Ten-man Chelsea were able to hold on for a point against Premier League leaders Arsenal while Manchester United returned to winning ways at Crystal Palace.
Liverpool eased some of the pressure on head coach Arne Slot with a much-needed victory but Lucas Paqueta’s red card provoked a remarkable outburst from the West Ham midfielder.
Arsenal finish “difficult” week with hard-fought draw
Mikel Arteta praised his Arsenal side after an “immensely difficult” week ended with a 1-1 with 10-man Chelsea at Stamford Bridge.
The Gunners started a Premier League match with neither William Saliba nor Gabriel in defence for the first time this season and with Martin Odegaard and Viktor Gyokeres only fit for the bench and Leandro Trossard injured.
They had to come from behind after Chelsea recovered from Moises Caicedo’s red card to lead through Trevoh Chalobah only for Mikel Merino to equalise.
“It’s been a positive week because the difficulty was immense but I have this flavour that today we should have won the game, and we haven’t,” said Arteta when considering their preceding games against Tottenham and Bayern Munich.
Set-pieces put Manchester United back on track
Ruben Amorim joked Manchester United were “stealing” set-piece routines after a second-half turnaround saw them beat Crystal Palace 2-1 to get them back on track in the Premier League.
Joshua Zirkzee and Mason Mount both scored following Bruno Fernandes’ free-kicks after Jean-Philippe Mateta’s twice-taken penalty had given the hosts the lead.
“We learn a lot in England. You are used to do that and see that (set-pieces), but when you come to the Premier League, you learn a lot about how other the teams do it,” said Amorim.
“And we are stealing a lot of things to score goals.”
Slot happy about Isak breakthrough
Arne Slot admitted Alexander Isak’s first Premier League goal for Liverpool was important for both him and the club.
And he played down leaving Mohamed Salah on the bench for the whole of their 2-0 win at West Ham, arresting a slide which had brought nine defeats in 12 matches.
Slot said of £125million British record signing Isak’s goal – followed by a late Cody Gakpo strike – “I don’t think there was much more than 10 minutes in him to go, so then to score just before you come off was important for us, but also for him.”
Paqueta criticises lack of “psychological support”
West Ham’s Lucas Paqueta has accused the Football Association of a lack of support in an extraordinary outburst after he was sent off for two dissent offences in quick succession during the Liverpool defeat.
In July Paqueta was cleared of spot-fixing allegations relating to deliberately getting booked for betting purposes after a two-year investigation but the probe cost him a likely move to Manchester City.
The Brazil midfielder wrote on X: “I understand that now I have to come across as the villain; it’s hard to live with everything that’s been caused in my life and in my psyche!
“I’ll keep trying to ensure they don’t affect me even more. This doesn’t justify my expulsion, and for that I apologise to the fans and my team-mates!”
What’s on today?
Birmingham and Watford face each other at St Andrew’s as both look to maintain their push for the Sky Bet Championship play-off places.
