Brainless decisions and key player simply not good enough – Liam Rosenior battles same old problems at naive Chelsea
‘There are times when we will have to suffer,’ said a visibly relieved Mikel Arteta after his title winners-elect scraped past ten-man Chelsea.
If the mark of champions is to win ugly then there will be red and white ribbons on the Premier League trophy come the end of May.
However, Arsenal fans may have no finger nails left to bite or sofas to hide behind by then if they have to endure many more tension-filled afternoons like this one.
After the ill-discipline that is undermining Chelsea‘s bid to claim a Champions League place came to the fore again in the shape of Pedro Neto’s brainless red card this should have been a routine home victory.
At that stage Arsenal were leading 2-1 thanks to two more set piece goals from defenders and just needed to manage the final 20 minutes plus stoppage time.
What followed was a hare-um scare-um finale during which only a world class save from David Raya to deny Alejandro Garnacho and an offside flag in the dying seconds after Liam Delap had found the net prevented depleted Chelsea from nabbing a share of the spoils.
The roar that accompanied the full-time whistle after six nerve-shredding minutes of stoppage time was one of relief as much as joy.
With title rivals Manchester City hosting struggling Nottingham Forest and Arsenal facing a tricky trip to a rejuvenated Brighton side in midweek, keeping their five-point cushion at the top felt a necessity.
A necessity especially after Neto had gone flying in to a reckless tackle on Gabriel Martinelli minutes after being booked for dissent.
When Mamadou Sarr inadvertedly deflected in William Saliba’s 21st minute header to break the deadlock the Gunners could have been forgiven for expecting the floodgates to open against a Chelsea defence without the suspended Wesley Fofana and the injured Marc Cucurella.
It was a Saliba goal from a Gabriel assist after the Brazilian had risen above Reece James to head down Bukayo Saka’s corner at the far post. A microcosm of Arteta’s Arsenal if ever there was one.
For this relentless machine is built on pragmatism as opposed to the free-flowing football of their previous Premier League winning teams. More George Graham than Arsenal Wenger.
Viktor Gyokeres had a couple of opportunities to forge openings for a second but his lack of pace meant he struggled to escape the attentions of the outstanding Trevoh Chalobah.
Chelsea then gave the hosts a taste of their own medicine when James’ wicked delivery from a corner was headed into his own net by the luckless Piero Hincapie.
The Blues were the better team after half time until Jurrien Timber turned in Declan Rice’s corner to put Arsenal back in front.
The reaction from Chelsea goalkeeper Robert Sanchez was bordering on embarrassing as he collapsed on his knees having flapped at the cross and then tried to pretend he had been fouled.
His play-acting was enough to convince teammate Neto who talked his way into a booking and a then in a petulant attempt for retribution cleaned out Martinelli to become the NINTH Chelsea player sent off this season.
Rosenior’s problems
To his credit, Chelsea boss Liam Rosenior made no attempt to defend Neto nor Sanchez.
Rosenior is battling many of the same issues that Enzo Maresca had to put up with. A young expensively-assembled squad who make too many naive decisions in big moments and a goalkeeper in Sanchez who is simply not good enough when it comes to the crunch.
“Same story, two things,” Rosenior told journalists post-match.
“I think anyone watching this game or previous few games, there’s two things that we have to improve, which is our discipline, which is our defending set plays and if we do that then we can still have a very, very good season.”
“If we don’t eradicate the set play issue that we’ve started to creep into our game and our discipline issues, then for all of the good things that we do in the game, we’re not going to get what we want to achieve,” Rosenior continued.
“It’s something that we need to address. There are certain focus, concentration issues that we have to address.
“We worked on set plays all week, believe it or not, and as a manager that makes it even more difficult to swallow because we knew Arsenal, one of their biggest strengths is that.
“When you work on things and talk about them, sometimes it’s the rules of life that ends up happening.
But it needs to stop because for all of that, I’m tired of coming out. I think we’ve had one disappointing performance against Burnley that we should win anyway.
“Leeds were very good, we gift two goals away and to be honest today to come away at Arsenal and perform the way we have done for large parts, dominate the game and give away two goals is just really, really, really disappointing.”
As Rosenior was left to rue what might have been, Arteta carried the look of a manager who knew his team had got away with one.
Sometimes in a tense, tight title chase it is better to be lucky than good.
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