Arsenal vs Stoke, Premier League: live score updates

Arsenal bringing it now. Good move, Ramsey has an effort and it needs the intervention of, I think, Martins Indi to turn that behind. Stoke deal with the corner well enough.

Better from Arsenal now. Ozil has woken up, clever little passing move on the edge of the area is a whisker away from opening Stoke up.

Butland blunder! Arsenal 's first decent move. Darting run from Ramsey, he slips to Bellering advanced on the right. A chipped cross. Butland flaps at the ball and it drops back to Ramsey who improvises a hooked shot, lands on the roof of the net after flicking the top of the bar.

Poor pass from Ozil. Poor pass from Wilshere. It's a deeply uninspiring start so far. The fans reflect the mood. Or are the mood.

Seemingly anodyne collision between Doiuf and Ramsey, but the Arsenal man is feeling it. Think he was winded. He's okay now.

Tons of empty seats. Arsenal have not really turned up yet. Stoke having much the better of it.

Joe Allen tries again but that is dealt with easily by Arsenal.

Stoke City have a corner. Sliced behind by Welbeck. Corner again.

The Bizarro World feel continues as Wilshere humps it forward looking for Aubameyang. Johnson clears.

Something of the Arsenal about that little move, and something of the Stoke here from Hector Bellerin as he slices down Sobhi from behind. Lucky not to be booked for that. Swap shirts, and that's a yellow card.

Excellent football from Stoke! Shaqiri, Diouf, and Bauer linking up well on the edge of the box, clever quick passing. Shaqiri has an effort! Sweetly struck curling shot, just wide.

Stoke having the better of the early exchanges, some darting runs down the left but not a lot of space for them. 

Stoke, in their white and blue, attempt to make some progress down the middle.

Arsenal: Ospina, Bellerin, Chambers, Mustafi, Monreal, Elneny,  Wilshere, Ramsey, Ozil, Welbeck, Aubameyang. Subs: Koscielny,  Mkhitaryan, Lacazette, Iwobi, Xhaka, Kolasinac, Macey. 

Stoke: Butland, Johnson, Shawcross, Martins Indi, Pieters,  Allen, Ndiaye, Bauer, Shaqiri, Sobhi, Diouf. Subs: Ireland,  Berahino, Cameron, Crouch, Haugaard, Campbell, Sorenson.

Referee: Craig Pawson (South Yorkshire) 

Suggestion of the Rugby League about the Stoke shirts today.

Mild, grey day in London.

is on pundit detail for Sky Sports and people on the internet seem to think that he said A Bad Word just now. A Very Bad Word, in fact. Not The Worst Bad Word, the one that rhymes with the name of the Todd Rundgren album, but the Second Worst Bad Word.

Anyway, if you want to hear that, then here's the clip. It certainly would appear to contain some bad language.

Charlie Eccleshare has done a very enjoyable interview with Emmanuel Frimpong. Perhaps Arsenal could do with a bit of Frimpers in the centre of the park, get stuck in a bit? Or something like him, anyway?

well, what more is there to say really? The usual band of talented but frustrating nice boys.

Happy Easter! Lamb, chocolate, sense of rebirth, possibly some sort of religious programming on the television. Marvellous, isn't it? Mmm? And now a chance to see the good old Arsenal play a team who have been something of a bete noir in recent years, it's.... SINISTER MUSIC PLAYS.... Stoke City!

The men from the land of pots travel to North London for this 1.30pm kick off with just 27 points from 31 fixtures, which means they are three points below Palace in 17th, albeit with a much worse GD. Stoke have not won since January 20th and look to be in all sorts.

Their problems were thrown into sharp relief this week when Xherdan Shaqiri opened his heart / ran his mouth to a magazine in his native Switzerland saying that, basically, the rest of the team are a load of old tut. A reasonable argument in many ways, although frowned upon. Sensationally, Xherdan has NOT done the traditional "I never said them things, I was mistranslated" follow-up, once an absolute staple of foreign players here speaking to hacks back home.

The feeling that even a Ronaldinho could do little in this team is sobering.

I had to realise that it's a bit different when you have players like Ribéry and Thiago at Bayern or Icardi and Kovacic at Inter.

Excellent stuff. Well, it remains to be seen what his team-mates make of it all. We will know which of them take their places very soon.