Apologies that this is out late. A medical appointment put my Monday out of kilter...
But narrow victory over Chelsea, and the three points were really all that mattered when it comes down to it. Lots to discuss, so let's crack on.
Sunday March 1st would have been my father's 96th birthday. It was he who first introduced me to The Arsenal (aged 6), and he had a load of pet sayings on game day and at the ground about the club/team - a tradition I have continued.
For example:
'It's Arsenal weather!' - irrespective of the weather...
'Come on Arsenal - nothing to beat!' - at the start of every half of football.
'Top right/left hand corner!' - this might vary, depending on the mood; but at every direct free kick.
And when an opposing player went down injured, it was: 'I hope it's nothing trivial!'
As a special homage to my father, I made a point of using every one of those sayings at the match. It was the least I could do.
Anyway, back to the matter in hand:
No changes from the romp at The Toilet Bowl; a not unexpected decision from the manager, with Eze - in particular - and Gyokeres clearly deserving of starts following their respective braces in that match. Havertz back on the bench, but no Odegaard; and still no Ben White. Hincapie is currently clearly the preferred choice over Calafiori at left back, but the combinations up front are still - despite it now being March - very much up in the air.
Make no mistake; Chelsea are a decent side. Not quite there yet, but they are getting there. They have some exceptional players amongst their ranks - law of averages I suppose - but who wouldn't mind the likes of Reece James, Palmer, Enzo, Caicedo and Joao Pedro in their squad? This week's announcement of a further £355m loss isn't going to help their cause, though. Their away supporters are amongst the most irritating in the entire Premier League, however. My level of contempt for them is almost as high as it can get, and they're up there with fans of Manchester United, Tottenham and - perhaps bizarrely - Aston Villa.
Arsenal started pretty well, helped greatly by a typically nervous performance from Chelsea goalkeeper Sanchez. And this not for the first time against Arsenal - remember that Declan Rice goal a couple of years ago? He is a disaster with the ball at his feet, and couldn't command his area either. If Chelsea don't replace him on the summer, that would be extremely negligent of the club. In comparison with David Raya... well, they're like chalk and cheese.
From very early on, when Gyokeres caught him in possession, both Arsenal players and supporters were on his back throughout, and he hardly recovered from that. One instance midway through the half, when Eze had the front to try to lob him from fully 50 yards, saw casual play from him and a further mistake as he carried the ball over the goal line for what should have been a corner. The linesman was far too far away to spot that, but the crowd made it quite clear what had happened! And with a string of errors with the ball at his feet, he looked like a disaster waiting to happen.
For Chelsea, Palmer looked the main weapon. He took up a lot of really dangerous positions; dropping into spaces strangely unoccupied by either Rice or Zubimendi. Half way through the first half, there was a change in defensive tactics from Arsenal as Arteta - having spotted the danger himself (I'm not the only tactical genius at the ground on match days, you know) instructed Saliba to follow him almost everywhere, leaving Gabriel to cope with the dangerous Pedro. Interesting.
Meantime, neither Eze nor Gyokeres were having the sort of games that one would have hoped for following last week. Up against a different calibre of opposition, of course. Neither Saka nor Trossard looked really on it, either, so one started to suspect that a set piece might be the answer. And so it proved.
An Arsenal corner in the 21st minute. And I spotted something new; pointing it out to all and sundry around me as the players lined up for it. Normally, Gabriel either takes up a position close to the penalty spot, or beyond the far post but close to goal, but this time he was not far from the far corner of the penalty box, and looking to run in from deep. 'Look at Gabriel', I said. 'This is new!' And it was certainly something that Chelsea hadn't bargained for, as a combination of strength and determination from the King of Brazil saw him burst past James and win the first header from Saka's dead ball, for Saliba to nod the ball goalwards. Saar could only divert the goal-bound ball into the opposite corner. Thank you very much.
As Graham (aka Animal) who sits in front of me said: 'You're wasted here. They should have you on the bench with Arteta!' Sarcasm, eh... but never a truer word...
The news that came out later that Nicolas Jover is on a goal bonus was not a surprise; and Arsenal are now a goal away from breaking the Premier League set piece goal record with fully 9 matches to go. So he's doing OK for himself.
