Arsenal beat Wolves: Five talking points as Arteta’s side win ugly after Martinelli red

Wolves v Arsenal: Match in pics

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Arsenal picked up an ugly 1-0 win over Wolves to strengthen their bid for a top four place in the Premier League. Gabriel Magalhaes scored from a corner to breach Wolves’ rock-solid defence and the hosts struggled to fashion much in response. Aaron Ramsdale tipped over Romain Saiss’ effort and the Gunners held on to win and move within one point of fourth-placed West Ham, despite Gabriel Martinelli’s red card. Here are Express Sport’s five talking points from a feisty game at Molineux.

Arsenal win corner battle

Coming into this game, Wolves and Arsenal were the only two Premier League sides not to have conceded a goal from a corner this season.

After 25 minutes, Arsenal were the only team left standing, with Gabriel tapping in to ruin Wolves’ perfect record from corners.

It was the Gunners’ first shot on target and their first goal in any competition since New Year’s Day.

Arsenal won’t mind that it came from a centre-back after a scrappy knock-down and involved a potential foul on the goalkeeper from Alexandre Lacazette. All that mattered was the goal.

Saka shines

On Tuesday night, Bukayo Saka was on the red carpet with Arsenal legend Ian Wright, attending the Brits to present an award.

He was back on more familiar territory on Thursday, shining on the right hand side of Arsenal’s attack.

The 20-year-old has been fantastic this season and continues to go from strength to strength, with his pace, passing and positional intelligence clear to anyone that watches him.

With Martinelli on the opposite flank, Lacazette occasionally struggled to keep up with his team-mates who are both 10 years his junior.

He was sacrificed after Martinelli’s red card, robbing him of a chance of making a telling impact on the counter-attack.

Goal-shy Wolves

Wolves have now scored just 19 goals in 22 Premier League games this season. That is the third worst tally in the division, with only relegation-threatened Norwich (14) and Burnley (17) worse in front of goal.

After a rocky start to the campaign, Bruno Lage has his side well drilled and solid at the back – only leaders Manchester City have conceded fewer goals.

But the Portuguese manager really needs to work on diversifying Wolves’ attack, which is far from exhilarating.

They may have lost Adama Traore’s x-factor, but Raul Jimenez is a top-class striker and Daniel Podence is a skilful and tricky forward.

Lage needs to find a way of getting them more involved, because they were starved of touches against Arsenal, whose pressing game worked nicely. In truth Ramsdale never looked that uncomfortable.

Gunners’ red card problem

Once they had the lead Arsenal did everything in their power to stifle any momentum Wolves were building up.

Throw-ins, free-kicks and goal kicks were deliberated over. Niggly fouls were made. Cynics might call it game-management.

But it nearly backfired, with Martinelli on the receiving end of two yellow cards in one motion from referee Michael Oliver.

The frustrated youngster tried to prevent a Wolves throw-in from being taken before sprinting back to barge over Chiquinho. He looked baffled when two yellow and a red followed, but it was poor discipline – something which has become commonplace recently.

Arsenal have now picked up four red cards in their last six games in all competitions, with Granit Xhaka, Thomas Partey and Gabriel the guilty parties.

Arteta wins ugly

Arteta will no doubt be annoyed with the red card, but the result is always the most important thing.

And after a run of five games without victory, this was a much-needed result – especially after Tottenham and Manchester United slipped up in mid-week.

Arsenal have the luxury of two games in hand on fourth-placed West Ham and results like this, against a very hard to break down Wolves side, are exactly what is needed between now and the end of the season.

In a quirk of the Covid-impacted fixture list, the Gunners face Wolves again in two weeks’ time. More of the same, without the red card, will be needed then.

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