Arsenal suffer 3-1 defeat at rejuvenated Swansea
FOOTBALL
Wednesday, 31 Jan 20186:56 AM MYT
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Jan 30 (Reuters) - SWANSEA CITY 3 ARSENAL 1
Arsenal suffered another painful Premier League defeat as Swansea City capitalised on some glaring errors to win 3-1 on Tuesday, boosting their survival hopes and denting the visitors' top four chances.
Swansea's Sam Clucas struck either side of Jordan Ayew's strike to give Swansea the points after Arsenal had taken the lead through full back Nacho Monreal.
The visitors scored after 33 minutes but their advantage lasted just seconds as Mesut Ozil gave the ball away and Clucas equalised for the Welsh side.
Worse was to come for Arsenal in the second half as keeper Petr Cech sliced an attempted clearance, leaving Ayew to fire home after 61 minutes before Clucas finished right-footed to grab his second of the night with four minutes remaining.
"I felt defensively we were very poor and made big mistakes," said Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger. "It's better not to talk about the second or third goals."
The defeat leaves Arsenal in sixth place, eight points adrift of Liverpool in fourth after the Merseysiders won 3-0 at Huddersfield Town, and they were left licking their wounds after one win in their last five league games.
They have three wins and six defeats in their 13 league matches on the road this season and have gone five successive away games without a victory in all competitions.
SWANSEA REVIVAL
Swansea, however, have been rejuvenated by new manager Carlos Carvalhal and climbed out of the bottom three with the win, moving above Stoke City on goal difference.
Having also beaten visitors Liverpool in the league last week, Swansea have won four and lost one of eight games in all competitions under the Portuguese coach.
"We have a chance (of staying up). We are not in intensive care," said Carvalhal. "We are not far away from the doctor saying we can go home."
Arsenal started with new signing Henrikh Mkhitaryan on the bench following his move from Manchester United as part of the deal that took Chile forward Alexis Sanchez in the other direction, but it was not long before they were ahead.
Ozil's superb ball over the defence found Monreal sliding in at the back post to score his fourth goal of the season.
That lead was wiped out in a flash, however, as Ozil went from hero to villain, giving the ball away under pressure to Alfie Mawson, who slid it through for Clucas to score.
Mkhitaryan came on to make his debut after an hour but moments later the hosts stunned the visitors by taking the lead thanks to another error, this time from Cech.
Arsneal defender Shkodran Mustafi rolled the ball back to the keeper but he made a mess of his clearance, presenting a gift for Ayew to score before Clucas wrapped up the win by firing home after another superb run from Ayew.
(Reporting by Toby Davis; editing by Ken Ferris)
Read more at https://www.thestar.com.my/sport/football/2018/01/31/arsenal-suffer-31-defeat-at-rejuvenated-swansea/#9UjhUeK4qd8muFf0.99
