Danny Welbeck leaps to give Arsenal Europa League victory over Sporting | Soccer

Momentum is a curious thing. It takes a while to warm up and it can get cold all of a sudden, but for now, it feeds Arsenal. It was not their most inspiring performance in recent weeks, but they had enough courage to extend their victory streak in all competitions to 11 and control the control of Group E of the Europa League.

Danny Welbeck inflicted a rare home defeat at Sporting, who have not lost a match to Estádio José Alvalade since Barcelona came to town there a little more than a year ago. year.

Unai Emery's desire to win the group as quickly as possible while letting his players boil is palpable and he described the win as "a great positive thing." Upon entering the game, he had spoken of his taste for the show, for the panache of the goals that had badailed the recent victories.But this match was more focused on goalkeeping when their game lacked enough gliding and that it showed in itself another facet of the team that he was building.

Another victory is at the edge of Arsenal, a little closer to the club's record of consecutive wins, which remains unchanged at 14 years old. Emery took a deep breath as he reflected on that. "Three games," he thought, "It's a lot of games, we only think about the next against Crystal Palace and also enjoying every moment." continue to win but we know we can lose to any time. "

This touch of realism stems in part from the Arsenal custom that wants the first halves strangely slow. This encouraged Sporting to take the initiative. The Lisbon team was striving to create major problems with this precision or finesse, but it was obvious that she wanted to advance the ball directly as often as possible.

Just after the half hour, Nani gave the crowd a boost of energy with a sudden change of pace and direction to give themselves a chance to shoot. His strike sparks just above the bar. If this raises the crowd, the mood worsens a little later when Sokratis grabbed a piece of Fredy Montero's shirt while the Colombian spread his legs. He came down and the screaming whistles fell from the stands while the referee signaled to play the game.

Everyone was forced to score in an offensive way after 45 minutes of play. A free kick by Henrik Mkhitaryan, who was repulsed by Renan Ribeiro. Fluency and urgency were lacking, and half-time whistling raised the question of why Arsenal could only find a solution in the second half – and perhaps he was too field to catch up with one of these days.

Emery is well aware of the phenomenon even though it has not solved the problem yet. "Every game is a great opportunity for improvement and one area is this one," he said. "We talked about it before the match. At half-time, in the locker room, we said we could not impose our game in the first 45 minutes, but we have the opportunity to change the result in the second half and think only to win that match and improve things. We did it. We must continue to find the solution so that the first half is better. "

There was a recovery right after the restart, when Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang was sent running twice in a row towards the goal. In both cases, the quality of the pbad was incisive although he had to shoot with sharp angles.

At half-time, Welbeck found the goal cleared with a powerful header, but the referee Damir Skomina refused the goal for a foul. The decision seemed questionable.

Their goal was fortuitous, Sporting being punished after a slip of Sebastián Coates. The defender tried in vain to gain the advantage over Aubameyang but deflected the ball to allow Welbeck to take advantage over Ribeiro.

Sporting coach José Peseiro was unleashing many perceived injustices, but it was hard to see what was going on.

Emery strives to create a whole team and the majority of the players he will use at Selhurst Park on Sunday were part of the group heading to Lisbon, though Mesut Özil had not yet done so . to play. Alexandre Lacazette and Alex Iwobi had short cameos. It's part of keeping the momentum going for as long as possible – and making it strong enough for the moment this race deviates from its course.

A year ago, Arsene Wenger played in three Europa League group stage games. One of the most prominent groups in Red Star Belgrade is confirmed players who do not get minutes of Premier League and 10 members of the academy that make up the match team. While Wenger used two completely different teams in the league and cup, Emery aims to promote the feeling of a group, regardless of his opponent or price.

Eleven victories and counting for the account, Arsenal's next hurdle awaits Sunday noon in South London.