Gyökeres doubles up as Arsenal survive late Slavia scare
Viktor Gyökeres scored and set up Noni Madueke inside the first half, but Arsenal had to ride out a second-half siege to beat Slavia Prague 2-1 in the Champions League.
Arsenal needed everything they had built in the first half to survive the second as they beat Slavia Prague 2-1 in Prague, with Viktor Gyökeres scoring once and setting up another before the hosts came storming back.
Noni Madueke put Arsenal ahead inside nine minutes, slotting past Nazar Domchak after Gyökeres held up a long ball from David Raya and fed him in behind.
Gyökeres doubled the lead himself in the 38th minute, finishing from the left of the box after Mikel Merino won possession high up the pitch and slipped it through, as detailed by The Analyst (Opta). Slavia pulled one back through Wiktor Nowak in the 90th minute, tapping into an empty net after David Jurásek recycled a cleared long throw with Raya drawn out of position.
Gyökeres' hold-up play unlocks Slavia early
The opening goal was built on a piece of individual craft rather than a passing move. Gyökeres took Raya's long ball on his chest under pressure and turned it into a forward pass for Madueke in a single action, the kind of hold-up play that lets a team skip the press entirely rather than work through it. Slavia had set up to contest Arsenal in midfield, but a direct ball over the top made that structure irrelevant.
The second goal came from a different mechanism: a high turnover. Arsenal won the ball back in an advanced area, and Merino's pass through to Gyökeres exploited the gap left by Slavia committing players forward to try to find an equaliser before the break. Pressing high and converting the recovery into a chance within seconds is the clearest sign of a team imposing a game plan, and for 45 minutes Arsenal did exactly that.
According to The Analyst, Gyökeres has now been involved in eight goals across his last ten starts in all competitions, five scored and three assisted. His Champions League record stands at 16 goal involvements for his career, 12 goals and four assists, a tally only Zlatan Ibrahimovic has bettered among Swedish players in the competition.
Why the second half told a different story
Arsenal's dominance evaporated after the interval. Oskar Kubiak forced a save from Raya within 22 seconds of the restart, and Slavia kept coming. The Analyst's figures show Slavia had 16 shots in the second half worth 2.17 expected goals, against four shots worth 0.19 expected goals for Arsenal in the same period. Expected goals estimates the likelihood of a shot being scored based on factors such as location and angle, and the gap here reflects a genuine shift in territory rather than a few spilled chances.
That swing points to Arsenal dropping into a deeper, more passive block once ahead by two, inviting pressure rather than continuing to press as they had before the break. Gabriel Magalhaes had to clear a Mojmír Chytil header off the line in the 75th minute, and Raya produced a strong save to turn away another Kubiak effort onto the post shortly after. Nowak's goal, from Slavia's 14th attempt of the half, was the pressure finally paying off, though by then it was too late to force an equaliser.
A losing run with few recent parallels
Nowak's goal did not prevent Slavia extending a historic run. Guardian Football reports that the defeat means Slavia have now gone 23 matches without a win in the European Cup or Champions League, matching the longest such streak in the competition's history, a mark previously shared by AEK Athens and FCSB, formerly Steaua Bucharest.
For Arsenal, the result continues a different kind of record. The Analyst notes the win stretched their unbeaten run to 32 matches in the Champions League when leading 1-0, a sequence dating back to a defeat by Lens in October 2023. Guardian Football adds that Arsenal are now unbeaten in their last ten away trips in Europe, a streak that arrived a week after what the Guardian's Ed Aarons described as a wobble against Fleetwood.
What it means for Arteta's attack
Gyökeres' display adds a layer to Arsenal's attacking options rather than displacing anyone outright. Kai Havertz remains the preferred central striker, but Aarons notes the Swede carried himself with extra confidence after his goal, and a forward contributing this regularly to goals gives Mikel Arteta a genuine alternative rather than a backup plan.
Madueke's goal was his fourth in the Champions League and ended a run of ten games without scoring in the competition since a double against Club Brugge last season, while Merino's involvement in both goals underlines his growing influence beyond midfield.
Arsenal's unbeaten start to this season's Champions League campaign stands, built once again on a fast opening rather than control from start to finish. The challenge, as Prague showed, is managing the second half as sharply as the first.