NEWS. . . BUT NOT AS YOU KNOW IT
As the Emirates Stadium held its breath at Galen’s all-important penalty against Arsenal, Thierry Henry remained calm as a cucumber.
A dizzying confrontation nevertheless reached its decisive moment in a tense penalty shootout where the Brazilian winger, scorer of the only goal of the first leg, had to beat David Raya to make the match bigger.
The Arsenal goalkeeper, however, raced to his left to make a snappy save that propelled his side into the Champions League round of 16 for the first time in 14 years.
Gunners legend Henry, however, was so sure of himself that Galeno would miss out that he had already left his post in the media segment at the Emirates Stadium to get on the pitch in time for his post-match presentation duties.
“He misses it,” Henry told the camera, before Raya produced the most iconic moment of his Arsenal career to date.
“That’s when he put the ball down,” Henry later revealed. “It seemed suspicious to me, so I left. “
The man of the moment, Raya, for his part, was very happy for his contribution to the victory, but then admitted that he had saved three penalties, after touching Marko Grujic’s attempt with his fingertips.
“I’ve saved three!” Raya told TNT Sports after the game.
“The other one I’ve kept to myself. . . but I’m very happy to have saved two consequences in the Champions League to reach the quarter-finals. “
The goalkeeper added: “We played a very, very good game from the start, we dominated and created chances, but it all ended in penalties.
“We’ve been working a lot on the aftermath this year, because on nights like this we have to be fine.
“All the hard work with the goalkeeping coach and the team has paid off, it’s a wonderful and collective moment. “
Raya also earned praise from his manager, Mikel Arteta, who made the difficult decision to upgrade the popular Aaron Ramsdale by signing a loan from Brentford this summer.
He said: “We had to do it at the end with the penalty shootout, we prepared well and we also thank the coaches for what they did and especially David [Raya].
“He had some difficult moments at the beginning, but he gave up, he had personality and ambition, and in the end he was rewarded for his moment.
“I don’t want to see it today, I’m very convinced that it will. You see the first few days here and what he had to go through and how he did it with that composure.
“If you look at his structural language and the position he takes, he’s not affected too much and that’s a key quality for a goalkeeper. “
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