Roy Keane, during his legendary playing days with Manchester United, often proved to be Arsenal’s jinx. His on and off the field battles with Patrick Viera, Arsenal’s answer to Roy Keane, still make him a villain in the eyes of many Gunners fans.
So it was no surprise that in his new role as the manager of Sunderland he made Arsenal fight for every inch of the grass during their premiership clash at the imposing Emirates Stadium.
But ‘Keano’ knew that this Arsenal side is a different kettle of fish. Within seconds of the kick-off, Arsenal, with their brand of passing football, made their intentions clear that Sunderland cannot afford to sleep at the back.
As expected the Gunners shot into a 2-0 lead within the first fifteen minutes through a Robin Van Persie unstoppable free-kick and a Philippe Senderos opportunistic strike. It seemed as if Arsenal will have a walk in the park and the side from the North-east must have been preparing for a long afternoon.It could have been the case for Sunderland, had a genuine Abou Diaby goal was not cancelled by the linesman on the 20th minute mark. The linesman’s mistake was turning out to be a grave one for Arsenal fans as Sunderland showed great resilience, a hallmark of their manager Roy Keane during his playing days, to wipe out the two-goal deficit just after half-time. The first Sunderland goal came right after Diaby’s goal was disallowed at the other end when Kenwyn Jones’ shot was saved by Manuel Almunia but Ross Wallace fired home the rebound. Sunderland were definitely not overawed by Arsenal’s fluent passing game and looked menacing whenever they had the ball. The goal sparked Roy Keane’s boys into life and with their first attack of the second-half equalised through Kenwyn Jones after some great initial play from Liam Miller.
Sunderland now had the belief of taking all three points from Arsenal, which sounded remarkable given the gap of talents between the two sides at the start of the match and all the more stunning after Arsenal raced into a two-goal lead within the first twenty minutes. But that’s the Roy Keane mantra,’never give up’.
The match was so finely balanced that Arsene Wenger was starting to feel the pressure and must have been thinking about that disallowed goal. But as always, the Arsenal manager, unlike Roy Keane, has the luxury of talent in his reserves and one such talent is Theo Walcott, the great English prospect. With ten minutes remaining in the clock and the Arsenal players getting desperate for the winning goal, teenager Walcott raced into the Sunderland box and set up the brilliant Robin Van Persie who shot past Craig Gordon with a crisp left footer for the all important winner.
The match turned a bit sour at the end when Paul Mcshane was red carded for a foul on Alexander Hleb which looked a bit harsh on the Sunderland player.
But the match was truly a classic and it was again proved that the Premiership is the toughest and the most enjoyable league in the world. Although Arsenal had that extra quality compared to a brave Sunderland side.