BEND IT LIKE DECLAN
Despite having made 405 senior appearances for club and country/countries, Declan Rice had never scored with a direct free-kick before the match between Arsenal and Real Madrid at the Emirates Stadium. Indeed, not only had the Arsenal midfielder never scored from a direct free-kick, he had not even provided the slightest shred of evidence that he might be a mite handy over any dead ball that wasn’t placed near the corner flag, ready to be arced with precision on to the head of one of his teammates. So when Rice channelled his inner Roberto Carlos and defied both his instructions from the bench and the laws of physics to curl the first of two free-kicks around the four-man defensive wall and centimetres inside the upright, it seemed fitting that the Brazilian he’d just emulated was in the stadium to see his thunder(bolt) stolen by a 26-year-old Londoner playing in one of the biggest games of his career.
Of course, while Roberto spent the remaining years of his career trying to replicate that goal against France with varying and often comical degrees of failure, Arsenal’s man of the match only had to wait 12 minutes before he got a crack at pulling off another spectacular set-piece. “Who’s it going to be: Rice or Ødegaard?” asked the world feed’s commentator in what was the daftest rhetorical question of the night until Arsenal fans started singing “Are you watching, Tottenham?”
There was only ever going to be one answer and as Rice struck the ball into the top bin with the power of 10,000 suns, Arsenal’s captain, who last scored with a free-kick during a 2021 league match at Burnley, was left standing with both hands on his head in shocked disbelief, a reaction that was echoed in the stands and in living rooms around the country as his teammate revealed these hitherto concealed contents of his locker. The icing on the cake was later provided by Mikel Merino, whose terrific strike to make it 3-0 was reduced to the status of footnote but could yet prove crucial. For all the plaudits they’ve received for the victory, Arsenal really should have won by more. “In these big games, I always try to step up,” said Rice, who also stepped up on an advertising hoarding to lap up the appreciation following his second goal. “I just thought go out there and have no fear. What have you got to lose? It’s a game of football against Real Madrid, if you’re going to have fear, good things aren’t going to happen.”
The victims of no end of bad and often self-inflicted things at the Emirates, Real were reduced to 10 men in the closing seconds of the game when Eduardo Camavinga was shown a second yellow card for an act of ill-judged petulance of the kind many Arsenal fans believe only goes punished when it’s perpetrated by one of their players. On this occasion the home fans had no complaints, although given how dismally the Real midfielder played in the first leg, they’d almost certainly prefer if he wasn’t consigned to the Naughty Step for next week’s surely unlosable [insert “eyes” emoji here] second leg.
LIVE ON BIG WEBSITE
Join Rob Smyth at 8pm BST for Bigger Cup updates on PSG 3-0 Aston Villa, while Simon Burnton will be on hand for Barcelona 3-0 Dortmund.
QUOTE OF THE DAY
It’s just funny for my mum because she left Poland to come to England and make a life; I left England to go to Poland to start my journey” – Maxi Oyedele gets his chat on with Will Unwin about his life at Manchester United, a tough loan spell at Forest Green and finding his feet at Legia Warsaw, who play Chelsea on Thursday.
FOOTBALL DAILY LETTERS
Top marks to The Guardian for its behind-the-scenes exposé of Real Madrid’s preparations on Monday, complete with a photo that told its own story. The Spaniards’ pre-game worries about dealing with Arsenal’s set-piece prowess were certainly realized in spectacular fashion last night, if not from the expected quarter. However, preparing Thibaut Courtois by having him make saves in a drastically reduced goal seems to have been a bad error of judgment, in retrospect” – Justin Kavanagh.
Without wishing to disparage the quality of Declan Rice’s excellent free-kicks, do we assume that his boss had no complaints about the ‘fly-away’ balls in use at the Emirates last night? And can we request that the same balls/same version of Declan Rice are used at future England tournament matches?” – Nathan Barber-Kebby.
It was very unfair of the Arsenal fans to start singing ‘Are you Tottenham in disguise’ at Real Madrid after going 3-0 up. Spurs actually won at the weekend unlike …” – Noble Francis.
I am still speechless. Still without speech. So as a neutral in the affairs of Arsenal and Real Madrid I am unable to describe my feelings having watched the most exhilaratingly beautiful 45 minutes of football of this or any recent season” – Lindsay Williams.
Re: Farmy Army (yesterday’s Football Daily – full email edition). Am I the last of 1,057 to say it gives a new meaning to ‘Tractor Boys’?” – Chris Hale (and no others).
I love the wit and satire that oozes out of the daily emails (or something like that) but please, please, please remember that satire requires a grain of truth for it to be proper satire. Amorim getting a natty retro hoodie to wear on the touchline and Big Sir Jim knocking 20% off as a goodwill gesture? Goodwill from the United hierarchy? No one’s going to believe that” – Peter Holford.
Send letters to the.boss@theguardian.com. Today’s letter o’ the day winner is … Nathan Barber-Kebby, who wins a copy of Groundhopper, by Pitch Publishing. Visit their bookshop here. Terms and conditions for our competitions can be viewed here.
RECOMMENDED LISTENING
It’s Max Rushden, Barry Glendenning and the Football Weekly pod squad on Tuesday’s Bigger Cup action. And Women’s Football Weekly is ready for you here, too
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