The Football Faithful
·29 April 2024
The Football Faithful
·29 April 2024
Our weekly Premier League awards honour the best – and worst – of the football action from the weekend.
Moment of the Week
The North London derby always delivers, doesn’t it?
Tottenham were on the wrong side of the fine margins against Arsenal, as Ange Postecoglou’s side fell to a 3-2 defeat. Spurs trailed 3-0 to Arsenal at half-time, in a home derby, for the first time in the Premier League era, though it could have been so different.
After Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg’s own goal handed Arsenal the lead, Spurs hit the post through Cristian Romero, before Micky van de Ven had the ball in the net. Disallowed for a fractional offside, Arsenal hit a second less than two minutes later to take control of the contest.
Bukayo Saka’s strike doubled the advantage for the Gunners and proved the turning point in what had been a frantic opening to the game.
Player of the Week
Kai Havertz is a man transformed in the title run-in. The Arsenal enigma is now propelling the club’s title challenge, with an all-action performance swinging the North London derby in his side’s favour this weekend.
The German has had no shortage of critics during his time in English football but has emerged as a key cog in Mikel Arteta’s team. Against Spurs he was superb, emphatically answering the questions about his best role and his contribution. He ran the channels. He held the ball up. He dropped in delightfully to link the game. And he delivered end product.
Mood–
A brilliant pass released Bukayo Saka for the second goal before Havertz headed home the third, and ultimately the winner, for his 12th goal in the Premier League this season. Eight of those have come in his last 11 appearances, with Havertz heading to cult status if Arsenal can get over the line in the title race.
Goal of the Week
Put another goalkeeper in, they’re still not saving that.
One of the sweetest hits we’ve seen in the Premier League this season from Jeffrey Schlupp.
The definition of top bins.
Miss of the Week
Nottingham Forest had their chances in defeat to Manchester City, outshooting the below-par champions at the City Ground.
Chris Wood had the best opportunity of the game for Forest, but somehow squandered it as the New Zealander fluffed his lines for a simple tap-in.
Brilliant.
Manager of the Week
Take a bow, Andoni Iraola.
Bournemouth took a gamble when sacking Gary O’Neil in the summer and Iraola’s start, failing to win in his opening nine games, had their judgement questioned. The Spaniard has turned things around impressively, however, with Bournemouth thriving after a bedding-in period under the Basque boss.
A 3-0 win over Brighton took the Cherries to 48 points for the season, setting a new Premier League club-record in the process. Since that nine-game run at the start of the campaign, Bournemouth are fifth in the division for points won. A team transformed.
Stat of the Week
Yeah, the tippy-tappy stuff might be easy on the eye, but what Arsenal really needed to do to become great again was follow the Tony Pulis textbook.
Tweet of the Week
It’s uncanny, to be fair.
Unlikely winner of the Month
If you had told someone that Brighton’s Goal of the Month winner would be a goalkeeper, few would have believed you.
Even less would have if you had informed them that the goalkeeper in question actually played for Burnley.
But here we are.
Six games in April saw Brighton score just once, when Arijanet Muric scored a comical own goal for the Seagulls.
Congrats, Arijanet.
Quote of the Week
After a touchline spat with Jurgen Klopp, Liverpool’s Mohamed Salah said ‘there will be a fire’ if he speaks on the incident at full-time.
Genuine anger from the Egyptian? Or an attempt to reduce a media s***storm?
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