A wasted opportunity. A missed penalty, frustration and more injuries. The 2-1 defeat at West Brom did little to lift the mood for the Arsenal players and fans.
Arsenal could have gone top with a win and Manchester City's shock 4-1 home defeat by Liverpool would've been an added bonus, but we couldn't do our own job properly and that was frustrating.
When Olivier Giroud opened the scoring before the half hour mark I thought it would be our day but, despite dominating for decent spells of the game, two goals in five minutes turned the game on its head. Santi Cazorla also missed a penalty as the Gunners slumped to an away defeat.
Losing Francis Coquelin to a knee injury after just 14 minutes was very frustrating, not just because he is a key member of the side but also we don't exactly have top class cover in the defensive midfield position. Mathieu Flamini doesn't often fill me with much confidence and Mikel Arteta sustained a calf injury against the Baggies. It leaves us in a difficult position but at least City's defeat meant we didn't lose any extra ground in the title race.
Arsenal started the game on top with Alexis Sanchez seeing his free-kick well saved by Boaz Myhill before the Chilean sent another effort harmlessly wide.
The Gunners eventually broke the deadlock after 28 minutes when Giroud latched onto Mesut Ozil's excellent cross to flick a header beyond Myhill.
Arsenal wasted the chance to double their advantage when Gibbs fired a shot over the bar and that miss proved costly as West Brom went on to take the lead with a quick-fire double. James Morrison got on the end of Chris Brunt's free-kick to loop the ball over Petr Cech in the Arsenal goal to level the scores. West Brom then moved in front soon after as James McLean's cross went in off Arteta.
Arsenal went agonisingly close to levelling the scores within two minutes of the restart as Ozil's first-time shot hit a post. The visitors continued to push forward and Gibbs' effort was well blocked by Morrison as Arsenal failed to find that all-important equaliser.
The Gunners refused to give up and when Ozil's perfectly-weighted pass found Flamini, it looked like it could end in a goal until Jonny Evans came in to stop the attack with a superb last-ditch tackle.
Arsenal really should have levelled the scores through substitute Joel Campbell and it is still baffling as to how on earth he didn't score. Cazorla lofted the ball into the box for Campbell but the Costa Rican sliced his effort off target when it looked easier to score.
As the visitors continued to push forward in search of a goal they were almost caught out by their opponents but, fortunately, Jonas Olsson's header hit the bar.
Arsenal were given the perfect opportunity to level the scores after being awarded a penalty seven minutes from time following Brunt's foul on Sanchez. But Cazorla slipped as he went to take the penalty and ended up slicing his effort over the bar.
Arsenal were rapidly running out of time and, after Laurent Koscielny's deflected effort was saved by Myhill, the defeat was confirmed.
OPPOSITION VIEW
West Brom fan Mike Beddoes was pleasantly surprised to see his side take all three points from the Gunners.
"It was a complete surprise to beat Arsenal in all honesty," said Beddoes. "When the first goal went in I began to think it was going to open the floodgates for Arsenal.
"We'd held on for so long once we went ahead that my heart sank when the penalty was awarded. Luckily he (Cazorla) slipped when taking it, so good fortune was on our side for once."
MY FINAL THOUGHTS
Without being too disrespectful to West Brom, losing this game was inexcusable and I am truly gutted by the result. We seemed to show a lot of attacking intent but we just didn't make our chances count enough and this is becoming the case too often. Giroud took his goal superbly but we need someone to be banging in the goals more regularly.
We must now temporarily forget about the league and turn our attention to the Champions League. The visit of Dinamo Zagreb is a huge game and we can't afford any more European slip-ups. We have to make sure we start strong and claim all three points, whilst also hoping Bayern Munich make no mistakes and beat Olympiakos. Do that and we will keep our Champions League dream alive going into the crunch final group game against Olympiakos. Fail to do so and we are out, it really is that simple, so we must produce a huge performance against Zagreb and get our season back on track.
As for the league we travel to Norwich next. We must make sure produce two big performances in the coming weeks to get our season back up and running and to avoid the campaign simply fizzling out. There is no reason for us not to be fired up for these two games so let's go make it count.
COME ON YOU GUNNERS
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