I had a few misgivings leading up to yesterday evening’s League Cup 2nd leg v Chelsea, I just couldn’t shake off those horrible memories of Arsenal losing to the Pensioners in the 2nd leg of the Champions League in 2003/04 – 22 years ago. Where has all that time gone?
I have no idea where those thoughts came from but my anxiety disappeared somewhat when I saw the Chelsea line-up. No Neto, a player who always seems to play really well against us, Garnacho, Estevao and Palmer on the bench seemingly carrying slight knocks and the injury boot very much on the other foot. Odegaard and Saka were out with a knocks, Merino is obviously out, but Arteta showed how important this trophy is to him by picking a near full-strength XI. Kepa came in as the League Cup keeper and it’s safe to say he’ll start at Wembley.
Rosenior had been quite impressive since he arrived at Stamford Bridge winning 6 of his 7 games up until yesterday, the only loss was the 1st leg 2-3 defeat to the Gunners. So the emphasis was on what Rosenior had planned and it seemed that he had a defensively tight strategy to try and strangle the game and look for an Arsenal mistake to open the door. He started with 5 at the back to reduce our set-piece opportunities and an industrial midfield. But Arteta didn’t need to chase the game, our super strength is our defence and if Chelsea wanted a slugging match in midfield then so be it. Was it boring? Yes a little but why should Arsenal open up and get mugged off, all we needed was to keep a clean sheet.
The responsibility was on Chelsea.
The opening exchanges were cagey, Chelsea pressed high and with a lot of energy but defensively they were as solid as a rock. Interestingly Arsenal don’t press as energetically anymore, I wonder if this was a deliberate ploy to conserve the legs as it is going to be a long hard season after all.
On 10 minutes and following a couple of early Cucurella incidents, Madueke left something on Goldilocks but the referee let it go and pretty much let both sides get stuck in from then on. I thought the officials had a good night.
From one of Arsenal’s few corners on the 18th, where Chelsea tried a new tactic of leaving three players up, the ball was cleared out but Eze picked it up. He then put Hincapie in on goal, but the Ecuadoreans shot was comfortably gathered up by Sanchez. A couple of long balls to Martinelli stretched the game his best chance came on 34 minutes but Gusto blocked his effort. It was an opportunity that maybe should have been taken.
The game up to this point lacked some intensity with both sides getting numbers behind the ball. Arsenal had no need to gamble it was all on Chelsea and they weren’t taking any risks. It suited the Gunners.
Then on 43 minutes some lax defending let Enzo Fernandez have some space but his powerful drive flew harmlessly over the bar. Chelsea pushed a little as the halftime whistle approached and suddenly Arsenal broke on 45, a long pass by Zubimendi found Eze charging into the box but he couldn’t control it and that was that.
Half-Time 0-0
Chelsea had definitely blunted the Arsenal attack but had also blunted themselves and as long as it remained like this the Gunners were happy. There were no changes by either side at the break and with another 15 minutes of strangulation ticking by Rosenior, he finally played his hoped for ace cards as on came Estevao, Palmer and a defender and Chelsea switched to a back-four. Initially the move worked as the pressure increased on the Arsenal goal but on 69 minutes and following a couple of shots on the Arsenal goal, Arteta freshened it up and on came Trossard for Madueke and Havertz for Gyokeres, Martinelli switched wings and that offered Chelsea a new, big problem.
Goalmouth action was limited, Chelsea had pretty much eliminated Arsenal’s corner threat and meanwhile the Gunners were defending as if they could keep a clean sheet for a week. Garnacho, our bete noir from the 1st leg came on but did next to nothing. On 76 minutes an Arsenal free kick eventually ended up at the feet of Zubimendi and he chipped a beauty to the far post where the King of Brazil rose to head home, but sadly Goldilocks did well to get in the way. There were a couple of penalty shouts for both sides but VAR was unimpressed and then the board went up with 6 minutes of added time.
