As title-chasing Arsenal completed back-to-back wins with ease, it took Sunday’s other English Premier League games to provide a double dose of late drama.
Newcastle United were facing ending another weekend in the relegation zone until Ayoze Perez stunned Tottenham Hotspur in the third minute of stoppage-time to win 2-1 at White Hart Lane in London.
Liverpool, who lost the previous weekend to Newcastle, left it even later at home to West Bromwich Albion, with Divock Origi recovering a 2-2 draw in the sixth minute of stoppage-time.
Photo: Reuters
The optimism which surrounded Juergen Klopp’s arrival as Liverpool manager two months ago has been substituted with a realism. Liverpool are five points adrift of Manchester United and nine behind provisional leaders Arsenal.
Olivier Giroud converted an early penalty for his 50th Premier League goal, before Mesut Ozil set up Aaron Ramsey to sweep in another as Arsenal beat bottom-placed Aston Villa 2-0.
It was goalkeeper Petr Cech’s 169th clean sheet in the Premier League — most achieved with Chelsea — matching David James’ record.
Photo: Reuters
Although Arsenal’s stay at the top could have been brief were Leicester City to beat ailing champions Chelsea yesterday, the win at Villa Park capped a good week when the Gunners defied the odds to book a place in the round-of-16 of the UEFA Champions League.
“I was a bit anxious today because we had given a lot on Wednesday night [at Olympiakos] and we came back very, very late,” Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger said. “I knew that Villa were fighting to survive... it was a controlled performance and a great week for us. Don’t worry. I had as well a few bad weeks already. So sometimes it balances a little bit.”
It has been a good four months for north London counterpart Mauricio Pochettino at Spurs. They had not lost in the league since the opening day of the season until running into a resilient Newcastle, who ended their 14-match unbeaten run.
Perez beat Tottenham goalkeeper Hugo Lloris at his near post as the full-time whistle loomed after fellow substitute Aleksandar Mitrovic had canceled out Eric Dier’s first-half headed opener for Spurs.
“In the second half, every time we had the ball we started to make some mistakes and we give them the possibility to a right to a goal,” Pochettino said. “I think the first person that was responsible of the defeat is me.”
With Newcastle out of the drop zone and up to 15th — above Chelsea — the pressure is off Steve McClaren for now.
“You’re only two days away from another crisis, so it’s important we keep our feet on the ground,” McClaren said. “We’ve not turned the corner... we want to be [like] this every week and that only comes on a platform on a bed of hard work, attitude, and commitment and discipline.”
A week after a miserable trip to McClaren’s Newcastle, Liverpool were facing a second straight loss.
Although Jordan Henderson put Liverpool ahead at Anfield, Craig Dawson quickly scored an equalizer in the first half for West Brom and Jonas Olsson put the visitors ahead in the 73rd minute, but Henderson set up Origi to score from outside the penalty area just when the Midlands club seemed set to take all three points.
“Maybe the crowd was disappointed, but they didn’t let us feel it,” Klopp said. “We were all in the game, we were all concentrated to get this one point at the end and it felt like three. I know it’s only one, but it felt like three and in this moment there was an explosion [of emotion].”
A sumo star was born in Japan on Sunday when 24-year-old Takerufuji became the first wrestler in 110 years to win a top-division tournament on his debut, triumphing at the 15-day Spring Grand Sumo Tournament in Osaka despite injuring his ankle on the penultimate day. Takerufuji, whose injury had left him in a wheelchair outside the ring, shoved out the higher-ranked Gonoyama at the Edion Arena Osaka to the delight of the crowd, giving him an unassailable record of 13 wins and two losses to claim the Emperor’s Cup. “I did it just through willpower. I didn’t really know what was going
The US’ Ilia Malinin on Saturday produced six scintillating quadruple jumps, including a quadruple Axel, in the men’s free skate to capture his first figure skating world title. The 19-year-old nicknamed the “Quad god,” who is the only skater to land a quadruple Axel in competition, dazzled with an array of breathtakingly executed jumps starting with his quad Axel and including a quadruple Lutz in combination with a triple flip and a quadruple toe loop in combination with a triple toe. He added an unexpected triple-triple combination at the end to earn a world-record 227.79 in the free program for a championship
Shohei Ohtani’s interpreter is being criminally investigated by the IRS, and the attorney for his alleged bookmaker said Thursday that the ex-Los Angeles Dodgers employee placed bets on international soccer — but not baseball. The IRS confirmed Thursday that interpreter Ippei Mizuhara and Mathew Bowyer, the alleged illegal bookmaker, are under criminal investigation through the agency’s Los Angeles Field Office. IRS Criminal Investigation spokesperson Scott Villiard said he could not provide additional details. Mizuhara, 39, was fired by the Dodgers on Wednesday following reports from the Los Angeles Times and ESPN about his alleged ties to an illegal bookmaker and debts well
MLB on Friday announced a formal investigation into the scandal swirling around Shohei Ohtani and his former interpreter amid charges that the Los Angeles Dodgers superstar was the victim of “massive theft.” The Dodgers on Wednesday fired Ippei Mizuhara, Ohtani’s long-time interpreter and close friend, after Ohtani’s representatives alleged that the Japanese two-way star had been the victim of theft, which was reported to involve millions of dollars and link Mizuhara to a suspected illegal bookmaker in California. “Major League Baseball has been gathering information since we learned about the allegations involving Shohei Ohtani and Ippei Mizuhara from the news media,” MLB