Arsenal 2-2 Crystal Palace (Kiwior 3′, Trossard 42′ | Eze 27′, Mateta 83′)
EMIRATES STADIUM — Nervous energy coursed around the Emirates after Jean-Philippe Mateta‘s stunning chip brought Crystal Palace level for a second time on Wednesday night.
Liverpool will win the Premier League title, but Arsenal didn’t want to do the honours for them. They withstood a late surge from the Eagles, ensuring that Virgil van Dijk will have to wait a little longer before popping the celebratory bubbles.
Palace deserved their point, but their hosts graciously helped them get it.
With just six minutes of normal time remaining, William Saliba ignored Martin Odegaard’s advice to roll the ball back to David Raya and tried to find his captain instead, despite Mateta being poised to pounce.
It was a poor pass that was brilliantly punished. Mateta easily rolled Odegaard before clipping a superb chip in off the underside of the crossbar from well outside the box.
Just a week ago, Saliba committed a similar error under pressure at the Bernabeu, losing the ball to Vinicius Jr and leaving the Brazilian an open goal.
Saliba has been practically faultless since establishing himself as an Arsenal regular.
Seeing him commit two similar mistakes in the space of a week has been as unusual as it will be disconcerting to Arsenal supporters.
With a Champions League semi-final double-header with PSG looming, now is it not the time for the Parisian’s standards to slide.
“We never found enough consistency in our actions to earn the right to completely dominate the game,” Arteta said.
“We had periods of that but we started to give sloppy balls away and we dropped the standards in certain defensive habits as well.
“When you are not at your best but winning 2-1 you obviously can’t give the ball away in the manner that we did. It’s part of football and it cost us two points.”
SIMPLY SUBLIME FROM MATETA!
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— Sky Sports Premier League (@SkySportsPL) April 23, 2025
As in Madrid, Raya played a role in the goal. He tends to stray out towards the edges of his penalty area when Arsenal are in possession to give the outfield players another option. That is part of the reason why Arteta bought him.
But it does leave him vulnerable if something goes wrong, as Mateta’s opportunistic strike showed. A goalkeeper isn’t much use if they are unable to guard their net.
“As soon as Odegaard takes up that position as another centre back and Kiwior becomes your left back, I think you’ve [Raya] just got to back in goal,” said Jamie Carragher on Sky Sports.
“As soon as Saliba has another player to play with, the goalkeeper doesn’t need to be there.”
Statistically, he had one of his best passing games of the season: a 90.6 per cent accuracy rate was his sixth-best return in the Premier League. He was fortunate that Palace were unable to capitalise on the few that went astray.
The Gunners were collectively lax for Palace’s first goal, failing to spot Eberechi Eze loitering with intent on the edge of their penalty box.
He punished them emphatically, zipping a first-time volley in off the post after being perfectly picked out by Adam Wharton’s driven corner.
The Arsenal set-piece machine roars again!
Jakub Kiwior nets his first goal of the season for Arsenal
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— Sky Sports Premier League (@SkySportsPL) April 23, 2025
It wasn’t all bad from Arsenal’s backline. Jakub Kiwior’s remarkable revival continued with an early opening goal.
The Pole, who has excelled while deputising for the injured Gabriel Magalhaes, bumped Eddie Nketiah out of the way and met Odegaard’s free-kick with a thunderous header from the penalty spot that flew past Dean Henderson.
It was his first goal in 14 months.
Kiwior also made a superb last-ditch block to prevent Nketiah from netting against his former club, moments after Eze’s equaliser, and is arguably (and improbably) Arsenal’s most in-form defender right now.
Jurrien Timber registered an assist, picking out Leandro Trossard to score with an incisive pass.
Myles Lewis-Skelly had some bright moments and is learning all the time in what is still a relatively new position.
But Raya and Saliba are the experienced pillars of the defence. Arsenal will need them at their best to progress past PSG.
Perhaps when the game state and competition stakes are more finely poised, concentration levels will be dialled up accordingly. The two glaring gifts that Arsenal have given out have come when they were 4-0 up on aggregate and in a match with little riding on it.
Time will tell whether this drop in sharpness was merely a blip or the start of something more serious.
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