Sunderland are\u00a0out of the relegation zone after a\u00a0goalless draw with Arsenal at the Stadium of Light.<\/p>\n
The Blacks Cats were well worthy of their point and perhaps should have claimed all three against a disappointing Gunners team.<\/p>\n
They had numerous chances to win the match but the stalemate is enough to move Sam Allardyce’s side above Norwich on goal difference and into\u00a017th in the Premier League table.<\/p>\n
For Arsenal, their failure to win will give\u00a0Manchester United hope that they can snatch the final Champions League qualification place.<\/p>\n
Arsene Wenger’s men remain fourth but United, sitting fifth, will close the gap to just two points if they win their game in hand.<\/p>\n
In a scrappy start, Sunderland struggled to keep hold of the ball and Arsenal had the first sight of goal when Alex Iwobi broke forward and flashed a shot wide of Vito Mannone\u2019s right-hand post.<\/p>\n
Olivier Giroud then saw an effort pushed away by Mannone before the Sunderland goalkeeper was called into action again soon after to keep out Per Mertesacker\u2019s header.<\/p>\n
The may have looked nervy in the opening stages, but Sunderland were not short on energy and soon grabbed a foothold in the game.<\/p>\n
As their confidence grew, Yann M\u2019Vila, Wahbi Khazri and Lee Cattermole all tried their luck from distance before Patrick van Aanholt came within inches of giving the home side the lead with a powerful, dipping free-kick which beat Petr Cech but not the woodwork.<\/p>\n
Sunderland were pressing Arsenal relentlessly but the visitors were enjoying the majority of possession and Ozil\u2019s deflected shot was kept out by Mannone as they signalled their attacking threat.<\/p>\n
The Sunderland shot-stopper then produced an ever better stop to keep out Alexis Sanchez\u2019s well-struck free-kick.<\/p>\n
But Sunderland came charging back and Jermain Defoe thought he should have had a penalty when his goal-bound effort struck Mertersacker\u2019s left arm in the visitors\u2019 box.<\/p>\n
Referee Mike Dean was unmoved, however, and it was the same story minutes later when Arsenal had an appeal of their own turned down after Iwobi’s shot was blocked by the arm of\u00a0DeAndre Yedlin.<\/p>\n
Sunderland, arguably in greater need of the three points than their opponents, began the second half with more urgency.<\/p>\n
Defoe was looking lively and saw an effort beaten away by Cech. The Gunners goalkeeper then reacted quickly to keep out\u00a0M’Vila’s follow-up.<\/p>\n
Sunderland were well in the ascendancy and Defoe\u2019s clever chip over Cech fell agonisingly wide before Lamine Kone failed to get a touch on a Khazri\u00a0corner with the goal at his mercy.<\/p>\n
Arsenal were struggling to create anything of note, although they were almost gifted an opener when Mannone came tearing out of his box and missed the ball. Luckily for him, Younes Kaboul was on hand to clear the danger.<\/p>\n
Arsene Wenger introduced Jack Wilshere with seven minutes remaining as he looked for inspiration – the midfielder\u2019s first taste of action since May 2015.<\/p>\n
He had little chance to make an impact but Arsenal almost fashioned an underserved winner when Sanchez struck a fierce effort from just outside the Sunderland box which Mannone did well to keep out.<\/p>\n
That was to prove the final action of the game, and while Sunderland will be disappointed not to have claimed the win, they have at least put survival in their own hands.<\/p>\n
For Arsenal, this was an uninspiring\u00a0performance which will give United real hope they can beat their rivals to a top-four spot.<\/p>\n
–<\/p>\n
Source: BBC<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Sunderland are\u00a0out of the relegation zone after a\u00a0goalless draw with Arsenal at the Stadium of Light. The Blacks Cats were well worthy of their point and perhaps should have claimed all three against a disappointing Gunners team. They had numerous chances to win the match but the stalemate is enough to move Sam Allardyce’s side […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":209207,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-209205","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/209205","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=209205"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/209205\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/209207"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=209205"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=209205"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=209205"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}