John bloody Stones. Arsenal fans must curse his name. Having stolen points from them at Etihad with a last-gasp equaliser less than a month ago, the Manchester City defender has popped up again to ensure Pep Guardiola’s side fully capitalised on the Gunners’ defeat to Bournemouth.
It was incredibly rough on Wolves, whose efforts deserved more. They had conceded 21 goals in their previous seven Premier League games. Watching them look for so long to be on course for an extremely respectable and hard-earned draw against Manchester City, you wondered how that could possibly have been the case.
The hosts were rarely able to get out of their own third in the first half, as you might expect, but when they did, they invariably looked right to try and release Nelson Semedo.
After two dress rehearsals for that move, Wolves finally got their grandest of openings. Semedo got clear, knew that Jorgen Strand Larsen would be heading for the back post and picked him out early with a gorgeous cross in behind the City back line for the Norwegian to tap home.
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Wolves’ defensive record this season has been woefully bad, but the early excitement, some big low saves from Sa, the lessons learned from prior collapses against Newcastle and Chelsea, and – finally – a change to a back five by Gary O’Neil all seemed to coalesce into something more resilient in Wolves.
Seeing out the remaining 83 minutes to take the full three points against City was always going to be a near-impossible job, but Wolves had a far better go at it than anybody would have expected.
At least, not this season. Their record holding onto leads last season was actually very good: they took 2.33 points per game after going ahead, the seventh-best record in the Premier League. They loved a lead so much we should have started calling them Dogs.
City found their response, because of course they did. Jose Sa lived up to his name as he didn’t quite make a whole save to keep out Josko Gvardiol’s swerving effort to the top corner from outside the box – the seventh City have scored this season from beyond the 18-yard line.
Beyond that, though, City were make to look a tad desperate. Wolves held their territory as a pack, and for a spell early in the second half, refreshed by their brief respite, they started to look more threatening than ever on the counter-attack. Matheus Cunha side-footed a shot narrowly wide, and substitute Carlos Forbs overhit a ball across the box just too far in front of Strand Larsen for him to tap home again.
The City machine kept trying to grind them down, and still Wolves stuck at it. Still they tried to get forward whenever they could in search of an unlikely winner. Still City grew ever more frustrated at their inability to make all their dominance count in a meaningful way for a second time.
And then, of course, John bloody Stones was the man to do it late, late, late on for City once again. A VAR check offered a brief hope of a reprieve for Wolves, with Bernardo Silva’s presence in front of Sa prompting a check on the screen.
Rightly, the goal was allowed to stand: Bernardo’s presence had stopped Sa from coming off his line to claim a corner, but you can’t be offside directly from a corner. Bernardo then made sure he got out of the keeper’s way for when the offside call actually had to be made: the moment Stones met it with his header. We’re sure even the most conspiratorial of Arsenal fans will whole-heartedly agree with an admirable level of magnanimity.
Wolves can take enormous heart from this performance despite the result, but just how much that helps a team who still have just one point to their name at the bottom of the table will only become clear in time.
And as for the title race…well, we’ll see what Liverpool have to offer against Chelsea – but either way, it has been a bad old weekend for Arsenal.
