HAV SOME Gunners ace piles pressure OF THAT
KAI HAVERTZ spared Aaron Ramsdale’s blushes as his dramatic late winner sent Arsenal top of the table.
The Gunners, who statistically boast both the best attack and defence in the division, displayed that they can also win ugly after previously hitting 24 goals in their past five top-flight matches.
And incredibly, this vital triumph was their eighth Premier League win on the spin as they continue to keep pace with their relentless title rivals Liverpool and Manchester City, who meet at Anfield today.
Ramsdale, on what could prove to be his final appearance for the club, looked to have cost his side when he gifted Brentford a leveller through Yoane Wissa.
And he was at the centre of a whirlpool of emotion when Havertz headed the winner, sliding in celebration before the travelling Brentford faithful, who taunted him with chants of “you’re just a s*** David Raya”.
The deafening noise generated from Havertz’s heroics shook the Emirates to its roots – this is a crowd beginning to dream of a first Premier League title in 20 years. Arsenal’s man of the moment Declan Rice forced the hosts ahead on 19 minutes when he burst into the box before powerfully heading Ben White’s cross past Mark Flekken.
It was his seventh goal involvement, three goals and four assists, in his last nine matches for the Gunners.
Roy Keane had claimed Arsenal had “paid way too much” for Rice last August when he sealed a club-record £105million switch to north London.
Rice is now making a mockery of that accusation as he continues to stamp his authority upon matches at both ends of the field.
The hosts were cruising and seconds out from the sound of the half-time whistle when disaster struck.
Ramsdale, making his first appearance since late November, hesitated with the ball at his feet, Wissa pressed before tackling the ball into the net.
Mikel Arteta turned away in disgust as large sections of Arsenal’s tetchy fanbase savagely made their true feelings known.
The Gunners will have to be near-perfect if they are to go the distance and those are the kind of errors and margins that could prove terminal.
Goalkeeper coach Inaki Cana
was among those to console shell-shocked Ramsdale as he trudged off at the break but he responded well, clawing away an audacious 35-yard half-volley from Ivan Toney on 55 minutes.
Yet he somehow bettered that save with a stunning stop to deny Nathan Collins at the back post.
Rice then went close at the other end when his curling longrange strike bounced off the woodwork.
But it was another summer signing that would later come up trumps in Havertz when he headed White’s cross home late on as the right-back grabbed his second assist of the night.