Arsenal 1-1 Manchester City: match report

0-1 David Silva 18'
1-1 Mathieu Flamini 53'

Arsenal took a series of punches (figuratively speaking) and went down early, but Mathieu Flamini put the ball in the proper goal this time and the Gunners were able to get a point, which is certainly better than the alternative (namely, losing the game; not the alternative of winning that would have been a lot better).

Early on Arsenal had to batten the hatches, as they were unable to keep the ball and Manchester City were doing that thing they do sometimes where they're really good at soccer. (Luckily they stopped later, but we'll get to that.) During one of Arsenal's sporadic spells of actually having the ball, Mathieu Flamini tried to play a pass to Lukas Podolski, who couldn't control it. Before you could say "goddamn it, when's Aaron Ramsey coming back," they had the ball in the Arsenal penalty box, a shot was ricocheting off the post, and David Silva was bundling it into the net. Oops.

Arsenal recovered, and came into the game a bit. Not long after conceding, they'd have a goal called off for offside - Podolski connected with Flamini and it was better this time than the last, though not quite there. At halftime, Arsenal were behind.

And soon after the half, they were not! For the third relevant time Podolski and Flamini connected, and Flamini finished well to equalize for Arsenal. It was probably the best thing he's done since he possibly threatened to blind Marc Wilson, or possibly the sleeves thing. Arsenal would spend the rest of the game pressing for a winner, and on balance probably played the better game, but the second goal wouldn't come and the teams would have to split the points.