Arsenal could well have been eliminated from this tournament since they did not equalise until the very end of the first match, when Cesc Fábregas converted a penalty. On that occasion, a win for Leeds United would not have been taken as a great miscarriage of justice. Arsène Wenger's side had been unable to scare the visitors. That reflected well on the Championship side and their manager, Simon Grayson, but the early opener by Samir Nasri made this a match of a different character.
The Leeds team has been gathering momentum in its bid to return to the Premier League. Elland Road is an asset in all circumstances, even if the hosts contrived to lose four times there earlier in the Championship programme. The atmosphere for a visit by Arsenal was all the more intense since it could be treated as a foretaste of the kind of occasions that could lie ahead for Leeds.
The start was unpalatable enough to have any home supporter grimacing. With five minutes gone Nasri, unhindered, strode through after a pass from Andrey Arshavin and tucked a finish beyond Kasper Schmeichel. Wenger might have put his captain, Fábregas, on the bench, but the inclusion of the France international Nasri, who was nowhere to be seen when Arsenal were defeated at Ipswich in the first leg of the Carling Cup semi-final, demonstrated that the Premier League side was in earnest.
They were even ready to change their ways. The right-back Bacary Sagna had attempted to pick out Bendtner when in a promising position to shoot, but he reconsidered when finding himself in comparable circumstances after 34 minutes. After making a tackle near his own penalty area, he rushed towards the attack. When his raking drive went across Schmeichel the goalkeeper's brushing contact made no difference to an attempt crashing towards the top corner. It appeared then that the setting and volume were matters of indifference to Arsenal.
The position could have been much worse. Schmeichel had, in particular, pulled off a remarkable block when Marouane Chamakh met a Nasri free-kick from close range in the 11th minute. That was far from being his only assignment. It looked, in any case, as if Arsenal were, for once, as pragmatic as they are artistic. Leeds had a long spell of chasing and covering, yet it can have drained neither their morale nor their stamina.
Against all expectation, they reduced the 2-0 deficit. Leeds might have been missing their centre-forward Luciano Becchio, who had failed a fitness test, but the team came up with its own remarkable way of scoring. Eight minutes from the interval they were keenly in contention. The goal, too, came in a manner to inflame the passions of the Elland Road crowd all the more as Bradley Johnson, from outside the area, lashed a shot high beyond Wojciech Szczesny.
That must have been galling to Wenger, who would surely have started to think that he had selected a line-up equipped for this tie that did not entail involving all of his main performers. As he had learned, coping with Leeds can be tricky, especially when the team is buoyed up by the waves of Elland Road noise.
Football is often a matter of role playing and the visitors re-emerged with a determination to present themselves as superior beings. The role playing worked only briefly, although they could have extended the lead immediately had the opening not come to the holding midfielder Alex Song. Even in Wenger's conception of football, such men do not necessarily have finesse and the save was made without trouble.
Nothing could deter Leeds. When they were under strain, almost anyone could rise to the occasion. Just as a third Arsenal goal did look certain a tackle came in on Arshavin from Robert Snodgrass, an attacking midfielder. For all the talk about the unimportance of the FA Cup, an encounter such as this dispels the jaded remarks.
For Leeds, it was a peek, too, at the kind of fixtures that can be relished if they haul themselves out of the Championship. They were hampered here, however, when injury meant that the worldly Andy O'Brien had to make way for Leigh Bromby. The hosts were still full of endeavour and another substitute, Davide Somma, ought to have equalised when he instead sent a shot wide. The introduction of Fábregas and Van Persie illustrated that the visitors could keep nothing in reserve. The Dutchman soon confirmed the wisdom of the substitution.
Source: Kevin McCarra, The Guardian on 19 Jan 11
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