Allen grabs reward for taking risk against Arsenal
A little risk gave Joe Allen great reward as the Liverpool midfielder struck a last-minute equaliser against Arsenal to rescue a 3-3 draw at Anfield on Wednesday night.
The Welshman was introduced to the breathless Barclays Premier League encounter with eight minutes remaining, which proved enough to make a crucial contribution.
By the time of Allen’s arrival into the contest, the Reds were behind – an Aaron Ramsey strike and a double from Olivier Giroud overturning Roberto Firmino’s brilliant brace.
But the home side’s efforts paid dividends as the game entered stoppage time when the No.24 moved onto a header down by Christian Benteke and clipped a shot into the bottom corner.
It was only his fifth goal for the club and the 25-year-old was pleased that his desire to get forward in the search for an equaliser helped Jürgen Klopp’s team take a point.
Allen told Liverpoolfc.com: “If you’re behind and you’re coming on, you’ve got to throw a little caution to the wind and gamble a little bit. I don’t get in the box that often but thankfully it fell for me and went in.
“I was running onto it and just tried to get anything on it – thankfully it ended up in the back of the net. It was a nice feeling to come on and make an impact. Thankfully we ended up coming away with a point.
“It was frantic. I thought we started brilliantly, fantastic to go up a couple of times in the game. The disappointment is the goals we gave away. Maybe we could have done a little bit better but that’s the way things are sometimes.
“It was a certainly a game that was end-to-end and very open at times, which always makes for a great spectacle.”
Liverpool must now quickly begin their recovery and preparation process before the second match of a huge Anfield double-header, with Manchester United the next rival to visit L4 this Sunday.
Allen admitted the Reds have to tighten up defensively by improving concentration but hopes his dramatic intervention against the Gunners can act as a catalyst.
He said: “You are obviously going to concede goals throughout the season and sometimes you hold your hands up and say ‘that was a great goal from the other team’.
“But some of the goals we have given away, sometimes we make it difficult for ourselves. So that’s one area that’s in need of improvement in some ways.
“It’s not an issue of quality, it’s more of a concentration thing. Hopefully we can eradicate that from our game and I’m sure we’ll keep improving.”
And on United, Allen added: “Those games are always great occasions, games you want to be involved in as professionals and look forward to.
“Hopefully we can use the little bit of momentum we’ve had to kick-start that game off, and hopefully we can take three points instead.”