Declan Rice the star as Arsenal earn famous win over Real Madrid | OneFootball

Declan Rice scored two superb freekicks as Arsenal enjoyed a famous win over Real Madrid at the Emirates Stadium.

The Gunners looked fired up from the start and would have scored from a corner early on had William Saliba not inadvertently blocked his team's effort.

Real Madrid posed a threat on the break evident by Jude Bellingham finding Kylian Mbappé in behind the Arsenal defence with just over a half hour gone in the game but the French forward's shot was straight at David Raya.

Bukayo Saka was causing Madrid plenty of problems with his running and the Arsenal man put in two excellent low crosses across the face of goal just before half-time.

After the break, it was all Arsenal and while Mikel Arteta's team have been known for their set piece proficiency it's not quite because of the two freekicks that Declan Rice delivered.

The first came in the 58th minute as the midfielder's effort swung out past the wall and then whipped back in with Thibaut Courtois unable to get over fast enough to keep it out.

That brilliant strike seemed to give Arsenal a surge in confidence and Courtois needed to be on his toes to deny Gabriel Martinelli, while David Alaba stopped Mikel Merino from scoring the rebound. From the resulting corner, the ball fell to Rice whose effort was then cleared away by Jude Bellingham.

Rice's second freekick was another beauty. In the 70th minute he whipped one around the wall and straight into the corner with Courtois perhaps thinking he would instead have tried to go up and over to his other side.

It will be hard for anyone to find two better freekicks scored by one player in the same game.

Five minutes later, it was 3-0. Merino's finish here will probably be overshadowed due to Rice's strikes but it was one that any top centre forward would be proud of as he instinctively found the net from Myles Lewis-Skelly's pass.

Mikel Arteta will be delighted with this result and more so the defensive performance that saw Arsenal professionally see out the game to take a three-goal advantage to Spain.

For Carlo Ancelotti, there is much to do and his face told the whole story as he watched Eduardo Camavinga walk off the pitch after being given a second yellow card for kicking the ball away in the final moments.

Real Madrid can produce special things in Europe as we know but after their trip to North London this might be too much to bounce back from.