Importance Score: 25 / 100 🔵
Key events
90+1 min: Brentford substitution: The 19-year-old Brazilian winger Gustavo Nunes finally gets to feel like a proper Brentford player, making his debut for the club after missing the entire season thus far with a back injury since his move from Gremio in August. Christian Norgaard makes way.
89 min: Norgaard picks out Mbeumo with an inch-perfect pass over the top and out wide. He plays the ball inside to Jensen, via Wissa, but the Dane slips and loses the ball a couple of yards outside the Arsenal penalty area. We’ll have six minutes of added time.
86 min: Jorginho walks down the tunnel, aided by a member of the medical staff. He landed heavily after contesting a high ball and seems to have done his arm, ribcage or sternum a mischief. Arsenal will have to play the rest of the game with 10 men, as they’ve used all their substitutes.
84 min: There’s a break in play as Jorginho goes to ground grimacing in discomfort. He appears to have hurt his chest needs treatment and both managers use the pause to give their teams a late pep-talk.
80 min: Saka has a shot from the edge of the area blocked after being fed the ball by Odegaard, whose control of a ball over the top in the build-up was simply exquisite.
80 min: Brentford substitution: Mathias Jensen on for Mikkel Damsgaard.
78 min: Flekken almost gifts Arsenal a second goal after his heavy touch allows Saka to tackle him and win the ball. The Arsenal substitute dilly-dallies over his shot and Kayode gets across to relieve him of possession. Arsenal substittution: Mikel Merino on for Declan Rice.
GOAL! Arsenal 1-1 Brentford (Wissa 74)
Brentford equalise! Arsenal clear the corner, Brentford recycle the ball and Yoane Wissa shoots on the turn from a couple of yards outside the Arsenal six-yard box to send a shot fizzing past Raya. Nathan Collins set him up, heading an excellent Michael Kayode cross from the right his way.
72 min: Wissa plays a ball into space for Mbeumo down the inside right but the winger’s attempted cross back to Wissa, who had charged upfield in support, is cut out. Mikkel Damsgaard as furious, as he was better placed to receive a pull-back and get a shot off.
69 min: Arsenal substitution: Jurrien Timber on for Thomas Partey. Brentford double-substitution: Michael Kayode and Yehor Yarmoliuk on for Ajer and Janelt.
68 min: Brentford are down but not out. They advance into Arsenal terriotry and Wissa tries to square the ball across the face of their goal. Raya cuts out his cross.
65 min: Rice overhits a scooped pass in the direction of Martinelli, who is unable to win the race to the byline against the ball, which bounces out for a goal-kick.
64 min: Arsenal triple-substitution: Martin Odegaard, Bukayo Saka and Myles Lewis-Skelly come on, with Tierney, Zinchenko and Nwaneri making way.
GOAL! Arsenal 1-0 Brentford
Arsenal lead! From the corner, Raya sends Rice on his way and the Aresenal midfielder advances to the edge of the are with Wissa backpedalling in front of him. Rice slips the ball wide to Partey on his right and the Ghanaian fires over Flekken into the back of the net.
59 min: Jorginho’s ball into the Brentford penalty area is headed clear by Sepp van den Berg and visitors attack on the counter. Bryan Mbeumo cuts into the Arsenal penalty area from the right but Ciaran Tierney puts the ball out for a corner. Mbeumo’s delivery is claimed by Raya, who sets up a counter-attack that ends with Thomas Partey firing Arsenal in front.
55 min: “Re: the nearly deceased pigeon in the goalmouth,” writes Matt Guthrie from Phoenix. “MLB pitcher Randy Johnson once threw a 99mph fastball right into a passing dove. The unfortunate event is available on YouTube.”
While this family forum is no place for avian snuff movies, I have seen the explosion of feathers in question. It was a quick, painless end although I’d presumed it was a gull, rather than a dove.
52 min: Brentford win a throw-in deep in Arsenal territory and Christian Norgaard trots over to take it. He eschews the option of Delapping the ball into the box and takes it short to Lewis-Potter, whose cross to the far post earns Brentford a corner. They take it short, creating an angle for Janelt to send a cross towards the far post. Raya plucks the ball from the air.
51 min: Reader, it was their 11th corner of the match.
