January 10, (THEWILL) – Arsenal were knocked out of the FA Cup in the third round after Championship Nottingham Forest won a famous 1-0 victory on Sunday night thanks to a second-half goal from Lewis Grabban.
The Gunners were lacklustre throughout the game, and the Tricky Trees were well worth their win, which set up an exciting fourth-round clash with East Midlands rivals Leicester.
Chances were few and far between during the first half. Expectedly, Arsenal had more possession, but they were unable to break down a resolute Forest defence that did not give their more prestigious opponents any inch.
With little creativity going on for both sides in the first half, Eddie Nketiah cut in from the right and fired a deflected effort beyond the post. It was the closest either team came to opening the score.
After Brennan Johnson had surged past Rob Holding in transition, Bernd Leno was forced into a fine stop to deny Philip Zinckernagel as the Gunners continued to struggle after the break.
Soon later, Leno was called upon once more to prevent James Garner’s well-hit free kick from nestling in the top corner.
Arsenal continued to underwhelm despite these alarms, and they were finally punished eight minutes from time. On the right flank, Ryan Yates sprinted into space and teed up a superb cross for replacement Grabban to sneak into the net at the back post.
Arsenal made a valiant effort to equalise, but they never looked like scoring, and Forest held on to earn an FA Cup giant-killing victory.
Jude Obafemi is a versatile senior Correspondent at THEWILL Newspapers, excelling in sourcing, researching, and delivering sports news stories for both print and digital publications.
