Five On the Road!

FENERBAHCE 2 Silvestre OG 19 Guiza 78

ARSENAL 5 Adebayor 10 Walcott 11 Diaby 22 Song 49 Ramsey 90+4

A trip to Turkey is never easyArsenal took the field against Fenerbahce with an untested back-four with Alex Song and Mikel Silvestre partnering one another for the first time and Gael Clichy and Manu Eboue on the flanks.

A five man midfield comprising of Cesc Fabregas, Abou Diaby, Denilson, Samir Nasri and Theo Walcott was designed to keep it tight while providing the opening for Manu Adebayor who operated as a lone striker.

Manuel Almunia skippered the Arsenal side with William Gallas and Kolo Toure being side-lined with injuries.

Despite being left alone upfront Adebayor put Arsenal ahead after a wonderful through ball by Fabregas in the 10^th minute.

Then barely a minute later another through ball by the Spanish midfielder put Walcott through and the English youngster found the net with the smallest of margin to put the Gunners two goals ahead.

Arsenal fans were in dreamland.

Then the home side snatched one back from a typical Arsenal weakness, that is the free-kick. Guiza volleyed the long free-kick from the left and the loose ball was deflected by Silvestre into his own goal.

Then Arsenal restored their two goal lead when Diaby latched on to a pass from Fabregas and shrugged off three Fenerbahce defenders before shooting past Demirel from quite an acute angle.

Just after the half an hour mark Dani Guiza put the ball into the Arsenal net but his effort was correctly ruled out for offside. Arsenal did not look comfortable defending.

Song who was earlier booked for obstruction was given a lucky break by the referee when he committed a similar offence on Roberto Carlos. In the 40^th minute Guiza was put through again but his low shot just missed the target by mere inches.

In the 41^st minute Fabregas put Walcott clear again but Demirel managed to cut out his low ball from reaching Fabregas. At the other end Almunia had to pull off another important save on one to one situation to deny Fenerbahce from reducing the gap.

Two minutes into the second half a sight every Arsenal fans did not want to see when Nasri went down clutching his left leg. From the resultant free-kick, comedic defending gave the opportunity for Song to get his name on the scoresheet, his first in European competition.

Almunia steady handling prevented an Alex’s free-kick from going in after Diaby adjudged to commit a foul outside the the penalty box just under the hour mark.

Again the Spanish custodian in the 67^th minute came out on top on one on one situation though it needed a collective effort to prevent the ball from ending up in the back oof the net.

Diaby exited in the 73^rd minute to be replaced by Aaron Ramsey, who scored a spectacular goal against England in their U-21 European Championship play-off match last week.

Finally Guiza managed to put his name on the scoresheet in the 78^th minute when a defensive error by Song put him through and he lobbed Almunia with ease to give the home fans some hope of a comeback by their team.

Johan Djorou came on for Walcott with six minutes to go. Carlos Vela followed Djorou a couple of minutes later in place of Adebayor.

Ramsey in the last minute of additional time opened his European account with another cracker from just outside the box which hit the post before going in.

It was five on the road for the rampant Gunners!

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