MATCH REPORT: Arsenal 0 – 2 Chelsea

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Arsenal (0) 0 Chelsea (2) 2

Premier League

Emirates Stadium, Drayton Park, London N5 1BU

Sunday, 22nd August 2021. Kick-off time: 4.30pm

(4-2-3-1) Bernd Leno; Cédric Soares, Rob Holding, Pablo Marí, Kieran Tierney; Albert Sambi Lokonga, Granit Xhaka; Bukayo Saka, Emile Smith-Rowe, Gabriel Martinelli; Nicolas Pépé.

Substitutes: Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, Ainsley Maitland-Niles, Nuno Tavares, Calum Chambers, Reiss Nelson, Mohamed Elneny, Folarin Balogun, Sead Kolašinac, Aaron Ramsdale.

Yellow Cards: Pablo Marí, Rob Holding, Albert Sambi Lokonga

Arsenal Possession Percentage: 35%

Referee: Paul Tierney

Assistant Referees: Constantine Hatzidakis, Neil Davies

Fourth Official: David Coote

VAR Team at Stockley Park: VAR Chris Kavanagh; AVAR Sian Massey-Ellis

Attendance: 58,729

Welcome to the Emirates for the first home game of the season; today our opponents are Chelsea. The good news is that we have secured the services of Martin Ødegaard and Aaron Ramsdale, although the former is not available to play today because he is awaiting visa clearance. The bad news is that Ben White has been taken ill and Alexandre Lacazette, Alex Rúnarsson and Willian have all tested positive for COVID-19, and as such are unavailable for this match, but the fourth member of this particular group, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, has since tested negative, so he will be on the substitute’s bench this afternoon.

Within a minute, we had the first shot on goal, as Emile Smith-Rowe’s effort brought on a comfortable save from Edouard Mendy in the Chelsea goal. As expected, both teams spent the opening minutes of the match probing each other’s defence, and out on the left hand side, Kieran Tierney was finding spaces in order to get some low crosses into the Chelsea penalty area. The pace of our forwards were causing the visitors issues at the back, and it was against the run of play, when after fifteen minutes, Chelsea took the lead when their new striker Romelu Lukaku had the easiest of tasks to shrug Pablo Marí away to tap it into the net from point-blank range. Chelsea now had their tails up and their confidence on the ball became evident to see with constant raids on our goal. However, after twenty-three minutes, we managed to break out and Nicolas Pépé released Bukayo Saka in the left channel with a superb ball, but he was unlucky not to get a snap shot on the Chelsea goal, as a strong block from Cesar Azpilicueta meant that the chance had gone. Every time the visitors came forward they exposed our weaknesses at the back, and at times things look quite messy and disorganised. Ten minutes from the break, Kieran Tierney was exposed out on the left, and as Mason Mount slotted the ball over and into our penalty area, Reece James was left with the simple act of scoring the second goal of the match for the visitors. Shortly afterwards, we had a surefire penalty call denied when Bukayo Saka was clumsily brought down in the Chelsea penalty area by Reece James but unbelievably referee Paul Tierney ignored our pleas. Just before the break, we started to apply pressure on the Chelsea goal, and won a couple of hard-earned corners, but we ended the half two goals down, sadly.

Chelsea started the second half in earnest and almost immediately placed us onto the back foot by pressurising us into our own half. Kieran Tierney lifted the crowd with some inspired play, and using his example as a lead, we took the match to the visitors, and a long-range shot from Bukayo Saka was tipped over the bar by Edouard Mendy. Pablo Marí was unlucky not to score when his header went over the bar, and a few minutes later, Bukayo Saka was replaced by Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang and almost immediately his presence lifted the team; in fact within a minute or so, he had an excellent goalscoring chance which was pushed aside by the Chelsea goalie. We started to look a little more lively, and sadly Kieran Tierney picked up an injury which left him with a limp. Minutes later, he was replaced by Nuno Tavares, who promptly got himself booked for a foul on Romelu Lukaku. Somehow, a header from Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang into the penalty area gave a chance for Emile Smith-Rowe to score, but sadly Edouard Mendy was first to it. Bernd Leno made a fantastic save from a header by Romelu Lukaku when he pushed the ball onto the bar and over, and with ten minutes remaining, Folarin Balogun replaced Gabriel Martinelli, which invigorated the team, as we started to push the ball around better and created chances in their penalty area. We appeared to run out of steam towards the end of the match, which the visitors sensed and tried to grab a third goal, but thankfully we managed to stand firm at the back. In the three minutes’ injury time, we simply did out best to contain the ball and keep Chelsea out, which we achieved, but either way, the two goals that were scored in the first half were the difference between the clubs today.

Not surprised at the result, but disappointed overall. Despite spending more money than any other club in Europe on transfer fees in this window (£130m), the hard and bitter truth is that clubs such as Chelsea are so much ahead of us now, and with no European football in the near distant future at the Emirates, it’s hard to see how we can attract top, experienced players to turn this around. Never in our history have we been in this position quite so early in the season, and with Manchester City being our next opponents in the Premiership, this situation is starting to look bleaker every week now. What is to be done? We know that we have several players to return from injury and illness, but even so, they may not be enough for us to finish in a high enough position at the end of the season in order to be in Europe for the next campaign. The senior players are not stepping up to the plate, there are no on-field leaders and the team appears to be directionless; even if Mikel Arteta stepped down tomorrow, we would still have the same set of players and as it stands, that may not be enough to get us where we should be historically, as many of our squad are young, inexperienced players. This is truly going to be a more difficult season than most of us ever imagined. Tough times ahead for us all.

