Arsenal won the FA Super Cup by beating Manchester City

The football season in England opened with a sensation in the match for the Community Shield – the Super Bowl – at London’s Wembley Stadium. Arsenal were able to save themselves in a meeting with the strongest club in the country, the winner of the Champions League Manchester City in the last seconds of regular time, which ended in a draw – 1: 1, and then defeated him in a penalty shootout.

The first official match of the English season quite long and persistently seemed to honestly warn not to expect any extraordinary turns from him. Arsenal spent a lot of money in the summer to add to the power, which, of course, was already impressive, but which in the last championship was still not enough to cut on equal terms with Manchester City in the “golden race”. And this last upgrade of Arsenal with Declan Rice, Kai Havertz on the field in the starting quarter of an hour was able to perform only two dozen passes, and owned the ball five times less often than the opponent, who actually did without Kevin De, who was still recovering from injury Bruyne, the most important character in terms of his control. You rarely see this even in the matches of the national teams, pushing one of the giants with the football “dwarf”. “Dwarfs” are much more daring.

In general, it was in some sense a strange sight.

One of the two best teams in the best European league rolled the ball without straining in the opponent’s half, and from its game it was breathed with transcendent ease, transcendent confidence in its capabilities, its exclusivity. And the other one – the one that a few months ago already hinted at the fact that she was going to compete with her and, in theory, was obliged to insist now on this with all her might – endured, endured and endured, trying to close all areas and directions that pose a threat in time . Well, yes, it turned out well at Arsenal, and, for example, Erling Haaland, the miracle sniper of Manchester City, gave almost no reason to remember his presence. But, whatever one may say, London’s patience and London’s rigidity were too little to force a reconsideration of views on the alignment. And then, sometimes there was a feeling that Arsenal, with all its external density, was holding on to a thin one – as in that episode, when a shot from the penalty line by Rodri somehow blocked Rice, and the ball, ricocheting from his foot, passed centimeters from the post .

And suddenly it turned out that those who had already spat on the London club, having decided that it, resigned to its outsider status, would not give anything interesting, were terribly mistaken.

The Manchester City players were probably surprised themselves to see that such a timid opponent, having just sat in the trenches, began to bite, finding a weak link in other people’s formations.

The weak link was the left flank of the Manchester defense. First, Ben White penetrated the penalty area there, who found that the defenders of Manchester City, who were carried away by the offensive, did not pay much attention to Kai Havertz. It was not easy for Havertz to accept the pass, but he, spinning like a top, accepted it and struck it terribly unpleasantly. Stefan Ortega, who stood at the gates of Manchester City, reacted by reflecting the ball with his foot.

And before the break, Arsenal built an attack even more dangerous. Now on the right near the penalty he found himself Bukayo Saka. And again, Kai Havertz, who seemed to have proved at Chelsea that the position of the center forward does not suit him, but got it after the transfer, was free. Only now he did not need to spin to handle the ball – he hit comfortably, almost point-blank. And this was the case when, of course, the goalkeeper is good, but still the fault that the goal did not take place lies mainly with the forward, who actually slapped the ball directly into the goalkeeper.

Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola, of course, made substitutions in the second half, designed to raise the degree of severity: the game, acquired by Arsenal, already shouted at the top of their voices that they would not interfere.

But among them was a replacement, which definitely struck everyone. Together with Kevin De Bruyne and Phil Foden, the options are understandable, perhaps, in fact, inevitable, the English youth player Cole Palmer appeared on the field. And most importantly, for his sake, Guardiola sacrificed Erling Haaland, the untouchable Haaland.

But it was Palmer who was destined to become a hero. A real hero, and not one to whom the title was awarded rather by circumstances than by a personal feat. Ripened from the loss of Arsenal and the activity of De Bruyne, he crowned the Manchester lunge with a fantastically accurate sweeping blow, demonstrating the composure of a highly experienced master in the penalty area. And the impulse of the partner immediately almost supported Foden, who was left alone with the London goalkeeper Aron Ramsdale. Ramsdale miraculously resisted, catching the ball that had already leaked between his legs with his heel, and saved the intrigue.

And then there was all the compensated time that did not want to end. And Arsenal, in a desperate position, went on and on, while Manchester City calmly fought back. He had to suffer a little bit – it was already the hundredth minute when the Londoners earned an angular and broad smile of luck in the form of Manuel Akanji, who inappropriately turned up on the trajectory of Leandro Trossar’s strike and fooled Ortega with a rebound. And the match turned to a penalty shoot-out, in which only Manchester players allowed misfires – Kevin De Bruyne, who missed, and Rodri, who lost the duel to Ramsdale.

Alexey Dospekhov