Despite conceding three goals against Leicester, goalkeeper Petr Cech on Saturday hailed Arsenal’s “beautiful” come-from-behind 4-3 Premier League victory on Friday night.
“Seven goals, fantastic comebacks,” the 35-year-old Czech said on his website. “The season started with a beautiful game which met all expectations.”
Arsenal opened the scoring in the second minute but the Foxes hit back to lead 2-1 and then 3-2 before the Gunners’ spectacular comeback in the closing minutes. “Once again, we had to come back and the team showed it was very well prepared because it could cope with the unpleasant situation,” said Cech. “We went for a win and we deservedly earned it.”
Cech, who holds the Premier League record for clean sheets, admitted that conceding three goals at home was not “an ideal start”.
“We started very well but then we made two mistakes and they turned it around,” said Cech. “The second goal was scored after a poor pass, which can happen, but we conceded the other two after corners. With the first corner, we were late. I thought the ball would go out as it was flying over me and suddenly there was a player. I got back late, I should have handled this better. With the third goal, also after a corner, (Jamie) Vardy’s header was nice, but we were there and we had enough time to find our place. We have to pay attention to this.”
Substitutes Aaron Ramsey and Olivier Giroud each scored in the final seven minutes to hand Arsenal a win over the 2016 champions.
“I’m happy we handled it well in the end,” said Cech, who joined the Gunners from Chelsea in 2015. “We lost the openers in my first and second years at Arsenal so now we were third time lucky.”
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