{"id":3917,"date":"2026-04-09T07:14:29","date_gmt":"2026-04-09T07:14:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportings.com.ng\/?p=3917"},"modified":"2026-04-09T07:14:29","modified_gmt":"2026-04-09T07:14:29","slug":"not-great-jamie-carragher-reveals-arsenal-concern-after-sporting-champions-league-clash","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportings.com.ng\/?p=3917","title":{"rendered":"&#8216;Not great&#8217; &#8211; Jamie Carragher reveals Arsenal concern after Sporting Champions League clash"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p><strong>Jamie Carragher has revealed why he is concerned about Arsenal\u2019s prospects in the Premier League title race moving forward after what he witnessed in Mikel Arteta\u2019s side\u2019s clash with Sporting CP in the Champions League on Tuesday night.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The Gunners limped to a 1-0 victory in the Portuguese capital, courtesy of a 91st-minute winner from Kai Havertz. The German drifted into the box late on, before slotting past Rui Silva following excellent work from Gabriel Martinelli.<\/p>\n<p>The result puts Arsenal in an excellent position heading into the second leg at the Emirates, although the manner of the performance in Lisbon will certainly concern Arteta.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<p>\n          <iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Havertz Snatches First Leg Lead \ud83d\udd34 | Sporting CP 0-1 Arsenal | UEFA Champions League Highlights\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/Ij2QUCFc9Do?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n        <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Jamie Carragher reveals Arsenal concerns following Sporting victory<\/h2>\n<p>Arsenal took just eight shots in Lisbon, accumulating just 1.3 expected goals. While they were able to control the game through possession, this was another somewhat lacklustre attacking display from Arteta\u2019s men.<\/p>\n<p>They\u2019ll certainly need to turn their performances up a notch if they want to win the Premier League title and reach the final of the Champions League in Budapest. Speaking on CBS Sports Golazo after the game, pundit Carragher highlighted these concerns, arguing that the result shouldn\u2019t paper over the disappointing nature of the performance.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt was a big game, but it wasn\u2019t a great performance,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhat I\u2019m saying is, yes they won, and the big thing for them is to win. It almost puts it away; we lost two, and now we\u2019ve won a game of football. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cBut it wasn\u2019t a great performance. If Havertz hits the post\u2026 it\u2019s not a great performance where they played fantastic football, was it? They\u2019ve won the game, no problem. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cBut if you think they play like that between now and the end of the season, that they\u2019ll win the league? We\u2019ll see.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Arsenal needed this result more than the performance<\/h2>\n<p>After consecutive cup defeats, Arsenal simply needed to put an end to the rot and win in Lisbon. While performance is normally paramount when projecting forward, the result was all that mattered at the Jose Alvalade Stadium. <\/p>\n<p>The Gunners didn\u2019t really need to win the game in the context of the tie, and they played like it. However, in the context of their season, for the vibes and morale around N5, they desperately needed to come away from Portugal victorious.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-table\">\n<table class=\"has-fixed-layout\">\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td class=\"has-text-align-left\" data-align=\"left\">Sporting CP<\/td>\n<td class=\"has-text-align-left\" data-align=\"left\">Statistic<\/td>\n<td class=\"has-text-align-left\" data-align=\"left\">Arsenal<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td class=\"has-text-align-left\" data-align=\"left\">44%<\/td>\n<td class=\"has-text-align-left\" data-align=\"left\">Possession<\/td>\n<td class=\"has-text-align-left\" data-align=\"left\">56%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td class=\"has-text-align-left\" data-align=\"left\">11<\/td>\n<td class=\"has-text-align-left\" data-align=\"left\">Total shots<\/td>\n<td class=\"has-text-align-left\" data-align=\"left\">8<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td class=\"has-text-align-left\" data-align=\"left\">5<\/td>\n<td class=\"has-text-align-left\" data-align=\"left\">Shots on target<\/td>\n<td class=\"has-text-align-left\" data-align=\"left\">5<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td class=\"has-text-align-left\" data-align=\"left\">3<\/td>\n<td class=\"has-text-align-left\" data-align=\"left\">Corners<\/td>\n<td class=\"has-text-align-left\" data-align=\"left\">4<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td class=\"has-text-align-left\" data-align=\"left\">3<\/td>\n<td class=\"has-text-align-left\" data-align=\"left\">Saves<\/td>\n<td class=\"has-text-align-left\" data-align=\"left\">5<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td class=\"has-text-align-left\" data-align=\"left\">1<\/td>\n<td class=\"has-text-align-left\" data-align=\"left\">Yellow cards<\/td>\n<td class=\"has-text-align-left\" data-align=\"left\">0<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\"><em><strong>Sporting CP vs Arsenal statistics per <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fotmob.com\/en-GB\/matches\/sporting-cp-vs-arsenal\/36af66#5205795\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">FotMob<\/a><\/strong><\/em> <em><strong>(correct as of 07\/04\/26)<\/strong><\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Carragher is right; this level of performance won\u2019t cut it for the rest of the season. However, Arsenal know they can play much better than they did in this game, and it should give them confidence to start producing more accomplished displays moving forward.<\/p>\n<p>The feel-good factor has returned to Arteta\u2019s camp, and they can now go into the Bournemouth match buoyed by the chance to go 12 points clear, rather than frightened at the prospect of losing their nine-point cushion.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Jamie Carragher has revealed why he is concerned about Arsenal\u2019s prospects in the Premier League title race moving forward after what he witnessed in Mikel Arteta\u2019s side\u2019s clash with Sporting CP in the Champions League on Tuesday night. The Gunners limped to a 1-0 victory in the Portuguese capital, courtesy of a 91st-minute winner from [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":233,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3917","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arsenal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportings.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3917","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportings.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportings.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportings.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportings.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3917"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sportings.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3917\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportings.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/233"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportings.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3917"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportings.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3917"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportings.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3917"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}