A very entertaining game ended at the Liberty Stadium ended 2-2 meaning the FA cup 3rd round tie goes into a replay at the Emirates Stadium. Arsenal made three changes from the team that started against Southamptom. Giroud,Ramsey and Mertesacker came in for Chamberlain,Podolski and Vermaelen respectively.
The first half was very one paced with both sides lacking a spark in the final third.Good interplay around the Swansea box lead to Ramsey being released on the left side of the penalty area, but instead of taking on the shot on his left foot he chose to come inside onto his right which gave an opportunity to the Swansea defenders and the chance was gone. At the other end former Arsenal youth player Kyle Bartley hit the cross bar from a corner.
The second half started with a much more of a higher tempo with both teams realizing that a replay would do no favours for either team.Olivier Giroud went close twice with his left foot, both were comfortable saves for Vorm, he although should ve scored with his next chance when Ramsey did brilliantly to dig out a cross from the left, Giroud timed his jump too early and the ball went harmlessly wide. It was the sort of cross Giroud feeds off and he will disappointed not to make more of it.
Swansea though predictably took the lead against the run of play. Michu, who had just come on minutes earlier skinned Mertesacker on the half way line and drove towards goal, he held off the challenge off Koscielny and poked the ball passed Szczesny.Surprisingly Arsenal did not buckle and continued to batter the Swansea goal. Wenger brought on Podolski for Ramsey to add a more direct threat to the front 3. With 10 minutes to go Arsenal were level and it was the German with a superb finish on the turn after a deep corner was played back in by Koscielny. If that goal was good the next goal scored was absolutely world class. It was similar to the Podolski goal scored against Montpellier in the Champions League.Gibbs played a delicious one-two with Giroud with the young left back superbly volleying the ball into the roof of the net. 2-1 with 6 minutes to play and it looked like progression was confirmed, but this is Arsenal and when do we make things easy for ourselves?. Swansea were level a few minutes later when Arsenal failed to clear a corner properly and Danny Graham was allowed to smash the ball into the roof of the net. There was still time for Koscielny to force Vorm into a fine save from an Arsenal corner,
So a draw was not the best result given we battered them in the second half and had the lead with 6 minutes left, but we are still in the hat for the fourth round and a trip to the South coast in Brighton awaits us if we can finish the job off in the replay.
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