsenal, who nearly took the lead when Tomas Rosicky slipped a beautiful ball through the run of Walcott down the right side of the box. Yet Walcott seemed to get the ball slightly caught under his feet, resulting in Lloris blocking the English international’s low shot with his legs.

Arsenal continued to pass their way through the Tottenham defense, and all of their chances finally resulted in a goal as Gnarby poked a pass into the run of Cazorla down the left side of the box in the thirty-first minute for the Spaniard to smash the ball past Lloris into the far corner of the goal, putting Arsenal up 1-0.  Despite the goal and Arsenal’s dominance, Sherwood refused to make a change at the half, and thus resulting in more chances for the home side as the second half began.  Walcott came close when Gnarby pinpointed out the 24-year-old’s run down the middle perfectly with a neat through-ball in between the Arsenal defenders, and Walcott rounded Lloris.  The former Southampton player took it slightly too far wide, only managing to cut a shot from a very tight angle into the side-netting.

Yet Arsenal made up for the miss just two minutes later when Rosicky caught Danny Rose, Tottenham’s last man, dawdling on the ball around the halfway line by dispossessing the poor full-back.  Off to the races, Rosicky charged in on goal, held off Kyle Walker, and dinked a cute chip over the charging Lloris into the back of the net from fifteen yards to double the home side’s lead.  Although Walcott was carried off on a stretcher shortly afterwards, the game was all but over, with Arsenal seeing out the result to knock Tottenham out of the FA Cup in the third round.
Man of the Match: Theo Walcott

About Alex Morgan

Alex Morgan, founder of Football Every Day, lives and breaths football from the West Coast of the United States in California. Aside from founding Football Every Day in January of 2013, Alex has also launched his own journalism career and hopes to help others do the same with FBED. He covers the San Jose Earthquakes as a beat reporter for QuakesTalk.com and his work has also been featured in the BBC's Match of the Day Magazine.