Arsenal just squeezed the life out of the Pensioners, nothing was getting through, Kepa collected a long pass into the box and Saliba celebrated as if we had scored. Chelsea had nothing to offer and in desperation threw everyone forward. Then it happened.
Trossard won the ball and slipped it to Declan Rice who had been wonderful throughout. Declan surged out of defence leaving the Chelsea players marooned in our half, he clipped a square pass to Kai Havertz who was supported by Martinelli and both smelt blood. Kai took it in his stride, did a soft shoe shuffle around Sanchez and calmly stroked home the winner. Seconds later the ref blew for time and Arsenal were back into a major cup final again after six years of abstinence.
This game won’t live long in the memory but I couldn’t give a monkey’s, the Gunners are back at Wembley and Arteta does pretty well at Wembley.
We march on.
By Kev
Good morning Kev.
As I said last night, Arteta got his tactics right and Rosenior got his wrong. Simples 😉
Morning Cicero, Kev.
Good post Kev.
I think we should take pride in Rosenior’s tactics. He basically told everyone watching that he feared us.
One of the most boring matches I’ve watched in a while but that was down to Chelsea. Look what happened when they did have a go. Up popped Havertz. 😂
RIP John Vigo…
£ 65 million down the drain, after all the abuse he took from Chelsea fans when he joined us , there was no way that he was passing to Martinelli. It must have felt like plunging a knife into their beating heart.
The game was a war of attrition , neither team was willing to chance losing by forming an attack . They could not afford us getting a goal and played safety first as a consequence .
Their Shay Given inspired corner defence was sufficient to make us more careful about pushing too many forward and nullified our set piece tactic which created a boring midfield stalemate.
However on the other hand it was job done in a pure George Graham manner. It was boring but as long as we kept them 20 yards from Kepa , it was never in doubt.
As I am writing this my wife is upstairs looking for our yellow ribbons , we’ve done the cup double before .
Why not again ?
I bet Havertz couldn’t believe his luck when Rice sent the perfect cross towards him and Martinelli. Cool as a cucumber he broke Chelsea’s heart and I loved it. He must have thoroughly enjoyed that..
There was a song about yellow ribbons. Dawn I believe.. lol
The Andrew Sisters many years ago adapted by the Arsenal fans when we wore yellow against Liverpool , with different words of course. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VX9tFm-AyhM
Round her neck she wore a yellow ribbon
She wore it in the winter
And the merry month of May
When I asked her: Why the yellow ribbon?
She said: It’s for my lover who is far far away
She wore , she wore , she wore a yellow ribbon in the merry month of May
And why I asked her why she wore the ribbon , she said it’s for The Arsenal on their way to Wemberlee .
Wemberlee , Wemberlee were the famous Arsenal on our way to Wemberlee
At long last, back at Wembley.
It was good to see a mixture of players, not all 1st Team, hold onto the advantage we had with a great pass at the end from Declan ensuring a great finish by Havertz to seal a place at Wembley.
Hopefully we will seal another place at Wembley for the FA Cup Final!
That’s the better version…
Morning Gooners, morning Rico/Cicero.
When we kick off against City in a few weeks time we won’t give this game a thought except for the goal Havertz scored.
Re-watching highlights and maybe we should have had a penalty, but we never seem to get them – ever!
No time to really enjoy the achievement because the fixtures keep coming relentlessly.
An earlier version of she wore a yellow ribbon, was in the 1949 John Ford U S Cavalry movie starring John Wayne .
If you open the you tube it shows scenes from the John Wayne film.
Havertz will certainly remember that goal Kev…
The Martinelli challenge could easily have been given. Not for the challenge on our player but the clearly obvious and deliberate kick out afterwards. That so called follow through was not natural.
Exactly Rico, the focus seemed to be on the initial challenge and not the following through which stopped Martinelli regaining his balance and chasing down the ball.
I reckon Kai will really enjoy it when we win something and the Chelsea fans will feel sick. The Chavs have spent an absolute fortune on forwards since selling him to us, great isn’t it? 😃
It is Kev, Noni and Crystal Tips had a good old tussle too.