Arsenal kept up their perfect start to the Europa League as they eased to victory over Bodo/Glimt at the Emirates Stadium on Thursday night.
The Gunners put in a strong display to defeat the Norwegian minnows 3-0 and now head into this weekend’s Premier League clash with Liverpool buoyed by confidence, where they’ll be looking to keep their place atop the standings there too.
Academy graduate Eddie Nketiah opened the scoring for the north Londoners before centre-back Rob Holding headed home to double the lead just moments later, then it wasn’t until after the break that Fabio Vieira wrapped things up after some good work from substitute Gabriel Jesus.
It was a night for rare chances as Arteta rotated the bulk of his starting XI in a bid to hand out valuable minutes to those that needed it and after a goal and an assist, the Portuguese maestro was certainly in the running for the ‘Man of the Match’ award come full-time.
However, the performance of Takehiro Tomiyasu on both flanks particularly caught the eye as he fully took his golden opportunity to impress Arteta. The Japan international’s early-season injury, combined with the form of Ben White at right-back, has seen him struggle to get back into the lineup.
He started the encounter on the right before switching to the other flank after the 70th-minute introduction of the Englishman.
No player registered more touches than Tomiyasu (83), which shows just how influential he was throughout the game – even Granit Xhaka (30) and Vieira (37) couldn’t match such returns, despite appearing to pull the strings in the engine room.
Also per SofaScore, the 23-year-old defender – who ex-teammate Mitchell Dijks dubbed a “warrior” – was a rock defensively after he won five of his six duels (83%), both on the ground and in the air, and he managed two tackles, two clearances and one interception, too.
A passing accuracy of 82% (from 65 attempts) and a 100% dribble success rate (2/2) highlighted his willingness to get forward, which is perhaps something that White – a natural centre-back – lacks when he’s deployed in the role. Not that it’s his job to get into the final third but it does show that the former Bologna man is still a viable option for the remainder of the season.
The Japanese right-back’s display also caught the eye of football.london reporter Kaya Kaynak, who graded Tomiyasu amongst his best performers on the night – ‘Got forward superbly and showed that he’s more than ready to fill the right-back spot if Ben White finds his standards slipping at any point,’ he wrote.
Having cost the Gunners around £16m in August 2021, it’s evident that the versatile defender isn’t going to be forgotten about anytime soon after he took this rare chance to deliver on the European stage.
AND in other news, Edu hit the jackpot on “untouchable” £40k-p/w Arsenal gem whose value has rocketed 94%…