Martin Odegaard admits the whole stadium was ‘annoyed’ after seeing what he did against Newcastle

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Arsenal have returned to the top of the Premier League table after beating Newcastle United.

The Gunners were far from their best at the Emirates Stadium, but Eberechi Eze’s stunner proved to be enough to get all three points.

Martin Odegaard was the driving force in attack in the first half, and he seems to be slowly getting back to his usual level.

However, the Arsenal captain kept doing something that really annoyed the fans – short corners.

Martin Odegaard admits Arsenal fans were annoyed with him for the short corners

Arsenal have been regarded by everyone in the Premier League as the kings of set-pieces.

Nicolas Jover has done a remarkable job in that department, and deliveries into the box from corners and free-kicks are usually excellent.

Against Newcastle, however, Arsenal decided to play it short from the very first corner they got in the game.

As soon as Noni Madueke stepped up to take the corner, Odegaard ran straight to him to receive the pass, and that visibly annoyed the Emirates faithful.

There were groans when it happened the second time, and the noise grew even bigger on the third occasion. However, the Arsenal captain had the last laugh.

When Odegaard went for another short corner, a few Newcastle players followed him, and that freed up space for Kai Havertz to receive the ball. The German took it and passed to Eze, who smashed the ball into the back of the net.

After the game, the Norwegian was asked about that, and he told Sky Sports: “We practise it all – short ones, first balls, second balls, everything.

“That’s our quality, we can score in so many different ways. Today we did it brilliantly, we were dangerous a few more times as well. Credit to the work we did on the training ground.

“The stadium was a bit annoyed we took it short a few times, but it paid off in the end, and it was a brilliant finish from Ebz.”

Arsenal fans need to calm down

The anxiety among the Arsenal fans at the Emirates has been clear to see for a few weeks now.

Supporters seem to get really nervous early, and that gets worse and worse as the game goes on if the Gunners aren’t comfortably ahead.

That is understandable because of what has happened in recent seasons, but fans should also be wary of putting unnecessary pressure on their own players while they are making high-pressure decisions.

It’s definitely not easy, but Arsenal fans need to calm down and back what the players are doing. Eze’s goal against Newcastle is the perfect example that they know what they are doing.

Hopefully, we’ll see that against Fulham next weekend.