Meanwhile, Chelsea were looking dangerous. From both open play and set pieces. Entirely different tactics to the insipid performance they put up in the Carabao Cup a few weeks ago. Palmer was conducting matters, Enzo and Neto were making headway towards the home goal, Reece James' delivery from dead balls was at Declan Rice levels, and things weren't entirely comfortable. I remarked that Arsenal were going to need at least one more goal, as the away side looked sure to score at some point. We were hopeful after half an hour or so, however, when Palmer sat down in midfield looking injured. 'I hope it's nothing trivial,' I remarked... but unfortunately he was soon ready to continue.
So it came as no surprise when they drew level just before half time. The timing was annoying, as there were seconds until the whistle, but that's the way it goes sometimes. But not as annoying as the timing of Manchester City's winner the previous day - 13 seconds before the end of first half stoppage time...
A James corner was almost deflected into his own goal by Declan Rice. Not by his head, but his elbow. An elbow that was wrapped around Hato's neck... Rice lucky to get away with that one on more than one count; but a great save from Raya, who clawed the ball behind for a further corner.
And from this one, Hincapie's intended clearance merely flicked off his head and deceived everyone; ending up in the far corner of the net. Deflating.
And Chelsea started better in the second half, looking far more likely to score than Arsenal. Raya parried an Enzo shot away for a corner, as they dominated the early possession and pushed Arsenal back. It was one too many losses of the ball by Trossard that saw him hooked by Arteta long before the hour mark; and his replacement, Martinelli, was to have a critical impact on the match not long after.
In the interim, Arsenal retook the lead; and from the most obvious source - a corner. This time from Rice, whose delivery was bundled home by the knee of Jurrien Timber. Sanchez wanted a free kick for a foul, but it was his own player who had impeded him as he staggered around his 6-yard box, looking lost and bemused. In the aftermath, Neto was booked for over-protesting the non-existent offence.
Look, I don't care - and I'm sure you don't either - how the goals go in. They just need to keep doing so, and Arsenal need to keep doing just enough. But this seems the ideal opportunity - as the football media seems to be all over it at the moment - to discuss corners.
Regular readers of this blog will know that I am not jumping on a bandwagon when I say that even as an Arsenal supporter I am fed up with the unedifying sights with which supporters are greeted at every corner. Even though Arsenal are main winners here - with the highest number of goals direct from corners in the PL this season. But this isn't the first time that I have declared my frustration with the jostling and grappling that goes on; starting long before the ball is in play. Something must be done about this. And, because there is so much contact, there are inevitable long post-goal VAR checks. We see this again and again. All of which add to the anxiety of supporters, of course.
I have heard a suggestion that perhaps attackers should not be allowed into the 6-yard area before the ball is kicked into play, and that's as good a suggestion as I have come across so far. But this is a contentious subject, and should surely be high on the rule-makers' agenda for the summer. Interestingly, teams in other European leagues don't get away with anything like the sort of stuff that Premier League teams do, for example - so if anyone is thinking that England are going to have a massive advantage at the World Cup they should think again. Despite having the likes of Trent, Reece James, Rice and Saka available to Tuchel this summer, World Cup referees aren't going to stand for it.
What we've been seeing and hearing, of course, is that Arsenal are boring, can only score from dead balls, and wouldn't deserve the title even if they do get over the line. Which is nonsensical, of course; but as we know Arsenal are subject to entirely different standards and levels of scrutiny than any other side - much, if I may digress, as Israel are compared to how genuinely genocidal regimes are viewed when it comes to conflict. Martin Keown summed it up perfectly in response to serial curmudgeon Chris Sutton, who argued that Arsenal are ugly and boring:
'I was looking earlier in the season, and there were 4 or 5 teams that turned up at Arsenal that didn't even have a shot on target in some of those matches.
And it's like - well... people saying that Arsenal are not really creating. But teams just sit on the edge of the box and not to have a single shot for 90 minutes... you know, there were 4 games on the bounce earlier this season.
They've had to be imaginative, and they've had to find other ways. And in the end, it's a dominance of possession that gives you all those free kicks, corners, throw-ins. And then ultimately there's just so many of them, and they're so good at it, that they're gonna score from those areas.
'So I don't see that as ugly. I just feel that's someone wanting to put a label on something...'