50 min: Arsenal win what seems like their 1,385th corner of the match. Nwaneri’s inswinger isn’t one of his better ones and Brentford clear at the near post.
48 min: Raya tries to pick out Zinchenko with a long pass from deep but Keane Lewis Potter turns on his afterburners and gets back to win the ball ahead of the Ukrainian, helped in no small part by a conspicuous nudge to Zinchenko’s back that knocked him off balance.
46 min: Martinelli pings a cross towards Nwaneri at the far post but, under pressure from a defender, the teenager is unable to connect with his attempted volley off the outside of his left boot from close range.
Second half: Arsenal 0-0 Brentford
46 min: Play resumes with Arsenal on the ball and no changes in personnel on either side.
An email: “On American TV, Graeme Le Saux has just asked if the pigeons on the pitch might have been standing in an offside position in the Brentford penalty area,” writes Justin Kavanagh. “He’ll get himself banned from the US, if he keeps up that kind of talk about the birds and the bees!”
Half-time: Arsenal 0-0 Brentford
An eminently forgettable first half draws to a close. Arsenal have been the better side and had the ball in the back of the Brentford net, only for Kieran Tierney’s header to be correctly ruled out for offside. Beyone that, it’s largely been a succession of Arsenal corners, with Declan Rice going close to scoring directly from one. Kristoffer Ajer went close for Brentford, bringing a smart save out of Raya, while Leandro Trossard was this far away from accidentally killing a pigeon shortly before the break.
45+2 min: Some lightning fast reflexes on show there, from both the pigeon and Flekken. It’s half-time.
44 min: Trossard jinks this way and that a couple of yards outside the Brentford penalty area before unleashing a powerful low shot that puts the heart crossways in a pigeon that came perilously close to meeting an extremely grisly end on the edge of the six-yard box and bringing a smart save out of Mark Flekken.
42 min: Trossard meets Nwaneri’s delivery at the near corner of the six-yard box but sends his header high and wide of the angle of far post and crossbar.
41 min: Declan Rice advances down the inside-left and tries to beat Flekken with a low shot from a tight angle. The Brentford keeper is unable to hold on to the ball and Arsenal have another corner. Rice’s inswinger threatens to dip under the crossbar but Flekken punches it over for yet another Arsenal corner.
40 min: Tierney sends a high, hanging cross towards the far post, where Keane Lewis-Potter nods clear.
37 min: Oleksandr Zinchenko pings the ball out to the left touchline, where Kieran Tierney controls it and is immediately penalised for straying offside. Like a sniper staring down a rifle-barrel, he closes one eye and peers intently across the pitch towards the linesman, as if to suggest there’s no way he had done so.
35 min: Excellent defending from Kristoffer Ajer, who slides in to block Martinelli’s shot from seven or eight yards out after the Arsenal winger had deftly controlled a ball over the top.
34 min: The name of Kevin Schade goes into the book for a cynical and injudicious challenge on William Saliba.
32 min: Ethan Nwaneri drills the ball across the face of the Brentford goal from the right and it’s cleared by Kevin Schade. Arsenal win another corner, take it short and after a Nwaneri scamper along the byline, he’s unable to pick out Leandro Trossard with his pullback.
29 min: Christian Norgaard is booked for a kind of scissors tackle from behind on Martinelli which has assorted Arsenal players, coaching staff and fans appealing for a stiffer punishment. VAR decide there’s no need to upgrade the booking to a red card and that seems fair enough to me. Other opinions are almost certainly available.
GOAL DISALLOWED: Arsenal 0-0 Brentford
As I suspected, Tierney was offside when Nwaneri crossed the ball his way from the right. His somewhat sheepish celebrations suggested he knew that to be the case.
GOAL! Arsenal 1-0 Brentford
Arsenal lead! Or do they? Nwaneri’s delivery is excellent but Yoane Wissa heads the ball out for yet another corner. The youngster sends the ball drifting across the edge of the six-yard box but it finds it’s way towards the touchline. Arsenal recycle the ball, Nwaneri gets another cross into the box and Kieran Tierney nods home. I’m fairly sure he’s offside …
23 min: Arsenal win another corner. It’s on Rice’s side of the pitch and his inswinger towards the far post appears to hit Saliba’s back before going out for another corner off Keane Lewis-Potter. Over to you Ethan Nwaneri …