Take a bow, Kieran Trippier. Thrust back into Newcastle United’s starting XI with a bang.
The veteran right-back was called in from the cold, relegating Tino Livramento to the bench, for Wednesday’s Carabao Cup semi-final win over Arsenal and showed his class with the ball – and his leadership without it – during the second leg showdown.
Newcastle had to be smart throughout – and a little bit cute too. Trippier, who has been there and done it in these type of games countless times, knows exactly what it takes to ensure his side gain that extra edge against a mischievous team like Arsenal.
Away from the match action, the Magpies’ leader refused to back down as he squared up to defender Gabriel midway through first-half, before later making sure he stood between a downed Bruno Guimaraes and Kai Havertz to ensure the Arsenal man couldn’t get to him after giving away a needless foul near Newcastle’s byline.
Trippier again got up close with Havertz in the second-half, standing over the German and angrily shouting after the Arsenal striker went down easily under a strong challenge from Lewis Hall. This was a captain’s performance from a man who has recently handed the armband over to Guimaraes.
“Arsenal do game management a lot and we did the same,” Trippier told Sky Sports at full-time.
The defender wasn’t the only one ensuring Arsenal were frustrated. Declan Rice launched into a heavy challenge on Guimaraes out of pure frustration in a rare moment of anger from the England international. Meanwhile, Gabriel and William Saliba too found themselves flustered from Newcastle’s relentless pressing.
The Arsenal duo are arguably the Premier League’s strongest central defender partnership. At St James’ Park they looked totally lost.
Gabriel failed to get the better of Alexander Isak throughout the contest, while Anthony Gordon made Saliba look like a fool on more than one occasion. The centre-back was booked for fouling the Newcastle winger in the first period before embarrassingly having the ball robbed from him as Gordon took aim from 40 yards after the interval.
“We wanted to get pressure on them [William Saliba and Gabriel] and in order to do that we had to get bodies in the right areas and press high – that is how we decided to do it,” Eddie Howe said of Newcastle’s gameplan at full-time. “You know you are playing against elite players, and one mistake can make things difficult.”
From Isak and Gordon at the top end of the pitch, all the way through to Trippier at the back, Newcastle were superb. Relentless in their pressing, clinical when they won it back and clever, off the ball, when they needed to be.
It was a performance of real leadership from Newcastle’s experienced assets to leave Arsenal rattled – and dumped out of the cup – at St James’ Park.
View news Source: https://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/kieran-trippier-stands-up-arsenal-30945259
