Much-changed Arsenal lose but head through at the top
ARSENE WENGER saw his Arsenal side secure top spot in their Europa League group despite falling to defeat at Cologne thanks to what he sarcastically deemed a “very nice penalty”.
The Gunners will go into next month’s draw as Group H winners as a goalless stalemate between Red Star Belgrade and BATE Borisov meant the 1-0 loss at the RheinEnergieStadion was still enough to give them an unassailable four-point lead.
A drab game here was settled courtesy of a controversial second-half penalty as Mathieu Debuchy was adjudged to have fouled Sehrou Guirassy in the area when in truth, there was minimal contact.
Guirassy stepped up to convert the resulting spot-kick and give Cologne maximum points which keeps them in the hunt to go through with Arsenal.
Wenger was not amused by the decision of Russian official Vladislav Bezborodov but did praise the hosts, who sit bottom of the Bundesliga without a league win all season, for their defensive resilience.
“We had a lot of possession,” he said. “We lost the game to one shot basically. It was a very nice penalty that we have to take on board. It was honestly not a penalty at all.
“We missed a little bit of the accuracy in our passing in the final-third that is required to score more goals. We had plenty of dangerous situations but we always missed a little something to finish our chances.”
Everton put in an insipid display in the 5-1 defeat to Atalanta.
There was nothing riding on the game for the already-eliminated Toffees but the visitors found it all too easy, even discounting a missed penalty from Alejandro Gomez, with two goals from Bryan Cristante early in each half.
Sandro Ramirez netted his first strike for the club, but goals from Andreas Cornelius (two) and Robin Gosens typified Everton’s haplessness. HEAD COACH Thomas Christiansen has pledged that Leeds United will “keep fighting” and insists that there will be no psychological scars following their 4-1 humbling at Championship leaders Wolves.
Leeds were well beaten at Molineux on Wednesday night and face a real test of character against Barnsley at Oakwell tomorrow where the Whites have a lamentable record over the past couple of decades.
A tough night in the Midlands was compounded by the 60thminute dismissal of Ronaldo Vieira, although Christiansen did take solace from elements of his side’s second-half response ahead of the young midfielder’s exit from the fray.
That said, the fact remains that tenth-placed Leeds have lost five of their last six Championship away fixtures, with the future of the United head coach likely to come firmly under the microscope again if his side suffer another tough awayday at Barnsley this weekend.
Remaining defiant and positive too, Christiansen said: “We faced the best team in the league, no doubt.
“But I believe that the players know what they did well on the pitch, the response that they did and the confidence that they have from me and that we are a good team.
“We will keep on fighting and this will be a good moment also on Saturday.
“We were there (on Wednesday). We just needed to have more of the ball, but when we played more than eight or nine passes, we also created some problems and we have the quality in the team to do that and this is what we are going to do on Saturday.”
Christiansen confirmed that top-scorer Pierre-Michel Lasogga sat out a second successive game due to illness and he will be assessed ahead of the weekend fixture.