Theo Walcott scored twice for the Gunners as they held off a late comeback from Bob B.radley’s side to move level on points with Manchester City at the top of the Premier League
Theo Walcott struck twice as 10-man Arsenal moved level with Premier League leaders Manchester City and consigned Bob B.radley to an enthralling 3-2 defeat in his first match in charge of Swansea City on Saturday.
Some slack defending from Swansea was punished by Walcott twice in the first half at the Emirates Stadium, taking his tally to six goals in his last five Arsenal appearances in all competitions.
However, Gylfi Sigurdsson, leading the line with B.radley not including a recognised striker in his first line-up, marked his 100th appearance for the club with an excellent finish to give the visitors hope ahead of the second half.
Mesut Ozil, celeB.rating his 28th birthday, then slammed a volley beyond former Arsenal goalkeeper Lukasz Fabianski, but second-half Swansea substitute Borja Baston pegged back the hosts with his first goal for the club.
The comfortable grip Arsene Wenger’s men had on the game began to vanish when Granit Xhaka was shown a straight red card – his fourth dismissal since the start of last season and more than any other player in the top five European leagues – for lunging in on Modou Barrow with 20 minutes remaining.
However, Arsenal hung on to end a run of four top-flight home matches against Swansea without a win and join City at the summit on 19 points from eight games.
B.radley’s team struggled to keep the ball in the early exchanges and Shkodran Mustafi almost made the breakthrough for Arsenal with a near-post header from Ozil’s corner that struck the crossbar.
But Arsenal made the breakthrough in the 26th minute.
Hector Bellerin headed Alexis Sanchez’s looped pass across goal and Walcott stole in ahead of the dawdling Jordi Amat to guide his shot inside the near post.
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