“That’s Shambolic”, whispered one of my friends during the game and to be honest credit to Vitoria for an absolute one-hundred percent of performance they gave at the Emirates tonight, although the headlines will have pictures of Nicolas Pepe tomorrow as the Ivorian came off the bench to score two absolute screamer of free-kicks and save Emery from blushes.
The visitors had upper-hand since the first whistle as Unai Emery’s men found it tough to cope up with Vitoria’s intensity which soon turned out rather worse for the Gunners, as Tottenham starlet Marcus Edwards, who is on loan from Arsenal’s arch-city-rivals opened the scoring with a fine turn and finish inside the penalty area in the eight minute.
Though Brazilian sensation Gabriel Martinelli equalised in the thirty-second with an header past Miguel Silva.
Arsenal’s celebrations didn’t last for too long as Vitoria deservedly restored their lead just six minutes later and thing looked as Ivo Vieira will pull off a major upset and take all three points back to Portugal.
But minute 72…Enter – Nicolas Pepe
Nicolas Pepe has not had best of days since his £72million move to Arsenal and his below par performance has led many Gunners faithful over getting frustrated by him and particularly the way gaffer is deploying him but here is Nicolas who has showed why exactly Raul Sanllehi wrote big cheque to get him from Lille.
Pepe scored two beautiful free-kicks and trebled his goal tally for Arsenal in fifteen minutes on the pitch tonight.
Well, Vitoria did put up a fight and nearly stunned the Emirates despite of their lengthy injury-list and resting some players ahead of Sunday’s clash at Sporting – will leave London with disappointment as they failed hold the Gunners even for a point after about taking all three.
