Arsenal hit back to choke Stoke and move top
FREE-SCORING Arsenal replaced Chelsea as Premier League leaders as goals either side of half-time by Theo Walcott and Mesut Ozil helped them recover from a slow start to beat Stoke City 3-1 yesterday.
A rash challenge by Granit Xhaka on Joe Allen gave Charlie Adam the chance to put Stoke ahead from the penalty spot after 29 minutes and the Scot dispatched his spot-kick with ease.
Arsenal raised their game and equalised three minutes before the break when Walcott stabbed in Hector Bellerin’s low cross.
Ozil’s looping header over stranded Stoke keeper Lee Grant put Arsenal ahead five minutes after the interval before substitute Alex Iwobi ran through to give Arsenal the two-goal victory they needed to top the table on goals scored.
A Gylfi Sigurdsson penalty and a brace from Fernando Llorente gave Swansea City a 3-0 win over fellow strugglers Sunderland in the Premier League, relieving the pressure on manager Bob Bradley.
Sigurdsson struck from the penalty spot in the 50th minute after a handball by Jason Denayer and he turned provider four minutes later, sliding a low corner into the box which Spaniard Llorente steered past keeper Jordan Pickford.
Llorente wrapped up the points in the 80th minute when he headed in Jefferson Montero’s cross following an interception by the excellent Leon Britton, who was making his first appearance since the start of November.
The win was Swansea’s second under American Bob Bradley, the favourite with British bookmakers to be the next Premier League manager to lose his job, and made it back-to-back victories at the Leicester City 4 Manchester City 2 Burnley 3 Bournemouth 2 Hull City 3 Crystal Palace 3 Arsena 3 Stoke City 1 Swansea City 3 Sunderland 0 Watford 3 Everton 2 Arsenal ............ 15 10 4 1 36 15 34 Chelsea ........... 14 11 1 2 32 11 34 Liverpool.......... 14 9 3 2 35 18 30 Man City .......... 15 9 3 3 32 19 30 Tottenham ....... 14 7 6 1 24 10 27 Man United ..... 14 5 6 3 19 16 21 Watford ............ 15 6 3 6 21 26 21 West Brom ...... 14 5 5 4 20 17 20 Everton............ 15 5 5 5 19 19 20 Stoke City........ 15 5 4 6 17 22 19 Bournemouth .. 15 5 3 7 21 25 18 Southampton .. 14 4 5 5 13 15 17 Burnley ............ 15 5 2 8 15 25 17 Leicester City .. 15 4 4 7 21 26 16 Crystal Palace.15 4 3 8 27 29 15 Middlesbrough 14 3 6 5 13 15 15 Swansea City .. 15 3 3 9 19 31 12 West Ham ....... 14 3 3 8 15 29 12 Hull City ........... 15 3 3 9 14 32 12 Sunderland ..... 15 3 2 10 14 27 11 TARGET MAN: Theo Walcott scores Arsenal’s first goal against Stoke City during yesterday’s Premier League match at the Emirates Stadium in London. Liberty Stadium for his team.
Italy international Stefano Okaka scored either side of half-time to give Watford a 3-2 win over Everton, their first victory over the Merseyside club in any competition since 1987.
Watford, who started with players of 11 different nationalities in their line-up, went behind in the 17th minute when Romelu Lukaku scored from close range for Everton after Gareth Barry lobbed the defence.
The goal was the Belgian’s eighth in the league this season but the lead was short-lived, Okaka equalising in the 36th minute with a back-heeled flick at the near post from Nordin Amrabat’s cross.
Okaka followed up on his first Watford goal by heading in the Hornets’ third from a corner in the 64th after Austrian Sebastian Prodl had headed in his first league goal of the season from José Holebas’s free-kick. Lukaku headed in his second with four minutes of normal time remaining but Watford hung on to go seventh on 21 points and ahead of ninth-placed Everton.
Okaka’s goals were his first in the Premier League since May 2010, when he was on loan at Fulham. A summer signing from Anderlecht, he was making his second start for Watford. Apart from the 11 nations represented in the starting line-up, Watford have now also had 11 different goalscorers in the league this season – a feat that only Liverpool can match.
Alan Pardew’s 300th match as a Premier League manager ended in drama as Fraizer Campbell grabbed an 89th-minute equaliser in a thrilling 3-3 draw at Hull City that eased the pressure on the Crystal Palace boss.
In another of Palace’s see- saw classics, Hull came from behind with goals from Adama Diomande and Jake Livermore and looking poised to earn the win that would have taken them out of the bottom three.
But it was former Hull striker Campbell who ensured manager Pardew could celebrate something from his landmark day as he finished off fine work from Wilfried Zaha, who had put Palace 2-1 ahead with a sensational 70th-minute strike.
Robert Snodgrass had put Palace ahead after 27 minutes, scoring the penalty after appearing to dive in the box. He then gave away the second-half spot-kick, fouling Zaha, that allowed Christian Benteke to equalise.
Leicester City bounced back after a miserable season so far to beat Manchester City 4-2 at the King Power Stadium last night.
A hat-trick from Jamie Vardy and a goal from Andy King saw the reigning Premier League champions lead 4-0, until the 82nd minute when Aleksandar Kolarov pulled one back. Spain international Nolito scored City’s second in the 90th minute but it was too little too late.– Reuters THE more one reflects on 2016, the more it sinks in, especially when marvelling at the magnificence of Chad le Clos in the World Short-Course Swimming Championships in Montreal. The thought is, what happened with Le Clos at Rio 2016?
Le Clos is, quite simply, a fantastic swimmer. The use of adjectives is deliberate. He is that good and that gifted. This past week, he broke his own world record in the 100m butterfly, and can go even faster.
It was in London at the 2012 Olympics that his coach Graham Hill told me that Le Clos “could be the Tiger Woods of swimming”. He wasn’t referring to any shenanigans, but it was a statement based on his swimmer’s ability. It has to be said that this was before Le Clos shocked the world by removing Michael Phelps’s clock of invincibility in the men’s 200m butterfly.
At the time, Le Clos – despite being the Commonwealth golf medallist in the event – was a 25-1 outsider to beat Phelps and win gold. But he did just that, and for good measure picked up a silver medal in the 100m butterfly as well.
However, in the next four years, with Phelps in retirement, Le Clos might have ascended to the No 1 spot in the world, but he was unable to match the 1min 52.96sec that he had in London.
It’s staggering to believe that the South African was just 20 at the time he beat Phelps. And, a couple of hours after one of sport’s great shocks, the American legend went up to Le Clos, shook his hand and looked him in the eye.
Watching
“I’ve been watching you for a year or so, and I’m looking forward to watching you in the years ahead. I’m handing over the (Olympic) torch to you.”
As far as compliments go, this was up there with the best you’ll ever get. In the ensuing years, between Olympic Games, Le Clos continued to pile up the medals and titles. But, somewhere along the way, he – by design or default – got under Phelps’ skin and got involved in trash-talk with the “retired” American.
It all came to a head in Rio when, shortly after racing to a largely surprising silver medal in the 200m freestyle, Le Clos shadow-boxed right in front of Phelps in the ready