One mistake and that was the difference.
William Gallas is becoming a giant killer coming up with big time goals. This time the normally sure handed Petr Cech made a hash of hauling in a corner by Fabregas letting the ball get away as a lurking Gallas headed it in at the stroke of halftime. Gallas did it the same way against Man Utd scoring a last gasp equalizer.
Gallas goal cannot be understated because Arsenal was missing its deft touch with Fabregas showing a bit of rust as he found some of his passes going astray or being intercepted.
Meanwhile the Emirates gave Ashley Cole an earful and some of the Gunners also put some extra mustard in their tackles. The match ended with Cole swinging at Fabregas after being brought down trying to clear the ball from the Chelsea end. It was a snapshot of the whole match as a testy match saw 10 yellow cards and 30 fouls committed. John Terry and Emmanuel Eboue had to leave the game with injuries after some tough tackles.
The Arsenal attack got an immediate lift when RVP was introduced as Hleb was a bit understated and Adebayor had his hands full with the Chelsea defense draped around him. He loves attacking through the left which was where Arsenal pushed their way forward. Clichy and Rosicky were very active on that flank. Eboue provided most of the activity through the right.
Full marks to the Gunners as they fought through the second half as Chelsea threw everything into the attack. Almunia was outstanding saving a Mikel piledriver and then keeping away a Sheva freekick. On the other end Petr Cech made some fine reflexive saves denying RVP and then Fabregas. I thought RVP’s goal was disallowed on a dubious offside call (Rosicky supposedly drifted away) and the Gunners should have gone two up. A bit later Adebayor’s effort was denied as he had made a foul earlier which on the replay looked a bit ticky tacky.
Anyways, great win and the result is Arsenal regain the top spot over Man Utd. Liverpool’s chances look bleak and Chelsea have a much tougher go as they are now seven points off the pace. The Gunners now need to win the matches that they need to win and next Sunday they meet Spurs who are coming off a ego boosting win against Pompey.
3 comments on “Gallas Cechmates his former team”
I find it interesting how you wrote an entire article about Ronaldo’s dive against Wigan, when the game was already over, yet you totally neglect to talk about Fabregas’ atrocious behavior. Not only did he blatantly dive in the second half for a penalty, but he committed a terrible tackle on Ashely Cole at the very end, and when Cole tapped his face, he rolled around like Cole had stabbed him. Cole wasn’t much better as he then stood up and fell back down. I just thought you should’ve had those events in your article.
Arsenal deserved the win other than that. Grant showed his managerial naivety with the way Chelsea were totally outplayed by a poor Arsenal team.
Andrew
Fabregas was way off his game, quite terrible actually. I don’t think he was match fit. And his frustration showed. So there maybe a reason for his acting out. He is usually quite level headed.
I am biased being an Arsenal fan but they are considered one of the cleaner teams. That is not because they are intrinsically cleaner players, they are bad actors. Both Fabregas and Hleb got caught faking a dive. They don’t try it too often. Lets face it they pale in comparison to Ronaldo who has had much more practice.
Anyways, you are right. This was not one of Arsenal’s scintillating matches. But they did enough. Btw, Man Utd did not look very impressive either and VDS was just awful.
I agree with you here. I’ve never seen Fabregas or Hleb dive before, and it wasn’t good to see. I would say Arsenal are cleaner than most. I just think Eboue has a tendency to go down easy. However, it’s not a criticism of the team or manager, because I can’t think of a single team that doesn’t have divers at this point. Although I’m very much opposed to any quota system on foreigners, I do think it’s because of them there is diving. The English players have now picked it up, as Gerrard and Lampard go down quite easily.
I’ll also agree, even as a United fan that Ronaldo dives. He rarely dives for United, as I think Fergie really does try to stop him, but I’m certain he learns it from Scolari at Portugal. I’d love to see him stop, but only time will tell. He was much better about it last year, and apart from Derby, he hasn’t done it this year.
Both Arsenal and United were poor, but it showed that they are better than Chelsea and Liverpool as they both won. VDS was uncharacteristically bad, but a great defense saved him. The same couldn’t be said for Cech, who I’d noticed wasn’t as confident grabbing corners since his injury. This is the first time it’s really hurt them though. I think United will be ok in goal with or without VDS though, as they have two great keepers to replace him, plus an apparent interest in Ochoa from America.
At this juncture, it’s safe to say that I’ll be biased towards United, and you for Arsenal, but after today we can look forward to many more debates as both teams look like they could go all the way.