With just a minute on the clock in this afternoon’s Premier League encounter between Aston Villa and Arsenal, the Villains capitalised on some trademark shaky defending to take the lead.
John McGinn played a dangerous long-range pass forward, which was bound for Ollie Watkins before it was cut out by Gabriel Magalhaes and spilled into the path of Cedric Soares.
With Cedric having his back to the oncoming pressure from Bertrand Traore, the full-back tried to play it back to Gabriel but botched the pass completely, leaving the winger to burst onto the ball.
Chelsea academy graduate Traore effortlessly skipped past Gabriel before slotting the ball into the middle of the box with an outside-foot pass, where Watkins was on hand to fire the ball in.
The ball took a deflection off of Rob Holding but was rightfully credited to Watkins, who took just over a minute to nab a goal against Arsenal after notching two in the sides’ meeting earlier this season.
Goal – WATKINS
Assist – TRAOREAston Villa 1 – 0 Arsenal (2 mins)#ASTARS pic.twitter.com/LXAFV2EXI9
— Extra Football (@GoalUpdates123) February 6, 2021
Pictures from BT Sport and RMC Sport.
If Arsenal can’t get back into this game, they’ll massively struggle to move up in the table as Villa are already ahead of them by one point, whilst holding a key two games in hand.