LONDON: Reiss Nelson performed brilliantly as he helped Arsenal return to the top of the English Premier League by beating Nottingham Forest 5-0.
Nelson was introduced for the first time in the English Premier League this season after Bukayo Saka was forced off.
Saka assisted Gabriel Martinelli’s opener in the fifth minute before being replaced with an ankle injury.
Nelson scored his first Premier League goal since July 2020 early in the second half, and added three minutes later before setting up Thomas Partey’s goal.
“It couldn’t have been better for me after coming on. Once the goal was scored, it was a pretty great game.
“I’ve been working hard in training, waiting for the opportunity to play and I’m glad I got it,” Nelson said.
Martin Odegaard completed Arsenal’s victory with 13 minutes remaining.
The win lifted Mikel Arteta’s squad one point ahead of Manchester City.
“It’s good to be there. It’s always difficult to win in this league and today we face a difficult game after playing in Europe, and I think the team responded well,” said Arteta.
Arsenal players also showed support for teammate Pablo Mari before kick-off.
Mari, who is on loan at Monza, was stabbed with a knife while with his family in a supermarket in Italy last week.
It’s been a miserable week for Arsenal after a 1-1 draw at Southampton and then a 2-0 loss to PSV Eindhoven in the Europa League.
LONDON: Harry Maguire is ready to return to Manchester United, thus increasing his chances of playing with the England squad at the Qatar 2022 World Cup next month.
The United captain has been sidelined since a month ago due to a hamstring injury when the Three Lions squad drew 3-3 with Germany in the Nations League.
However, the defender is scheduled to return to full training this week after missing seven games with the team and his ‘return’ appears timely for manager Erik ten Hag after fellow defender Raphael Varane suffered a similar injury against Chelsea on Saturday. then.
In the meantime, England manager Gareth Southgate can also breathe a sigh of relief to see Maquire’s comeback in Qatar later when Varane is likely to miss action with the French team at the World Cup.
“History is not on Raphael’s side and we will all miss him. He has been at the best level of the game since I have been here. Right now, we just have to wait and see what happens with his injury and how long it takes for him to recover.
“But as a team, we will give him full support,” said teammate Christian Eriksen.
Varane’s absence hints that Maguire has a bright chance to show his ability after United were dropped in the first two games of the season and only started once in the Europa League.
He now hopes to play the remaining Premier League games before joining Southgate’s national team.
PARIS: Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) star Kylian Mbappe insists he “never asked to leave” the Qatari-owned club in January despite reports that he is looking for an exit as soon as possible.
“I’m very happy. I never asked to leave in January,” he said after PSG’s 1-0 win over Marseille while insisting he was not “directly or indirectly affected” by rumors about his future that have circulated this week.
It was the first time the France star had spoken publicly since reports said he wanted to leave the club for Spain ahead of the Champions League clash with Benfica.
The rumor was then reported by various media in France.
“I don’t understand why the story came out on the day of the match. I was as surprised as everyone else,” said Mbappe.
“People can think I’m involved, but I’m not at all.”
However, several sources confirmed that Mbappe wanted to leave PSG because it came from those close to the player.
LIVERPOOL: Erik ten Hag hopes Cristiano Ronaldo’s 700th goal with the club in his career can spark the striker’s performance again after the Portuguese striker scored Manchester United’s 2-1 win at Everton early this morning.
The five-time Ballon d’Or winner is familiar with life on the sidelines under Ten Hag after starting just once in the Premier League this season.
Ronaldo was again placed on the bench but was given an early chance due to Anthony Martial’s injury.
The 37-year-old grabbed the chance before the end of the first half to give United the three points in an action that saw plenty of mistakes made by both teams.
“Every player needs it (confidence), even if you are the best in the world,” Ten Hag said after Ronaldo’s first Premier League goal of the season.
“I work with a lot of goalscorers and they need goals every season to get that feeling, to confirm their instincts.
“When they get some goals, it will continue and the games will be easy. That will also be the case for him.”
The Red Devils tried to bounce back after being beaten 6-3 by Manchester City last week but got off to a poor start.
In his first Premier League game since arriving from Real Madrid, Casemiro’s mistake led to the opening goal when Amadou Onana’s interception allowed Alex Iwobi to curl the ball into the corner from outside the penalty area.
Everton came into the game with the best defensive record in the league, but United equalized after 10 minutes.
Antony, who became United’s first player to score in the opening three Premier League games, finished off Martial’s fine pass.
Martial only lasted half an hour after suffering a hip injury.
It created space for Ronaldo to get in and he needed just 14 minutes to do it.
Casemiro made up for his mistake by winning the ball in the middle and passing the ball to his former Real Madrid team-mate who fired low past Jordan Pickford.
The goal increased Ronaldo’s goal tally for United to 144.
The Madrid record holder scored 450 goals for the Spanish giants while 101 for Juventus and five for Sporting Lisbon.
Jurgen Klopp insists it would be “silly” for him to stay on at Liverpool if he had any doubts about his future at the Premier League club.
There is a little bit of pressure on the German following the Reds’ poor start to the new season with his side only picking up ten points from a possible 21.
A 3-3 draw against a brilliant Brighton on Saturday was the latest match in which Liverpool have dropped points with Klopp’s side currently sitting ninth in the standings and 11 points off leaders Arsenal.
Liverpool and Jurgen Klopp are running aground when they need to run fast just to stand still
The Liverpool boss signed a two-year contract extension in April that sees his deal run until the summer of 2026 and, despite recent results, Klopp insists he has no doubts Anfield is still the right place to be.
Klopp told Sky Germany: “I always knew that I would like to stay here. I’m still at the right place here, 100%. And if not, then you have to end it. It would be silly not to. But everybody involved doesn’t see things like that.”
A brace from Roberto Firmino and Adam Webster’s own goal had given Liverpool a 3-2 lead, after coming from two goals down, but Leandro Trossard sealed his hat-trick in the 83rd minute to snatch a point.
When asked if he was concerned about the lack of confidence amongst his players, Klopp replied: “Concerning I am not sure is the right word but we can’t ignore the fact.
“But the Ajax game (their previous match 18 days ago in which they scored an 89th-minute winner) didn’t give us any kind of rhythm.
“That’s something you usually get from these situations. With the late goal we would have taken a lot of things into the next game, but unfortunately we didn’t play and since then that feeling is pretty much gone.
“We had confident moments today – Bobby for the second goal, you could see a lot of that – but the passing game was not good.
“We passed balls all over the place, which we can only explain by saying we were not confident at that moment, because of how the game started.
“We are under pressure, we don’t ignore that, we don’t increase it every day but it is there.”
Klopp added: “If we are 100 per cent honest, it is not the first time. It is a sign that the confidence level is now not extraordinarily high.
“In our situation, if you get confidence back you want to build on it and increase it, and it was obvious that the first goal, especially, and then the second goal didn’t help in that.
“If you watch football long enough, you remember games here where we had situations years ago when we were only one goal up and it happened quite frequently that everybody was nearly having a heart attack because we were just not convincing in these moments.
“It reminded me of that a bit today. I cannot say I was 100 per cent convinced that we would not concede a goal when we were 3-2 up.
“We should defend all three goals better, no doubt about that, but in different areas, not just in the last moment.
“3-3 feels like a defeat even though it is not, and we have to fight through this.”
