Aubameyang Hits Brace As Arsenal Wallop Vorskla 4-1

By Harry Morgan

Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang scored a brace as Arsenal walloped Ukrainian side Vorskla 4-1 in the opening Europa League game at the Emirates Stadium on Thursday.

Unai Emery finally handed Leno his debut, after the goalkeeper’s arrival from Leverkusen for €25 million this summer, in a 4-2-3-1 system that had Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang as an arrowhead, against  Vorskla’s 4-4-1-1 formation.

Vorskla attacked early in the game, but Yuriy Kolomoets was caught offside while attacking Artur’s through pass in the 6th minute, Vladyslav Kulach shot wide in the 11th minute before Vyacheslav Sharper was shown the yellow card for a bad foul in the 19th minute.

Alex Iwobi shot over the bar in the 28th minute, before assisting Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang with a pass for the Gabonese international to fire the hosts into the lead with a right footed shot from the right side of the box to the bottom left corner.

Aubameyang braced the upright with a right footed shot from outside the box in the 40th minute, Sokratis headed off-target just after the restart, and Danny Welbeck headed  Henrikh Mkhitaryan’s cross into the bottom right corner from close range to extend the lead in the 48th minute.

Aubameyang right-footed a shot from outside the box to the bottom right corner in the 56th minute.

Alex Iwobi shot wide ten minutes later and Vladimir Chesnakov missed a glorious chance to pull a consolation for the visitors when he missed the post narrowly from close range in the 67th minute.

Mesut Özil put the game beyond the visitors reach in the 74th minute with a left footed shot from the left side of the six-yard box to the centre of the goal, and Vladimir Chesnakov pulled one back for the visitors with a shot from the centre of the box to the top left corner.