God Of football

Chapter 726: Broken Palace.

The stadium tightened as the Palace fans whistled, clapped and stamped their feet, desperate to drown the moment.

Arsenal shirts gathered, Saliba and Gabriel pushing forward with Havertz lurking at the near post.

After the referee’s signal, Rice whipped the delivery in, the ball swinging with venom toward the heart of the six-yard box.

And there, Saliba rose above the melee, timing perfect, his frame towering as his forehead connected cleanly with the ball—

”SALIBAAAAAA!”

The commentator’s voice ripped through the television broadcast, the sheer roar carrying the weight of the tension in the stadium.

The fans behind the goal watched as the ball ricocheted off the inside of the post, kissed the paint on its way across the line, and thumped into the back netting.

”GOOOOOOAAAAAAAALLLLL, Arsenal. It was 3-0, but suddenly they are back within just one!”

Arsenal’s players swarmed William Saliba, who wheeled away in triumph, arms outstretched, before he turned, realising it wasn’t done.

But not everyone saw glory in it.

Crystal Palace’s defenders turned in unison, arms raised furiously.

Their goalkeeper pointed both hands toward the cluster of away shirts who had crowded the six-yard box, gesturing wildly that his view had been smothered, his escape routes shut off, his eyes deliberately blocked in those precious seconds before Saliba’s thundering header.

Selhurst Park, already raw from the long siege, erupted into a chorus of jeers, but the referee didn’t flinch.

He gave a sharp shake of the head, a firm gesture to play on.

There was no whistle, and there wasn’t going to be any consultation.

Arsenal’s players had read the same signs and wasted no time.

Saliba trotted back toward his own half with his chin high, the ball clutched to his chest as if it belonged to him alone.

”Controversy or not, that’s 3–2!” the first commentator exclaimed over the noise. ”Palace want the foul, the keeper wants it called, but the referee waves it away! Arsenal will not care, and their away end has just come alive!”

And it had.

The travelling support, who for long stretches had sat biting their nails, nervously watching chance after chance go begging, were now a wall of sound.

Fists pumped into the cold South London air with their flags being waved furiously, bouncing to the rhythm of a chant that seemed to come from every throat at once.

”We can lose the win,

but we’ll never lose the run!”

It was a defiant reminder that the streak mattered.

Arsenal’s unbeaten record this season wasn’t just a statistic.

It had become the pulse of their campaign, a source of pride and a bragging right too sharp to surrender in a night like this.

Even if three points proved elusive, they could not, would not, allow defeat.

The game itself absorbed that energy, its pulse shifting into something altogether more frantic.

Palace, stung and rattled, dug themselves even deeper into their own penalty area, abandoning all semblance of ambition.

The red-and-blue shirts pulled tighter and tighter together, conceding possession entirely, content to form a wall of legs and lungs and desperation.

But Arsenal pushed, and pushed again.

Every clearance from Palace seemed to return within seconds, a wave of black shirts crashing back onto their box.

Trossard and Saka continued tearing at opposite wings, dribbling into blind alleys only to spin out and keep the ball alive while Rice and Ødegaard patrolled the edge of the final third, recycling, angling, probing for the gap that never seemed to open.

Havertz and Nwaneri, now playing with each other up front, looked to pose a threat that Arsenal hadn’t had in the first half, and the commentary mirrored the frenzy.

”Arsenal throwing everything forward now!” the first commentator barked. ”It’s attack against survival, pure and simple! Palace are clinging, clinging for dear life!”

The minutes bled away with cruel pace while the balls kept being whipped across the box with bodies flinging themselves at any chance they could get to.

Each moment stretched the tension like wire.

Arsenal were not going to be satisfied until it was level.

The away end, loud now with both hope and nerves, pushed them on with chants that never dipped in volume.

And then came the sound that made 22 players, 50,000 fans, and millions watching at home stop to listen, as the fourth official raised the board.

”Word from pitchside is that there’ll be five minutes of added time!”

the co-commentator announced, and the incredulity in his voice was impossible to miss.

”Just five. That feels light, doesn’t it? In a season where the average has been closer to eight or nine, this feels... small. Very small.”

A ripple of boos swept through the Arsenal support at that figure, disbelief wrapped in frustration.

Five minutes!

After all the delays, the collisions, the stoppages and only five?

