Arsenal maintain lead but their clad iron grip on League shield chase loosens

By Ed Emeanua

Arsenal FC continued their steady but methodical pursuit of the English Premier League (EPL) shield this season, but relegation tormented West Ham United forced them to relent somewhat, after coming from two goals down to holdoff the league leaders in a pulsating 2-2 draw at the London Stadium on Sunday.

Arsenal still tops the table with 4 points separating them and defending champions Manchester City, who still has a game to play.

Arsenal poured forward in an attacking spree from the start of the game, but it was the home side that had a shoutout for a likely hand to ball incident early on in the fast paced encounter.

West Ham had built up with neat passing around the edge of the box in a meticulous effort to breach Arsenal’s defense. Saïd Benrahma found the room in the 5th minute to send a tentative shot towards the goal line that hit Rob Holding’s arm but the central referee and VAR both ruled his arm was tucked in directly in front of his body, so, no foul.

The visitors were already two goals up within the first 10 minutes of the game to show their determination and tenacity to remain on top of the EPL table.

The match began to swing from one end to the other. As if in a rehash of how to yank a defenses apart, Arsenal’s Thomas Partey transitioned play, Bukayo Saka dribbled inside before teeing in a reverse pass into overlapping right back Ben White’s path. West Ham failed to track him and his play flashed across the box, finding Jesus for a simple tap-in for the first goal.

Then on the 10′, Gabriel Martinelli was allowed too much room and time to locate Martin Odegaard with a timed cross to the back-post which allowed him to guide in the ball past Łukasz Fabiański on the volley for the second goal.

The game then turned into a ding-dong affair. On 31′, Partey mysteriously gives the ball away very casually on the edge of the box, allowing Declan Rice to pounce and win the duel, before rolling his pass into the path of Lucas Paquetá who was brought down by Gabriel. The referee blew his whistle allowing VAR to check the incident allowing West Ham to get a deserved lifeline.

Benrahma stepped up for the spot kick, kept his cool and sent Aaron Ramsdale the wrong way to tuck the ball into the bottom right corner, bringing the scores to 2-1.

In the second half, Martinelli’s close shot from a corner kick on 50′ struck Antonio’s arm for a penalty award but Saka skied his spot kick wide off the mark.

Then on 54′, Thilo Kehrer looped the ball into the box with Arsenal defense caught napping, allowing Jarrod Bowen to evade the offside trap and finishing with a first time shot past Ramsdale to tie the game 2-2.

Both sides pressed for the lead but mush share equal blames for spurning chances after chances to win the game.