Arsene Wenger says he’ll have to have a chat with Santi Cazorla and Alexis Sanchez to find out why the Spaniard didn’t take the penalty Arsenal were awarded during today’s 4-1 win over Hull.
Instead, Alexis Sanchez stepped up and missed, something which did cause the manager some consternation when Cazorla was the designated penalty taker (having already scored two this season).
“Santi was down to take it,” he told the BBC. ” don’t know why it did not happen, they have pecking order, it was not planned for Sanchez to take it.
“I want to know what happened and for it not to happen again. Overall anyone can miss a penalty, we have to accept that.”
The Arsenal manager was pleased with the win though, especially after a difficult away trip in midweek in the Champions League.
“I feel overall it was a positive performance after playing away in the Champions League and away again today,” he said.
“We started well, dominated and were fluent. They defended well but overall we managed to score the goal then after the missed penalty we had to be serious and score the next goal.”
Alexis, you naughty little monkey!
In the Southampton match, it looked like Alexis tried to take the ball from Santi before his match winner. Seems unnecessary drama, just let Santi take ’em. Hope to see him score penalties with his right and left in the same match.
Why dont players respect the pecking order.. it’s there for a reason.
Because pecking order is for pecking!!!
And for chickens.
Nice to see us actually getting penalties after last season’s ridiculous stats.
Thank you! Somebody said it finally. Last season the lack of penalties is borderline ridiculous. This season referees make the right calls for us and as a fan I think we’re lucky in that sense. Shows how bad refereeing has been for us the last few seasons.
It’s because most of them are greedy, when it comes to scoring goals
He’s not wrong.
wenger did add that just cos someone is named penalty taker that does not mean they have to take the penalty, if at the time of a penalty award the penalty taker might not want to take it for a variety of reasons, and if someone else really wants to take it, then its no real problem.
But it’s there for a reason. Cazorla, as experienced as he is, should be able to take that penalty at any time. Especially at Hull away.
We’re not managers or at training, but I also don’t get why Alexis is second or third on the list. He’s never scored a competitive penalty. I think he’s missed three for us. [Before anyone brings up Chile, shootouts excluded.]. Ozil and Theo aren’t exactly great at them either, granted.
As captain Kos should’ve told Santi to take it
Or kos could’ve taken it !!
He’s better than many in our team
I was so looking forward to seeing if Santi would put it down the middle again! Gutted when Alexis stood up. 🙁
He can’t keep doing that surely
One would have thought not…
No one apart from Santi seems to score. Theo missed and so did Alexis.
Damn screwed with my fantasy team alexis
Same here mate, I had mesut as my Capitano, did nothing the whole game, got a simple tap in, blasted it over…. even elneny got an assist
It wasn’t a simple tap-in, why does everyone keep saying that? Arseblog claimed “it would have been easier to score” which is just silly. It bounced pretty awkwardly and came at him fast. Granted one of the best players in the world should have scored it and would have scored it 9/10 times, but I think watching it it was pretty understandable that he got under it because of the way it came at him.
A Santi penalty score would have been a solid 5 points for the goal. Taking his total to six on the day. Thanks Sanchez! All in all I’m just happy that they won. Now bring on chelski.
I don’t care who takes the penalty as long as we stop taking these slow stuttering runs up to the ball (think Sanchez and Ozil). Just pick a spot, run up as fast as you can and smack it into the bloody net! Hull had no problems doing it…
Cazorla would have set an EPL record if he scored (8 goals coming from penalties in a row).
Santi must be devastated to miss out on that record
Let’s hope he sets it next week instead!
On the other hand, Diego Perotti takes the most badass penalties I’ve ever seen, and his walkup is so slow it makes you want to pull your hair out.
Selfish Sanchez took a rubbish penalty and could have cost us points in a closer game. He may think he’s as good as Messi or Ronaldo but he clearly isn’t. He’s a very, very good player, but would be even better if he was more of a team player. I don’t like the fact that he seems to think he’s more important than the team, and I hope he’s not demanding things in order to sign a new contract.
Sanchez not a team player? What planet do you live on, pal?
Fickle as fuck
No, I’ve always thought he’s selfish. If Santi had scored that penalty hewould have set a Premier League record, and Santi was the designated penalty taker, but what does Sanchez care about that, nothing.
