Russo’s on Fire!
Arsenal Women 1 Tottenham Hotspur Women 0
Gooners and Lionesses fans have cemented Euro’s ’22 MVP “Beth Mead is on Fire” chant as a favourite chant on the terraces.
But it could soon be joined in tandem with a similar paean to Mead’s attacking partner for club and country, Alessia Russo. After a brace in England’s dominant 7-2 friendly thrashing of Austria, the ex-Man Utd striker popped up to smash the only goal of a hard-fought London derby in front of another sellout crowd.
The announced attendance of 60,050 is the second highest in WSL history, just short of the record 60,160 at the Emirates for Arsenal’s win over Manchester United in February.
With Arsenal currently in third sport four points behind Chelsea and Man City, they could ill afford to come a cropper like they did at the Tottenham Stadium in December, when the Cockerels beat their London rivals for the first time in the WSL, after the Gooners wasted a hatful of chances.
Likewise, Arsenal made a fast start here with five corners in as many minutes. Spurs were finding it almost impossible to get out, but a minute later they surprised their hosts breaking the press with some excellent work from star-in-the-making Man Utd loanee Grace Clinton. The through ball was on, but the excellent Carlotte Mae Wubben-Moy snuffed it out.
However, the pattern of the first half was very much waves of Arsenal red bearing down on the Spurs goal. Unfortunately, for them they could quite nail that final pass and were a tad too intricate for their own good. Especially as, in one of their few forays Spurs went closest to opening the scoring when Jessica Naz cut inside, and her snapshot was tipped onto the bar by Manuela Zinsberger.
Jonas Eidevall probably gave his team a bit of a rocket in the half-time team talk because they certainly didn’t want to get mugged off twice in the same season. Meanwhile, his opposite number Robert Vilahamn would no doubt have called for more of the same, frustrate and try to nick a winning goal.
But cometh the hour or in this case the 48th minute, cometh Alessi. MVP Kim Little found space and worked the ball out to Mead, who threatened to execute her trademark left/right/to left trademark dribble and finish into the back of the net. But the challenge by Amanda Nilden, which could have been a penalty, knocked her off balance and the ball fell invitingly for Russo, who wasn’t going to miss from five yards out as she stroked into the back of the net.
That should have been the cue for a comfortable afternoon in the sun, but Arsenal huffed and puffed their way to another three points.
Red Russo: The Arsenal striker celebrates her winner against Spurs.