LONDON — WSL league leaders Arsenal saw their 14-match winning streak come to an end at home to Manchester United after a pair of late strikes from the visitors. In flying form coming into the match, Arsenal failed to find their better football and went in at the break a goal down thanks to Ella Toone’s late first half effort.
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Not on the back foot for long, the hosts equalised early in the second half thanks to Frida Maanum’s deflected drive before Laura Wienroither gave them the lead. Lively throughout the match, Untied refused to be beaten and found their own equaliser through Millie Turner at a late free-kick before Alessia Russo completed the breathless turnaround with her own header at set piece in the dying seconds of regular time.
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Rapid Reaction
1. United expose Arsenal’s weaknesses
Still playing with an improvised backline following injuries to starting centre-back pair, Leah Williamson and Rafaelle, the Gunners had done well to weather most incoming attacking storms before this outing. Yet, once Leah Galton who has been digging down into some of her better form this season began to run at the usually unchallenged defensive line, the entire Arsenal team began to quake.
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Indeed, it was the visitors who enjoyed the better attacking spells during the first half as they stretched the play across the broad Emirates pitch that Jonas Eidevall’s team usually relish playing on and had yet to be beaten on in the WSL, winning all four of their previous league matches played in N7.
Even when Arsenal found their equaliser at the start of the second half to swing the match into their favour and help them build momentum, the fragility of their defence remained clear when United questioned its resolution. And with Manuela Zinsberger having a less than faultless day in goal, United trusted in themselves to keep going and indeed, find the moments of quality to see them come away with all three points.
