Chelsea 3-5 Arsenal: Gunners Gunning Onwards

Arsenal Celebrate in front of fans (guardian.co.uk)

1 – 0 Lampard (15)
1 – 1 van Persie (36)
2 – 1 Terry (45)
2 – 2 Santos (48)
2 – 3 Walcott (55)
3 – 3 Mata (80)
3 – 4 van Persie (85)
3 – 5 van Persie (90)

What a game of football!!! If you had offered me a 3-3 draw in the 80^th minute, I would have bitten your hand off. But no, thats not the Arsenal way. We had to do it the difficult way, coming from behind 3 times before eventually killing Chelsea off.

However good the final result, I must say that the defending on the day, from both sides was a joke. I don’t really care for Chelsea’s defensive weaknesses, only to the extent that we capitalised on them. I’m concerned with our own. First Terry tapped in a corner just before half time. The marking from Arsenal, Mertesacker and Djourou in particular was worrying me. Santos too did not cover himself in glory.

In the first 9 minutes, Chelsea had 3 very good chances that they wasted. On 11 minutes, Walcott skipped past Cole and delivered a peach of a ball to Gervinho in the Chelsea box. All Gervinho had to do was tap into the net. He missed. Two minutes later, Walcott again placed a clever ball at the far post. All Van Persie had to do was poke it on target and it would have been a goal. He placed it over the bar.

By this time, I was thinking we are going to regret the chances we missed and so it was. In the 15^th minute, Juan Mata easily evaded Santos on our left flank and crossed into our area. Mertesacker missed his header and Lampard, who sneaked in between Mertesacker and Koscielny headed low into the net. 1-0 Chelsea.

Lampard scores for Chelsea (Guardian.co.uk)

You could see that we were shaken, but unlike before, we didn’t feel sorry for ourselves but went after Chelsea. We started to come back into the game, but we were not closing Chelsea in midfield. Both teams were threatening to score every time attacks were launched. It was such an open game.

Midway through the first half, I thought to myself if we keep our defence tight, we can beat Chelsea today. They were as shaky as we were defensively.We allowed them too much time and space to pick their runners. Mata, Sturridge, Torres and Cole were tormenting Santos and Djourou on our wings.

Gervinho did what Gervinho does best. He ran through the Chelsea defence and credit to Ramsey for picking him out with that pass. Gervinho unselfishly passed sideways to Van Persie to tap into an open net. 1-1. Chelsea were rocked. To their credit, they started to come at us more and just before half time, they won a corner.

I thought, here comes another Arsenal defensive howler and it was. John Terry tapped in unmarked in the middle of our box. 2-1 in favour of Chelsea.

They say conceding before half time is always bad as it gives momentum to the other side. Well, not to Chelsea. Whatever Arsene said to the team and put up their arses worked. Arsenal came out all guns blazing, closing Chelsea in midfield and in the forward areas. Ramsey and Gervinho were all over the place, chasing runners, intercepting balls and setting up counter attacks. Within 3 minutes of the restart, Santos found space on the left, he received a ball from Song, ran at the Chelsea goal and fired between Cech’s legs. 2-2 the score.

7 minutes later, Walcott, who was winning his duels with Cole on our right flank, made a chump of Ashley Cole. He drove at him, was tripped, the ball rolled onwards, Walcott did not wait for the whistle for a foul but got up and produced a sublime piece of skill to run past Terry and Ivanovic. He fired a hard shot early at Cech’s near post. 2-3 to the Arsenal.

Stamford Bridge was shocked. The Arsenal fans were on cloud nine. I could not contain myself. I was by now jumping up and down with joy. For the next 20 minutes, the game was a tense affair. You got the sense that Chelsea would score but equally you sensed that Arsenal would score too. We had several opportunities to kill them off on the counter attack but we could not pick out Theo who was open on the right with a ball over the top. Gervinho too failed to clip a ball over for Ramsey to run clear at the Chelsea goal.

And so it was. On 80 minutes, Santos gave the ball away with a very poor pass. To his credit, he tried to retrieve the ball but was fouled by Lukaku. The ball was passed to Mata outside our area. There was no Arsenal midfielder or defender closing him down. He fired. 3-3 the score. I thought Chezny could have done better.

Now the game was at a point where the next goal wins the match. Both teams probed, but Arsenal looked the more dangerous. And with 5 minutes to go, Malouda played a bad back pass to Terry, the ball went behind Terry, who slipped and fell face down on the turf, and found Van Persie who had anticipated the pass. He was clear on goal with just the keeper to beat. There could only be one outcome. 3-4 to the Arsenal.

Van Persie scores in empty net (Guardian.co.uk)

Chelsea pushed forward to find an equaliser, Arsenal squandered more chances to kill them off on the counter and eventually, we did kill them off and my word!! We counter-attacked, Van Persie was on the left, the ball was played to him, he controlled and fired a ferocious shot at Cech’s near post. Cech put out a hand at it but couldn’t stop the net bulging. 3-5 to the Arsenal.

By this time I was on cloud 19 and a half. I yelped and danced and fisted the air and screamed and danced some more. My 4 year old nephew who had passed out besides me at kick-off woke up alarmed.

I grabbed a Windhoek Drought from my fridge and gulped it. It tasted even better than at kick off. I helped myself to a few more…

Players celebrating with fans (Arsenal.com)

You could see what it meant to the players too. They went and danced in front of the Arsenal fans as if a cup had been won. I was really touched by the emotions at that moment.

Now, coming back down to earth, this result to me means little on its own but is just another step in the right direction. We should not get carried away because there is still a lot of work to do with this team. We are still very naïve defensively and our attack is not yet very efficient, but we are getting there.

Lets take it a game at a time and see where we end up. Next up is Manchester City in the Carling cup quarter finals at the Emirates. Lets beat them and remind them that we are still THE ARSENAL!!

Onwards marches the Arsenal!!