Opinion2 min read
Saka against United. Yes, we're still gooning over it.
January 2023. Saka cuts inside, United discover his left foot, and us Gooners become completely unbearable. A goal worth reopening the group chat for.
Some goals deserve serious tactical analysis. Bukayo Saka's against Manchester United on 22 January 2023 deserves us Gooners cancelling whatever responsible activity we had planned and watching it again.
Our take: the best part isn't even the finish. It's that everyone watching knows which foot he wants, and he still gets to use it. Excellent preparation, lads. Did the scouting report arrive as a fax?
The left foot. That one. Yes, again.
For anyone whose memory has mercifully deleted the stressful bits: we won 3–2 at the Emirates. Rashford scored first, Eddie Nketiah equalised, and Saka put us ahead in the second half. United subsequently equalised too, because apparently ninety minutes of uncomplicated happiness would invalidate our membership cards.
But stay with Bukayo for a moment.
He comes inside from the right and sends a left-footed shot across David de Gea into the far corner. The match report has it at 53 minutes. Even United's own website has to keep that information available. Public service broadcasting.
There's something especially satisfying about a goal with so little mystery. No elaborate disguise. No need to consult a touchscreen. Saka wants that angle, finds it and hits the ball beautifully. United are welcome to submit a strongly worded objection to the net.
Us Gooners will be over here gooning over the replay. Again. The camera angle from behind the shot has claimed another perfectly good afternoon.
Eddie still gets the last word
Saka's goal is the one we're admiring here. Nketiah's 90th-minute winner is the reason we can admire it without making a small, wounded noise afterwards.
He diverted Ødegaard's effort in from close range to settle it, as the Premier League report records. Not every great Arsenal memory needs to begin thirty yards out. Sometimes it needs a striker in exactly the right spot while everyone else is composing their explanation for a draw.
That's why reducing this match to one starboy compilation misses the pleasure of it. Bukayo supplied the outrageous finish. Eddie made sure the United fan in your group chat couldn't reply with the score.
An essential contribution to the arts.
Allow us to be insufferable
Fellow Gooners, we spend enough football hours debating whether a sideways pass indicates structural decline. We're allowed to enjoy a winger cutting inside and absolutely leathering one against United without adding a paragraph of emotional insurance.
Does enjoying an old goal count as living in the past? Of course. You're reading an article about it. Outstanding detective work.
Now put the replay back on. The goon platoon hasn't finished inspecting the far corner.
Archive opinion: revisiting Arsenal 3–2 Manchester United, 22 January 2023. Cover photograph is a general Emirates Stadium scene, not a photograph of this match: The Emirates Stadium by Julian Osley, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons; reproduced without edits.
