Rivals Arsenal and Liverpool met today at Anfield in a match featuring two teams who desperately wanted to claim all three points. Arsenal needed the win to keep pace with all five teams above them in the Barclay’s Premier League table, four of whom won this weekend (Chelsea play tomorrow). For Liverpool, they could not risk falling any further down in the league table as the season approaches its halfway point; at this point last season, they were sitting in first place, whereas today they entered the match in a tie for 10th.
The home side dominated the first half, and were finally rewarded in injury time when Philippe Coutinho latched onto a Jordan Henderson pass, shook Per Mertesacker with a nifty body fake, and fired home to give his team the lead:
Liverpool held their 1-0 advantage for all of a minute. A Raheem Sterling free kick was knocked around in the air in the Liverpool box, where Aresenal defender Mathieu Debuchy headed the ball off of Martin Skrtel and into the back of the net for an equalizer just before halftime:
Arsenal striker Olivier Giroud has made a huge impact since returning from injury about a month ago, scoring four goals in six matches. The Frenchman finished expertly in the 65th minute off a nifty feed from Santi Cazorla, thrusting the visiting Gunners into the lead:
It looked like Liverpool were going to (undeservedly, it must be said) come up empty at home as the second hald went into an absurd nine minutes of injury time. Skrtel—the reason for all the extra football after Giroud had accidentally booted him in the face and opened up a huge gash—struck a picture-perfect header off an Adam Lallana corner to send each team home with a point:
While both sides will have wanted all three points, neither will be distraught over just grabbing the one. Arsenal will return home to the Emirates Stadium to meet the struggling Queens Park Rangers on Boxing Day, while that same day Liverpool will travel to Turf Moor to take on a frisky Burnley side that has taken points from each of its last four home games (two wins, two draws).
