Arsenal's 'over celebration' against Fulham defended by Laura Woods

Laura Woods stood up for Arsenal's celebrations following their late winner against Fulham, after Richard Keys and Andy Gray had criticised them.

On Saturday evening, Mikel Arteta's side continued their 100% record start to the Premier League with a win in one of the many London derbies.

The Gunners went behind in the second half to an Aleksandar Mitrovic goal, his fourth of the campaign already, following a mistake by Gabriel.

Martin Odegaard got the hosts back level in the 64th minute but it looked like the visitors would hold on for a huge point, until Gabriel made amends by scoring in the 86th minute.

The players were delighted with the goal, celebrating in style, with Oleksandr Zinchenko nearly removed by a steward who thought he was a fun, and they celebrated their fourth win in four at full time.

However that celebrating did not go down well with disgraced former Sky Sports pairing Keys and Gray, the former now better known for his rants about Gary Neville than anything approaching coherent punditry about football.

Speaking on beIN Sports, Keys said, "It’s Fulham, and they trailed for a time," as if being behind in a match somehow negated winning in the end.

"Yeah, well played, you came back to win it and they keep their 100 per cent record intact. But they haven’t won the title tonight. They’ve won a London derby… Let’s not get too carried away. We’re four games into the season."

Gray, a long time removed from his legendary commentary days, chimed in with, "I get the fans getting over excited. If you want me to be blunt about Arsenal, I like what I see, right? But they’ve beaten Palace, Leicester, Bournemouth and Fulham. It’s not a who’s who of big teams.

"This is over hype. It’s Fulham. This is a league game. If this was the semi-final of the cup somewhere and you’d won, then I get that.

"Maybe this is what he [Arteta] wants to instil here, I don’t know. I would say it’s dangerous because you’re going to have plenty of downs, that’s for sure."

Fortunately, Arsenal supporter Woods was able to bring some sense to the absolute stupidity that was on show, taking to social media to point out that football should be about celebrating.

"Genuinely…what is the point of football if you can’t enjoy it in the moment?" she asked on Twitter.

"It’s just a happy team with happy fans who will probably go out tonight & get sh*t faced. That’s the point."

Genuinely…what is the point of football if you can’t enjoy it in the moment?

It’s just a happy team with happy fans who will probably go out tonight & get sh*t faced. That’s the point 😂

Better not celebrate a goal in case you lose the game either 🙄 https://t.co/SyBLbkGTjQ

— Laura Woods (@laura_woodsy) August 27, 2022

It's not the first time that Woods has defended the north London side from 'over celebrating,' something you'd imagine she'd do no matter which team was being criticised.

Earlier in the year, fellow talkSPORT colleague Gabby Agbonlahor wasn't impressed with the way Arteta's side had celebrated after beating his own Aston Villa, with Woods going into bat for her club.

The 35-year-old recently revealed she had left Sky Sports after 13 years with the broadcaster, having signed up to ITV for their upcoming NFL coverage, to go with her work on the radio and with DAZN for boxing.