Martinelli gets the party started
...and Saka forces late second to give Arsenal kickstart to the season
Any team with this many Gabriels should be able to blow its own trumpet, and Arsenal have plenty to be proud of about their start to this season.
Crystal Palace are a good team and cause plenty of teams plenty of problems, particularly with the vociferous Selhurst Park crowd behind them. That Arsenal took a merited first-half lead and then held it under pressure is to their credit. So is the efficient melding of established players, young and old, with the fruits of summer transfer business.
As for the Gabriels — well, Martinelli scored, Jesus was a handful and Magalhaes was excellent at the back. And if the first half largely belonged to Arsenal’s forwards, then the second was about their defensive resilience — not a quality that has always been apparent for quite some while, though.
Aaron Ramsdale made several excellent saves without quite inspiring confidence in his kicking and handling and that allowed Palace back into the game when Arsenal looked comfortable, but the main difference was that Arsenal looked like an elite team again.
A year ago, the odds may have favoured Palace. no longer. This is an Arsenal team that knows what it is about, even if it is callow compared to the other top six contenders. yet there is speed, purpose, determination and a genuine goal threat.
It will have done them a power of good, too, to have held on here, as Palace piled forward with the Holmesdale End driving and drumming them on. Handy then, that a wicked deflection off Marc Guehi from a shot by Bukayo Saka should seal the outcome with five minutes to go. no alarms and no surprises from there.
Look, it’s one match. no-one should be getting too excited. yet there was enough here to suggest Arsenal have moved in an upwardly direction since the end of last season. It might not be ‘all’ this season — but it might not be ‘nothing’ either.
Signs around Selhurst Park told supporters that if they saw anything that needed reporting there was a number to call. By midway through the first half, lines may have been blocked by Crystal Palace followers saying Arsenal had stolen the ball. It was that one-sided. Palace simply couldn’t get into the game and Arsenal’s lead became more a matter of when than if.
Everyone has had their fun with the All Or Nothing documentary that followed Mikel Arteta and his players around last season, but the reality is this team are light years away from the same stage 12 months ago. In 2021, their campaign began with an away fixture on Friday night across London and Brentford’s 2-0 win was barely even a shock. Few were expecting the same of Palace last night.
Patrick Vieira has done a good job, transforming the style of play and producing a team that looks up and where it might be going, rather than over its shoulder at survival. yet Arsenal are the bolters in pre-season, the form team, the most noticeably improved. Arteta has made bold signings, drawn on the strength on the fringes of Manchester City, and blended it with the best crop of young players in the country.
It seems to have worked. Arsenal were everything they had promised to be early on, and only some shaky footwork from goalkeeper Ramsdale allowed Palace to get a little momentum behind them before the half-time whistle intervened.
Until that point, Arsenal had been dominant, from the opening stages where they tore at Vieira’s defence. The Frenchman has schooled them well, and Palace are known for their resistance, but they were at full stretch here.
In the fourth minute, Jesus almost conjured the perfect start on his debut with a fabulous run through the centre, superb close control and balance, before his shot was blocked by Guehi. The ball fell to Martinelli at an inviting angle, but he shot wide. On the bench, Arteta put his head in his hands. A little early for despair one might think, although it makes for great television.
Just four minutes later, another chance. The ball was switched out to Oleksandr Zinchenko, keeping Kieran Tierney on the bench to the surprise of some, and his shot forced an excellent save from goalkeeper Vicente Guaita, who must already have been fearing a busy night.
next, he was retrieving the ball from his net. Few would have Arsenal as set-piece specialists but since the start of last season only Manchester City and Liverpool have scored from more corners.
Their first goal — and therefore the first of the 2022-23 Premier League season — came from precisely that route. It was swung in by Granit Xhaka, picking out Zinchenko in enormous space on the far side of the penalty area. Smartly, he headed back across goal and Martinelli was quickest to it, steering his own header past Guaita for a deserved lead.
And at that stage, Arsenal looked capable of a statement win, but moments of weakness got Palace back into the game. There was a decent penalty appeal after 35 minutes when a high ball dropped onto the hand of Gabriel at the back. A complete accident, for sure, but he had plenty of time to get it out of the way. Then Ramsdale made a couple of kicking errors, one of which ricocheted from Odsonne Edouard and could easily have cost a goal.
Suddenly, Arsenal’s confidence ebbed and Palace could have gone in at half-time level. Joachim Andersen won a header that fell to Edouard, and Ramsdale redeemed his earlier errors with an excellent save. Edouard then emulated Jesus’s earlier jinky run only for his shot to be deflected over by Gabriel.
The second half begun much the same way, with Palace again lively with Eberechi Eze through oneon-one and Ramsdale equal to it again, this time saving with his legs. At the other end, Arsenal’s new captain, Martin Odegaard, curled a free-kick just wide. now, a footnote. In the 44th minute, Xhaka miscontrolled a ball outside the Palace penalty area and when it was nipped off his toes, tumbled to the floor dramatically. It may have been momentum that took him there but referee Anthony Taylor thought it was mischief and booked him for diving.
So Xhaka became the first yellow card of the season. What are the odds on that, as they may have been asking in Tirana.
CRYSTAL PALACE (4-2-3-1): Guaita, Clyne, Andersen, Guehi, Mitchell; Schlupp (hughes 86), Doucoure (Milivojevic 75); Ayew, Eze (Ebiowei 86), Zaha; Edouard (Mateta 58). Subs not used: Ward, Johnstone, Richards, Riedewald, Plange. Booked: Clyne.
ARSENAL (4-2-3-1): Ramsdale; White, Saliba, Gabriel, Zinchenko (Tierney 83); Xhaka, Partey; Saka, Odegaard, Martinelli; Gabriel Jesus (Niketiah 83).
Subs not used: Holding, Cedric, Pepe, Sambi Lokonga, Nelson, Elneny, Turner. Man of the Match: Bukayo Saka. Booked: White, Xhaka.
Referee: Anthony Taylor.