Liverpool’s Dominik Szoboszlai has refused to criticise Arsenal’s style of play at 1-0 up, suggesting his team likely would have done the same thing.
Arsenal started very strongly in Sunday’s game against Liverpool at Anfield, and the reward for that start was an early goal from Kai Havertz in the 16th minute.
Having taken the lead, the Gunners’ primary focus was on keeping it. Whilst the team did have some good chances to add a second goal throughout the 90 minutes, it’s also true that there were periods where they tried to slow things down and frustrate Liverpool.
Speaking to Viaplay Fotball after the game, Dominik Szoboszlai was asked about this stop-start tactic employed by Arsenal. But Szoboszlai himself wasn’t keen to feed into the narrative.
Reporter: “It’s difficult, you see Arsenal, there is a lot of stopping the game and starting the game, stops all over again. How efficient is that, and how difficult is it to play against a team like that?”
Szoboszlai: “Yeah it’s always a thing. But I think we might do the same thing if we were leading 1-0, and they wouldn’t do the same thing if they were losing 1-0, so that’s football. We have to keep on going.”
It’s a good response, particularly given Liverpool did play in a similar way to secure a draw at the Emirates Stadium earlier this year. David Raya didn’t have a save to make in that 0-0 draw, as the away side tried to wind down the clock for a point.
The primary difference in this case was that Arsenal had the lead, and no necessity to score another goal.
It would have been nice to kill the game off, and Christos Tzolis went close when he forced Alisson Becker into the best save of the match. But 1-0 was enough for three points, and it was only sensible for the Gunners to see the game out.
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