West Brom 0-4 Arsenal- Lacazette at the double as Gunners hammer Baggies.
Arsenal have hammered West Brom 4-0 thanks to a double from Alexandre Lacazette as the Gunners have now won three consecutive games for the first time this season.
Mikel Arteta made two changes from the side that beat Brighton with Alexandre Lacazette and Dani Ceballos coming in for Gabriel Martinelli and Mo Elneny.
West Brom started the better of the two sides, controlling possession as they looked to make amends after their drubbing at the hands of Leeds United last time out.
With 15 minutes gone, Arsenal came close to opening the scoring. Bukayo Saka cut inside onto his weak foot and tried to find the far corner with the ball just going out of reach of Pierre Emerick Aubameyang who followed up at the near post.
The Gunners were now controlling the match and enjoyed possession as they knocked it around with ease as again Bukayo Saka looked extremely lively for the visitors.
Just past the 20-minute mark, the game’s first goal came, and what a goal it was. Kieran Tierney picked up the ball, clipped it past Furlong, and then cut back inside the box before curling his shot into the net with his weaker right foot to give his side a deserved lead.
Just six minutes later Arsenal doubled their lead. After great build-up play from Emile Smith Rowe and Bukayo Saka, the ball fell to Lacazette who played in Smith Rowe who then slid a neat ball back to Saka who had the easiest of tap-ins as the Gunners were running rampant.
Arsenal was now dominating the game and another chance came their way minutes later with Smith Rowe again involved as he played in Lacazette however the Frenchman’s shot was well saved.
West Brom ended the half the stronger side as they needed to claw a goal back however they went into the break down 2-0 after Arsenal played their best half of football for the season.
Just minutes into the second half West Brom thought they had a goal back through Callum Robinson; however, the goal was disallowed after Pereira was deemed to be offside in the build-up.
Charlie Austin was then brought on to give the Baggies some more attacking impetus and Hector Bellerin was taken off just eight minutes into the half for Ainsley Maitland Niles. Just 15 minutes into the half the Gunners had their third.
After great work again from Bukayo Saka, the winger shifted his defender and played his cross to the back post where Ajayi had his clearance hammer off the post. The ball fell into the path of Smith Rowe and he had his shot saved well by Johnstone in West Brom’s goal, only for the rebound to fall to Lacazette who lashed home his shot to effectively end the game as a contest.
Just four minutes later Arsenal had a fourth. A swift counter-attacking move that started with Maitland Niles and ended with Kieran Tierney who rifled his cross into Lacazette’s path and the Frenchman barely had time to get his feet sorted before his shot found the net for his second goal of the contest.
From then on Arsenal was in cruise control as West Brom tried to find a consolation goal. Charlie Austin had perhaps their best chance with 12 minutes remaining after a defensive header found its way to him, however, his shot flew over the bar.
Bernd Leno was forced into a save seconds from time as he looked to maintain his clean sheet as Arsenal managed to see off West Brom for their third win in a row.
The win sees Mikel Arteta’s side move up to 11th just three points behind Chelsea who have a game in hand in sixth.
The Gunners face Newcastle in their FA Cup third-round match next up and going by their performance tonight, Arsenal will be odds on favorites to progress to the next round as they look to defend their 2019/20 title.
