Rap artist Jese leads Arsenal a merry dance to set the stage alight
STOKE CITY’S newest superstar, Jese Rodriguez, is a man of sublime football skills with another career as a recording artist who goes by the alter ego of Jey M.
Jese scored the winner against Arsenal and the stadium resounded to the beat of the Wenger Rap, an angry tune that may signal another fraught season ahead for the Gunners.
A few months ago, when Arsenal won 4-1 here, some of their fans hired a plane and flew a banner over the bet365 Stadium that read: ‘Wenger — Out Means Out.’
After an unconvincing win over Leicester in their opening game followed by a performance that lacked conviction here and a 1-0 defeat, it will not be long until the discontent returns.
Arsenal dominated this game and made chance after chance but their finishing was wasteful.
The goalkeeping of Stoke’s Jack Butland was inspired and Jese was ready to make his mark. The quality of his second-half finish showed his pedigree.
He is a crowd favourite already and when he was substituted in the 70th minute, he was given a standing ovation.
Stoke have been criticised for a lack of ambition in the build-up to this season but they have a fine goalkeeper in Butland, a strong defence, experienced midfielders in Darren Fletcher and Joe Allen and forwards of genuine class like Xherdan Shaqiri, Saido Berahino — and now Jese.
He almost made an immediate impact when he skipped past Shkodran Mustafi in the third minute but Petr Cech blocked Jese’s shot.
Arsenal were the better side in the opening exchanges and Alexandre Lacazette set up a chance for Aaron Ramsey but the Welshman’s shot was weak. Minutes later, Alex OxladeChamberlain sidefooted a volley straight at Butland.
There has been much talk of Butland dethroning Joe Hart as England keeper and he proved his class again after half an hour when he spread himself to stop Ramsey’s volley.
Two minutes after the break, Jese ran at the Arsenal defence. He played a short pass to Berahino and gathered the return.
Cech came off his line to narrow the angle but Jese swept the ball past him with a clinical left foot finish. It was a glimpse of his class.
Afterwards, Arsene Wenger expressed his frustrations with his team.
‘We had plenty of chances to score but we didn’t,’ he said. ‘In this kind of game it’s important not to make a mistake but straight after half-time we were too sluggish on defending and we paid for it.
‘I was not convinced by our central defence today.’