Remember everyone, keep the faith, get behind the team and the manager, as this season is going to be crucial for our future success in all competitions. Stick with the winners. Our next match: West Bromwich Albion at The Hawthorns on Wednesday, 25th August at 8.00pm (EFL/Carabao Cup). Be there, if you can. Victoria Concordia Crescit.

Steve

Too Dearly Loved To Be Forgotten: Arsenal v Racing Club de Paris 1930-1962 by Steve Ingless (Rangemore Publications, ISBN 978-1-5272-0135-4) is now available on Amazon.

Arsenal transfer strategy “clearest in years”

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For a few years now it has felt Arsenal do not have a clear transfer strategy.

A turnover of manager from Arsene Wenger to Unai Emery and then Mikel Arteta has not helped things.

But matters were made worse due to the turnover of staff who oversaw the transfer strategy.

From the Wenger / Steve Rowley / Ivan Gazidis / Dick Law era we moved onto Raul Sanllehi and Sven Mislintat with a bit of Francis Cagigao thrown in and then onto Edu.

Often it felt like “too many cooks” and it let to a muddled transfer strategy which led to a lot of short-term options – the likes of Sokratis, Stephan Lichtsteiner, David Luiz and Willian – coming in; as well as plenty of players that clearly were not good enough.

This summer, Edu has got a bit of stick off fans due to liking a BBQ and his family enjoying posting pictures of him on Instagram cooking food. I did not realise that enjoying family time was frowned upon.

Whilst Edu can be heavily criticised for not having players in place for the beginning of the season and our lack of sales, where he can be praised is for the actual strategy of bringing players in:

It is clear and obvious that this summers strategy – and hopefully the strategy for the long term – was to focus on players under 24 who can still improve, be moulded by the manager and have a potential sell on value.

The strategy is one which served us well in the 90s and 00s, as well as one which Borussia Dortmund have followed for many years.

Under Arteta, is is the likes of Kieran Tierney, Emile Smith Rowe and Bukayo Saka who have flourished; whilst senior players like Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, Alexandre Lacazette, Hector Bellerin and Nicholas Pepe have struggled with his demands.

“You can not teach an old dog new tricks” comes to mind.

So adding the 5 new players to Tierney, Gabriel, Smith Rowe, Saka and Martinelli shows we are looking towards the future.

That is 10 important first team players all aged 24 or under – Tierney being the “senior man” of the group.

Over the rest of this window we will hopefully replace Hector Bellerin with Emerson Royal (22, Barcelona) and might replace both strikers with a younger option.

That will leave us with just a handful of players 26 or over.

The other aspect is Ben White, Martin Odegaard and Aaron Ramsdale were all desperate to join us. Pushing for a move.

Edu is building a young, exciting squad of some of the best talent in Europe. The Arsenal transfer strategy is the clearest it has been in years.

Plenty to be excited about.

Keenos

Aaron Ramsdale – Q&A with Sheffield United fan @ArtyBianco

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On Friday we sat down with friend of the site and Sheffield United fan Arty Bianco to get his take on Aaron Ramsdale’s impending transfer to Arsenal. Arty is the man behind the Arsenal Ultimate Team Print as well as being resident Sheffield United matchday programme artist.

Aaron Ramsdale was only back at Sheffield United for one season; how did you rate his performances?

It was a season of two halves for Rammers. It felt that for a very long run of games at the beginning of the season he got nowhere near any of the goals we conceded.

There were contributing factors to his slow start – the entire team was out of form, defenders making mistakes, injuries, inconsistent defensive partnerships but he looked like a rabbit in headlights at times.

He was clearly a talented young goalkeeper but was perhaps out of his depth; but we did not have the luxury to bed him in.

In the second half of the season he showed just how good a keeper he is… (It felt he’d arrived away at Everton Where he really contributed to us winning the points).

It was the good form that saw him picked for England’s Euro 2020 squad at just 23.

What are Ramsdale’s strengths?

He is blatantly a good professional with the right attitude and bags of potential. He was well thought of by everyone at Sheffield United. He is a likeable guy and his move to Arsenal shows he has a drive to play at the highest level.

And his weaknesses?

Like any young player he needs game time. Throughout last season we saw him improve the more he played.

He needs the opportunity and environment to prove himself consistently over the course of a season or 2. You can have all the faith in your own ability in the world and so can your coaches but until you’ve been there and done it, what’s in your head does not count for much.

Would you have liked Ramsdale to stay?

Of course, but taking into account the circumstances – the fee, it being Arsenal, our relegation – it was always unlikely he would remain. Once one of the “traditional” big 6 comes in and offers £20m+ for any player in the Championship, they are gone.

Is £24million a good deal?

Had we been able to keep hold of him another year, he might have been worth even more ‘if’ we had managed to secure promotion, but without a win in 3 games that seems a long way away.

The other side of the coin is if his form had have dipped again and we fail to come straight back up, his value might have dropped next summer.

From Arsenal’s point of view, they are getting a talented young goalkeeper. If he fulfils his potential £24million could be seen as a bargain for them.

What should Arsenal do with Ramsdale?

I genuinely think the best thing Arsenal could do would be loan him to a to a top end Championship club (that ‘should’ be defending less) so in theory replicate where they want Rammers to be the season after.

This will see him making less but more important saves ones win points – and hopefully keeping clean sheets whilst doing so. That would stop the ‘he’s been relegated twice’ narrative the media keep peddling.

Anything else?

I really want Ramsdale to do well. I think he could become England’s number 1. All the best Aaron, go smash it.

Thank you to Arty Bianco for answering our questions. His Arsenal Ultimate Team Print can be bought HERE.