Why should he care. You aboot tae start greetin’ mate?
So we santi getting a record helps the team? He missed a penalty? Wow.
A PL record for not scoring goals except from the spot…not a record anybody really wants.
Regardless of the record, which probably none of the players were even aware of on the pitch, Alexis stepping up to claim a penalty is exactly the type of ownership we’ve been begging our players to have. So he missed, but if he made the goal we would’ve been talking about how fine a form Sanchez is in.
In the end, it’s no big deal?
Of course he’s a team player, the guy runs relentlessly for the team. I for one am happy that he’s being more selfish, the best goalscorers usually are and that can only bode well for us.
Calm down mate,
Spot on. To be world-class, he must improve on his judgement and know when to go solo and when to pass. That’s what made Thierry great.
“I hope he’s not demanding things in order to sign the new contract” all players demand things during a contract negotiation mate, hence the name.
“Cazorla would have set an EPL record if he scored (8 goals coming from penalties in a row).”
Did you make that up?
that point was mentioned in the commentary
To be honest I doubt Santi gives a shit about a record like that.
Next time Alexis steps up to take a penalty, he should riffle it like he did for that second goal he scored.
that’s the funny thing, that finish and the one he scored last week were both super precise finishes with quite a small scoring window. When you consider that, it’s hard to believe his shot was so close to the keeper.
@Paul they did mention something about that on the USA broadcast so I think it’s a legit stat, albeit not the most important record.
Was there not sufficient time between the penalty being awarded and Sanchez taking the penalty for Wenger to instruct Cazorla to take it instead!?
It’s usually quite loud when a home team gets a penalty awarded against them. So he’d need to come onto the pitch to check if Santi carrying a knock and and couldn’t take it, then talk to Alexis… But he’s not allowed on the pitch.
Also it got taken quite quickly (by the usual penalty standards) if Livermore isn’t completely off the pitch when it was taken.
I think its clear Alexis does not really listen to Wenger or his instruction. He’s a wild card that works in our favor most of the time.
I don’t think Wenger gives much instruction. Wengers management style is the equivalent of hit and hope.
how the fk do you know?
Because every ex Arsenal player has said so. There’s no tactical instructions pretty much.
Can you give a single example of a former Arsenal player saying that?
Alexis can definitely be a handful to manage, he’s that type of player. He ignored Pep’s instructions regarding national team playing time on numerous occasions as well during his time at Barca.
Poor communication skills, like all Latin American players. They never listen even to the refree. I wonder why he was there when the ref was looking to book santi for a second time, he could’ve annoyed him further…..
“Like all latin american players.”
Yeah, oooookay donald trump. Lets have some more absurd over-generalizations.
tough words
At least we avoided one of those embarrassing “To me–To you” pulling & dragging tussles over the ball. They end up making both players look a twat.
Sanchez will get a flea in his ear off Wenger & we move on.
Alexis…as soon as he stepped up I had the feeling he was going to miss it. Plus the hesitant step…it wasn’t going in.
Thankfully as per Alexis, he made up for it the hard way.:D
Some Gooners so in a rush to criticize, Sanchez is just an ambitious young man.whats wrong in that?!
It’s supposed to be an easy goal and if you just aim for a corner and kick full force it will usually go in. I was never worried that Arteta would miss because he didn’t complicate things needlessly. I would imagine that Giroud, Xhaka or El Neny would just blast it in. I don’t have confidence in Cazorla, Sanchez, Ozil or Walcott as penalty kickers. The one positive is that I don’t think Sanchez’s confidence will be hurt by this. Ozil looks broken after he misses.
You don’t have confidence in Santi? He’s excellent at them.
After today’s goal, perhaps Xhaka should be smashing the penalties home.
If Santi did not give Alexis the green light then Wenger and the team are in trouble. These things have to be 100% clear.
I reckon Xhaka takes a mean penalty.
Take it you did not see the Euros.
Call them over before they’re about to take it and make it clear Santi takes the penalty. Don’t have too give them THAT much freedom 🙂
Well Wenger could easily have intervened and laid down the law. But he chose not to do that and as such shouldnt be complaining about what happened to the press afterwards imo.