For Arsenal, it was all about whether they could recover from the low point of their season so far – the shock 1-0 loss at Everton from last Saturday. Nobody had seen it coming and Mikel Arteta was determined to show that it belonged to a different era, not this one, that has his team leading from the front in the title race.
Arsenal fell short. It was a game in which they craved victory, particularly before Wednesday’s meeting against Manchester City here. But Arsenal were not themselves, lacking their usual intensity and fluency in the final third.
For a while, it appeared that they would find a way. Leandro Trossard, their £21m January signing from Brighton, had only been on the field for four minutes when he opened the scoring shortly after the hour – against the run of play. It was his first goal in Arsenal colours and stood to stretch his new club’s lead over City to eight points.
But Brentford, who had been much the more dangerous team in the first half, found the equaliser that they deserved when the outstanding Ivan Toney nodded in from close range. Thomas Frank had said Brentford would need their best ever Premier League performance to get a result and he could be hugely proud of the collective effort.
Frank’s team are unbeaten in 10 in the competition, playing with belief and dreaming of Europa League qualification. For the first time this season, Arsenal are wobbling, the Emirates Stadium lacking the conviction that had previously been put together. It feels wrong to suggest the wheels are about to come off, an assertion based on the past and not the present. One thing is clear. Arsenal dare not lose to City.
Arteta had been confident of a blistering performance, having overseen a good week of training. But it was possible to see Brentford as awkward opponents, much in the mould of Everton – compact, physical, able to punch on the counter. And that was how it turned out.
Frank’s team were excellent and the pick of their many openings before the interval came when Toney popped a pass off to the lively Bryan Mbeumo in the 25th minute and drifted into space inside the area. Mbeumo cut back and Toney had the time to pick his spot. His shot struck the crossbar.
Rico Henry had blown a huge chance in the early going, arriving to meet Toney’s cross from the right at the far post but, under pressure, made the finish look more like a clearance. Brentford could also be disappointed when Mbeumo got the run on the last man, Gabriel Magalhães, who slipped to allow the striker clean through. Mbeumo was pulled back for a shirt tug. There was not much in it.
Bukayo Saka had tiptoed through to prod at David Raya on 15 minutes while Oleksandr Zinchenko blasted high after a half-cleared corner. But the home crowd were angsty as the first half wore on with their team struggling to get through Brentford’s well-organised ranks.
Toney drew a save out of Aaron Ramsdale with a blast from distance while moments earlier, Ben Mee had thumped a free header goalwards from a corner, seeing it inadvertently blocked. Gabriel Martinelli spun and banged a volley high in the 43rd minute but Arsenal had to do more.
The home fans tried to stay with Arsenal and yet it was easy to feel the jitters, especially when Toney blew another clear chance on 57 minutes after Mathias Jensen’s pull-back from the right. Toney placed wide of the near post.
There was a reason why Martin Ødegaard felt the need to whip up the crowd. Arsenal needed something and found it when Trossard timed his run at the far post, stealing in on the blind side of Mads Roerslev. Ødegaard had released Saka up the right, he got the better of Jensen to cross and it felt as if that might be that.
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But Brentford had no time for that script and the equaliser followed a penalty-box scramble after a free-kick. Ethan Pinnock eventually won a towering header and, when Christian Nørgaard hooked the ball back, there was Toney to crash home. There would be a VAR check for a possible offside against Pinnock on the initial free-kick but he was deemed not to be interfering. Social media went into meltdown with claims Nørgaard was offside before the assist.
There were emotional scenes when Toney ran to the bench to hoist aloft a shirt bearing a message of support for Sergi Canós, the Brentford player on loan at Olympiakos, who has recently lost his mother. Arsenal felt a return to the tension and, although Zinchenko and Eddie Nketiah went close towards the end, a winning goal never looked on.
