Arsenal came back from a 1 - 0 defeat at Portman Road, to beat Ipswich at the Emirates and book their place at Wembley.
Arsenal played the 1st half well. Unlike the reverse fixture at Ipswich, the Gunners came into the game with lethal intent, rather than just intent. Ipswich on the other hand came to get the job done - they definitely asserted themselves defensively. Throughout the 1st half, Arsenal came close to putting the ball in the back of the net, but seemed to either hit the ball at the keeper/defender, the bar or to either side of the net.
Right off the bat, Ipswich shot at goal from the kick-off to test Szczesny. Apart from that and the collision with Sagna, he had a quiet half. The half was reminiscent of the Wigan game over the weekend, where Arsenal created chances, but couldn't finish well. Denilson deputized well for Song, while Wilshere provided some telling passes - which took some of the creative burden off Fabregas. Fabregas remained the creative dynamo in the middle of the park, and linked the play well with the front three of Van Persie, Arshavin & Bendtner. The defensive line also had a solid showing.
In the 2nd half though, Arsenal converted their chances and showed why football is more watched than Rugby. It didn't start all well though, Ipswich had a corner that had the Arsenal defenders scrambling at the ball. Even after that, the Gunners had a few bad passes in the opposing third. (Even Fabregas had some iffy touches.)
Eventually though, Bendtner put the home side ahead after taking down a fantastic cross-field ball from Wilshere and bending it in from the left wing. (A lot might be said about Bendtner, but everything about the goal said one thing - class.) Ipswich were definitely rattled by the goal because they had done well defensively throughout the game. Fast-forward 3 minutes to Koscieiny's goal - which is the first time in a while that Arsenal have converted a corner - and they were panicked. From then onwards, Ipswich tried to go forward, but Arsenal kept the ball well. In the end, Arsenal scored a third through Captain Cesc to effectively kill off the game.
At the end of the day, Arsenal might have put themselves in this precarious position, but the Gunners did a superb job of erasing the blight from the 1st leg. This time around, the team had more of cutting edge and did a good job of negating any Ipswich resistance.
Final thoughts : Nothing really, except Wembley here we come!
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