Good Omen

It's been looking so good for English team in this round of European games as Arsenal tonight, joined the League of English teams to have not just recorded good performances but also handsome wins away from home after defeating their Greek Opposition, Östersunds FK by three unreplied goals with David Ospina saving, outrightly, catching a last minute penalty.

They join the likes of Manchester City and Liverpool who defeated handsomely their respective opponents, FC Basel and FC Porto 4-0 and 5-0. Only Tottenham, didn't follow this trend, albeit, they put in a stellar performance to come from two goals down to draw Juventus at Turin.

Arsenal started the game as the better side of the two, forcing the home side into errors which paid off for them with two goals in succession. First from Nacho Monreal in the 13th minute after Alex Iwobi's shot was saved by the Östersunds' Goalkeeper but only as far as the feet of Nacho Monreal who had no problem firing home from close range for his third goal in four games for the Gunners, after his recent return from injury. He opened scoring in the 5-1 victory against Everton, did same in the loss to Swansea and now in the UEFA Europa League against Östersunds FK.

Henrikh Mhkitaryan's continued his fine form in the competition, making it two nil eleven minutes later two nil eleven minutes later, capitalising on a defensive error to see his shot heavily deflected home by Östersunds' defender, Papagiannopolous. Mesut Ozil made it three in the 58th minute after a good interchange with Mhkitaryan to take the game out of reach for the hosts.

The hosts were given a lifeline to get a consolation goal after Hector Bellerin brought down Saman Ghoddos in the first minute of added time, only for Tom Pettersson from the resulting penalty to see his weak effort saved by David Ospina in one of the easiest penalty saves you'd ever see.

In all, it was a good win for the Gunners but in between that was a loss of steam after the first two goals were scored. They took their legs off the gas which is not what you want to see from a team that is determined to win. They should take cues from teams like Manchester City and Liverpool who when they got their groove and their oppositions were not living up to the standard, punished them accordingly. This kind of attitude would affect games, especially against resilient sides who wouldn't give up so easily.

Also, it was a bad game for Danny Welbeck who struggled during the course of the match. One would have thought he would grab this rare start for him with both hands after Alexandre Lacazette was ruled out due to injury and Pierre Emerick Aubameyang Cup tied, having played for Borussia Dortmund in the UEFA Champions League but have dropped to the UEL, making it impossible for the Gabon International to feature for Arsenal. Arsene Wenger earlier fumed at the rule that made it impossible Aubameyang to feature.

We wait to see what the remaining two teams in the UCL would do and whether they'd live up to the bar already being set by and for English teams.