A big win and top trolling keeps Arsenal in Liverpool’s rear-view mirror | Soccer

HUMBLE PIE

While their march towards the title has looked fairly serene and been declared by many as a foregone conclusion, Liverpool’s efforts to shake off Arsenal increasingly resemble those of a drunk pub patron trying to get rid of a rogue length of toilet paper that has become stuck to the sole of their shoe after a visit to the gents. Having gone to Bournemouth and taken care of business in a match their own manager suggested could have gone either way but for a couple of iffy decisions, a tight offside and some better finishing from the home side, Liverpool managed to put more distance between themselves and their nearest rivals, only to glance in the rear-view mirror last night to see the green and goofy face of Gunnersaurus looming large.

Given their six-point lead with a game in hand, the title still remains very much Liverpool’s to lose. However, it is worth noting that their extra game is against an Everton side that no longer look the pushovers they were while under the stewardship of a different inhabitant of the Jurassic era. What’s more, while the Merseyside derby is being contested in a spirit of blood and thunder under the Goodison Park lights, Arsenal’s players will be chillaxing during their now customary winter break in Dubai. If Liverpool’s bitter Merseyside rivals can do them a favour and Arsenal return from their holidays in a similar state of overpriced Salt Bae steak-fuelled serenity and reinvigoration to last year, Mikel Arteta and his men will certainly back themselves to take the title race right to the wire. Crucially, they still have a league match to play against Liverpool in May.

While Arsenal have tended to make heavy weather of quite a few of the wins that have kept them in the hunt thus far, for the final 35 minutes of their shellacking of Manchester City their players yomped about with all the giddy abandon of calves confined to a barn all winter who have just been released into a field. Having paid undue deference to their visitors for almost an hour after being gifted an early lead, it took Erling Haaland’s equaliser to spark them into life and realise that despite being champions, Pep Guardiola’s side are currently a complete shower. “I liked that the team showed a lot of personality and competitiveness,” gushed Mikel Arteta following his side’s demolition of City in a fixture that is becoming one of English football’s more enjoyable needle matches, due in no small part to the retaliatory and genuinely funny trolling of a certain Norwegian by Gabriel, Myles Lewis-Skelly and even the DJ in charge of the Emirates playlist.

While Arsenal’s players and fans communed in an atmosphere of genuine joviality and togetherness that you don’t always get at the Emirates, all concerned should keep their eye on the bigger prize. After all, this wasn’t the first, second, third, fourth, fifth or sixth league match City have lost this season – and it’s unlikely to be the last.

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 QUOTE OF THE DAY

Humiliating? It’s not embarrassing. When you loan a player – and I don’t think it’s official – you expect him to play and to improve, so there is nothing humiliating there. I understand the question but I am just focused on my players, that’s all. When the window closes, I will be really focused on just our team and to improve our team” – Ruben Amorim, who watched Manchester United suffer their 11th defeat of the season, says he won’t mind at all if Marcus Rashford goes on a goalscoring spree at Aston Villa. Nope. Meanwhile, the word is that Rashford may have played his last game for his boyhood club, even if Amorim doesn’t stay in the top job at Old Trafford.

 RECOMMENDED LISTENING

Football Weekly is here with a look back at the weekend that was.

What are the odd of BOTH your teams being thrashed 7-0 on the same day? Having been born and raised in Cardiff and the heady days of Jimmy Scoular and European nights at Ninian Park, I now live in Sussex and am a season ticket holder at the Amex. Cue Nottingham Forest 7-0 Brighton, shortly followed by Leeds 7-0 Cardiff. It didn’t help that Wales had been thrashed in Paris the evening before. Three teams, null points, rugby scores all. Ho hum” – Peter Harris.

During the Villa game, I heard one of the commentators say that ‘Boubacar Kamara lacked concentration there’. Can’t argue with that. You always want your Kamara fully focused” – Darian Boyd.

A regular part of my job involves making powerpoint presentations, and the photo in Friday’s News, Bits and Bobs caught my eye in the worst possible way. What is that horrible font that some poor Uefa marketing intern was handed for Munich 25, and why not make ‘Road to’ the same font? The whole garish mess looks like something out of a Walt Disney nightmare. Which, now that I think about it and consider the minds behind the whole shebang, could well be the point” – Daniel Stauss.

Send letters to the.boss@theguardian.com. Today’s winner of our prizeless letter o’ the day is …Peter Harris. Terms and conditions for our competitions, when we run them, can be viewed here. 

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