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| Half an hour to defend a 2 goal cushion made for a nervous watch. |
After having let Drogba score 13 goals in 13 games against us before yesterday, it was hard not to be nervous going into the match. Couple Drogba's devastating form against Arsenal with some shaky looking home form I think that yesterday's result was worth much more than 3 points. There had been a fear of losing the big games, and, although I feel it had sizably diminished by the Man United game a couple of weeks ago, it still posed a big problem. I can't help but feel that when playing United and Chelsea, Arsenal always seem to dominate possession, but never really do anything with it. It almost looked like it was going to go that way again yesterday.
Arsenal dominated much of the first half, playing some fantastic football deep inside Chelsea's half, still lacking that killer instinct and awareness. For the whole game, Arsenal were playing the ball around, just inside the attacking third, pushing it out wide and getting into great crossing positions, but not being able to swing in that final ball because there was no one in the centre. Van Persie - who is without a doubt a fantastic player - was never there, he was drifting out wide, looking to support the attacks from there. As the main striker, the rest of the team needed him in the middle. That was where Chamakh would have been, offering that aerial presence in the opposition's box.
The breakthrough came at just the right time, in a slightly scrappy fashion. I'm sure that Carlo Ancelotti was planning on reading them the riot act at half time anyway, but the goal came at the perfect moment. Chelsea then needed to regroup at the break too. Wilshere deserves praise for his composure to slide the ball through for Song, however I think that he was lucky that it made it through that sea of blue. I feel that that summed up Chelsea's game, poor defensively (and going forward too).
Chelsea started the second half in the same manner as they finished the first, badly, Fabregas won the ball back from Chelsea's restart within 5 seconds (ish) and this set the tone for the next ten minutes, when twice Fabregas and Walcott combined with devastating effect, putting Chelsea 3 down with 35 minutes left. This being Arsenal, they sat back and just defended the lead, paying the price when, via some woeful goalkeeping, Chelsea pulled one back through Ivanovic. It has to be said that Fabianski should have done much better, he came out flapped at Drogba's free kick and missed. He should have stayed on his line, and I feel that if he had they wouldn't have scored.
After this, little else happened, Chelsea attacked but were thwarted by an Arsenal defense with more steel to it than has been normal of late, Fabregas received his fifth booking of the season, and is now suspended for the trip to Wigan tomorrow night. Nasri also missed a golden opportunity to make it 4-1, however 3 points is 3 points, and put us up to second (albeit for a day, Man City are 3 points ahead, having played 2 games more at the time of writing).
I agree with the players when they say that we were never out of the title race, but i feel that after this result, we're in it even more.
Bring on Wigan.
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