This is something of which you, I and everyone else is fully aware, and is another thing I've pointed out in previous posts. I couldn't have said it better than Martin did.
A word for referee Darren England here. He managed to prevent no less than three successive possible Arsenal counter-attacks following Raya grabs by stopping play when Chelsea players obstructed him. Could easily have let play gone on, and then come back to the infringement. The crowd, already in a state of anxiety, had a scapegoat. I actually thought that the type of obstructions we were witnessing was a bookable offence, but apparently not. It used to be, and still ought to be...
On 70 minutes, a bizarre series of events. Firstly Declan Rice scampered back to stop a fast break down the Chelsea left from Enzo, with Timber stranded upfield. A superhuman effort to get to the ball, but he then hoofed the ball behind for a corner and limped away as a result of all the effort. Timber headed the subsequent corner clear, and Martinelli set off in a foot race with Neto. Neto brought Gabi down - as clear a yellow card (maybe even a straight red) offence as one could possibly see - but Martinelli jumped back to his feet to continue the attack. Nonetheless England yet again failed to play advantage and stopped the game in order to send Neto off. And it did actually appear that Neto hadn't been aware that he'd already been booked... all very strange.
But the drama of that minute wasn't over yet. Not far from my seat, we saw Gabriel and Rice in frantic discussion. It seemed clear that the former was telling the latter that he needed to go off, with Rice refusing to do so. Martinelli sprinted to the other side of the field to tell one of the Arsenal physios that Rice had an ankle problem, and moments later Norgaard was preparing to replace Dec.
Chelsea's 9th (!) PL sending-off of the season. Haha and oh dear. And for a while Arsenal wrested back control, with Eze testing Sanchez with a firm left-footed shot. Havertz and Norgaard on for Gyokeres and Rice by this point. But - and we've seen this before this season - nerves started to get the better of the Arsenal players despite the man advantage as the end of the game approached. They dropped further and further back, allowing Chelsea onto them, and the anxiety levels in the crowd went through the roof. Sam, to my left, told me he couldn't take much more of it and my wife, to my right, told me that she'd rather go home than wait until the end. As I explained, this is all part of being a match-going supporter of a team that has something to play for; and that they needed to 'suck it up'. I was doing my best to hide my nerves, but my pulse rate was also dangerously high as we entered injury time and Chelsea continued to threaten.
And we have David Raya to thanks for the preservation of all the points. A despairing dive to claw away a Garnacho cross-shot - and he'd had to wait to dive because of the presence of Pedro; millimetres away from deflecting it in the other direction. And then a superb double save from a Pedro overhead kick, before Delap poked the all into the empty net. The Arsenal crowd were in shock and disbelief at seeing the ball in the net. Especially my wife. But - and even though we were over 50 yards away - I confidently announced that it was definitely offside. The fact that Pedro had indeed been a good yard offside doesn't detract from the quality of the save.
Further disappointment for Linked-In Liam, and Arsenal had clung on. It wasn't pretty, but at this stage of the season that doesn't matter. 9 to go...
It's going to be like this until the end of the season now. What could have been something of a procession for Arsenal is anything but. Some thought it might be easy, but it is not. It rarely is. And so on to Brighton on Wednesday. Three points the only requirement. One game at a time. And - probably right to the end of the season - it's a game every 3/4 days.
The Premier League has to tbe the priority, but I cannot go without mentioning the Champions League draw; which, as the saying goes: 'If Carlsberg did...' Bayer Leverkusen, then Sporting or Bodo/Glimt, before a likely semi-final meeting with Barcelona. In the other half of the draw are PSG, Chelsea, Bayern, Real Madrid, Manchester City and Liverpool. Teams get a bit more space to play in Europe, and that should suit Arsenal. And the spectre of playing against another Premier League team has retreated, with neither Newcastle nor Tottenham (hah!) likely to progress much further in Arsenal's half. To be honest, I'd prefer to play Bayern or PSG than City, Liverpool or Chelsea, should we get all the way to Budapest. Let's not count any chickens, but the draw could not have been kinder.
OK - I'll be back on Thursday. COYG!
Hang on... in all the excitement I almost forgot! Happy St Totteringham's Day - the earliest ever! And Tottenham are in trouble - but you won't find a shred of sympathy on this page. Cheerio. Cheerio. Cheerio...
