Arsenal loss “hard to take” but City can catch up – Sagna

Goals from Theo Walcott and Olivier Giroud, the latter on the stroke of half-time, gave the Gunners what appeared to be a comfortable advantage until Yaya Toure hauled his side back into the game with less than 10 minutes to play.

The Chilean striker led the team in scoring last season as Arsenal won the FA Cup for their second year in a row.

Toure reduced the arrears eight minutes from time with a goal of breathtaking nonchalance, ambling onto Bacary Sagna’s pass and placing a left-foot shot into the left-hand corner as easily as if he was picking up a pen.

Kevin De Bruyne had two clean looks at goal in the first half but Pellegrini declined to place the blame on his forward.

“The injuries to the Arsenal key players worry me a lot and that is basically where I see Manchester City having an upper hand”.

Theo Walcott got the ball near the corner of the City box and curled a sensational strike past Joe Hart and into the back of the net.

“I understand that we must improve, especially in the games we are playing away, but we continue to be involved in all the competitions”.

The victory moved Arsene Wenger’s men to within two points of surprise leaders Leicester City, but perhaps more significantly, opened up a four-point gap to Man City in third. “He took that decision, and I think more important than that was the mistake we made in the last seconds of the first half”. He sees things that nobody else does, you just have to make that run. “We are very happy because we showed all the ingredients you need in big games – good organisation, strong solidarity, high work-rate, moments of brilliance and moments when we needed to hang on”.

“I think they’re just favourites”, said Carragher.

While Aguero and Silva are important to City, Kompany appears to be a player they can not do without.

“I’m a bit cautious because we have lost three or four players recently so I have to be cautious a little bit”.

“We hope that Vincent will return back soon”, Pellegrini said.

The Gunners doubled their lead in first-half stoppage time as Giroud drilled low past Hart after Walcott capitalised on an errant Eliaquim Mangala pass to find Ozil, who duly delivered his 15th assist of the campaign.