Arsenal continued their fine form in front of goal, spanking Sheffield United 6-0 at Bramall Lane to keep up the pressure on title rivals Manchester City and Liverpool.
Mikel Arteta’s side netted five times before half-time for the first time in an away Premier League fixture with Martin Odegaard, Gabriel Martinelli, Kai Havertz and Declan Rice all on the scoresheet alongside Jayden Bogle’s own goal. Ben White rounded off the scoring before the hour mark as the Gunners saw out the match playing at a canter.
After the game, man-of-the-match Martin Odegaard faced questions from Sky Sports Monday Night Football.
On making it look easy…
We know it’s a tough place to come, so I think we’ve done really good from the start. We took control of the game. We know what their game is like. They want to play a lot of direct football and we had to be ready for that. And then, when we had the ball, we were in a good mood today and we created a lot. We scored the goals early on and kept on going from there. So, in the end, it was a solid and nice performance.
On making a quick start…
Definitely. We wanted to keep the momentum going. We’ve had some good games now in the league. We wanted to keep it up and we always want to start strong. Especially when you come to places like this, it can be a bit tricky if you don’t start well.
On how much he enjoys pressing opponents…
I think it’s unbelievable the work we put in without the ball. I think it’s easy when you look at us, we win 6-0 today and some of the other games we played recently we won a lot. You can talk about what we do in front of the goal, but I think the work we do without the ball, from the front line all the way to the back to the goalkeeper, it’s really good and it’s a pleasure to be a part of that and we feel really self safe when we’re defending and I think that’s so crucial. It makes it a lot easier for us to attack as well so we have to find the right balance and I think we’re doing that good at the moment.
On scoring from cutbacks…
Yeah, It’s definitely something we work on, to get enough people in the box and what areas to attack. For myself, I like to come from the deep, from a midfield position and I like to end up there on the penalty spot and then we have the front players attack in other areas. We just have to look at each other and make sure we fill up all the spaces and then some of us will get the ball and score hopefully.
On what happened in Dubai to spark such a good run…
It’s a good question. I think we needed a break, to be honest. I think we were in a tough moment before the break. We were tired and we needed a little restart. And I think we did brilliantly to get away. We worked on some details. We had some time off. And yeah, we came back strong. And now we have to keep it up. Coming towards the end of the season, that’s when it matters, you know. So we have to keep this momentum going and keep pushing each other every day. And try to be a little bit better every day in training. And then we’ll see where it takes us.
On potentially going top with a win over Brentford…
Every game is crucial now. You see the quality in this league. At the top of the table, it’s a good fight, the quality is there, and every game is important. So it’s another important game and another three points we want to get. Hopefully, we can do that.
On photographer Stuart MacFarlane not being part of this evening’s celebrations (a question posed by Jamie Carragher)…
I was too scared to do it today, so I went straight inside today!
Top captain! Look forward to seeing him progress over the next year’s!
Jamie Carragher is a toad
Smile Jamie.
Turd. Get your spellings right.
A proper prick
Absolutely!
The pressing these days is nuts!
Love it!
COYG 💪
Odegaard is a class act.😀
Hey Jamie, no comment on VVD celebration as if they have won the world cup?
The next phase in our evolution is to be able to replicate this type of performance across a larger group. One key potential addition who excites me is Viktor Gyokeres. Even just his youtube highlight videos show you an unbelievable physical specimen. His superpower seems to be riding tackles and getting behind defenders who try to body him off the ball. They can’t. They’re either too slow or not strong enough. That’s how he gets a sight of goal most often. In one clip, he takes on about four opposition defenders who all seem surprised by his initial burst of… Read more »
Interesting perspective but I’d imagine he’d be our backup option for the summer window (both from position and player perspective). We’re more likely to Target and Winger and a Midfielder on priority. And then if a chance emerges, a Striker. Possibly a very young one.
As a swede I’d love to have Viktor at Arsenal. Was hoping for Isak but we were never really in for him.