But the same couldn’t be said for the Palace fans who were praying that the time run out soon.

The tension ratcheted higher still, the noise folding into a storm of urgency.

Arsenal’s players knew it too as their faces hardened all of a sudden.

This was mostly the last stint of the game, and they needed to make it count within the remaining minutes.

The mission now clear: five minutes to make Selhurst Park collapse under the weight of one last Arsenal surge.

And as the clock struck ninety, the ball was already back at Rice’s feet.

”Rice has the ball now and is pushing forward with it,” the commentator announced.

”It’s all or nothing for Arsenal as Saliba and Gabriel join the attack. This is full commitment from Arteta’s men!”

At Hampstead, the energy in the living room where the four of them had gathered matched the energy in the stadium.

Izan’s hands clapped together once, sharp and loud, his chest tightening with adrenaline.

”Come on!” he roared, the sound filling the space like he was inside Selhurst Park itself.

Hori, curled up on the sofa with a mischievous glint in her eye, wasn’t ready to give in.

”Oh no,” she said, shaking her head dramatically.

And even though she had crowned herself the villain, her body betrayed her as she was leaning forward, knuckles white, invested as the rest.

At Selhurst Park, Mikel Arteta was on the touchline, arms windmilling, his throat raw from shouting.

”Raya! Push higher! Everyone, forward!” His suit clung to him from the rain, but he barely noticed, pacing like a man possessed.

On the pitch, Declan Rice saw the urgency in his manager’s gestures.

He lifted his head, drove forward, and whipped a cross into the box.

The delivery was hopeful more than precise, and it was met by a desperate Palace clearance that had the ball spiralling downfield.

Jean-Philippe Mateta chased it like a predator sensing weakness, legs pounding across the slick turf.

Perhaps he was hoping to pressure Raya into a mistake, but the Spaniard wasn’t rattled.

As the Frenchman closed, Raya shaped as though to lump the ball into touch, only to feint at the last possible second.

Mateta lunged the wrong way, sliding helplessly, his boots carving mud from the grass.

”The audacity!” the commentator exploded, half in disbelief, half in admiration. ”Raya’s just sent Mateta into another postcode!”

The Spaniard glanced up once, calm in chaos, then launched a missile of a pass back upfield.

It soared over the halfway line, curling through the night air, and dropped perfectly into the path of Ricardo Calafiori.

The Italian didn’t hesitate.

He cushioned it, shifted his weight, and with one fluid motion, swung his left boot through the ball.

”Calafiori, strikes it!” the commentator screamed, voice breaking as the shot tore toward the top corner.

Dean Henderson hurled himself sideways, his fingertips stretching, clawing desperately for contact.

The ball brushed the tips of his gloves, but the power was too much, and the trajectory was even purer.

Arsenal weren’t going to be denied as the net rippled violently and the away end exploded.

”GOOOOAAAAAAL! Staggering, just staggering! The Gunners have collapsed the Crystal Palace here in south London!”

Calafiori’s face lit up as the noise of disbelief and celebration swallowed Selhurst Park.

He turned instantly, sprinting with arms spread wide toward David Raya.

The two met in a euphoric embrace, goalkeeper and defender colliding like brothers in arms with their teammates piling in after them.

From the bench, substitutes burst forward, unable to restrain themselves.

The line between the pitch and dugout blurred as players and staff charged onto the grass, fists pumping, eyes wild, while the commentary barely kept up.

”This is unbelievable! From one end to the other. Raya with the audacious feint, the long ball, and Calafiori with a thunderbolt finish! Arsenal’s bench is on the pitch! Arteta is leaping with his staff! They’ve clawed their way back! This is what you love to see, and this is why we love the game. From 3-0 down to 3-3 and it is all square here at Selhurst Park”

The living room at Hampstead mirrored that eruption as Izan punched the air, his voice raw as he shouted, ”YES! That’s how you do it!”

Komi clapped harder, matching his rhythm, her support now fully vocal.

Even Olivia and Hori, villains no longer, were on their feet, screaming along with the goal call, swept into the moment.

Whatever lines they had drawn earlier dissolved into the flood of Arsenal’s equaliser.

Selhurst Park was a cauldron now, the night alive, and Arsenal—against all odds, were level!

A/N: Okay, this is the last of the previous day. Keep spamming the Golden Tickets, and I will see you in a bit with the first of the day. Have fun reading.