Even though it's hard for me to admit/accept it, we got outplayed and out coached today. Not that Chelsea were that much better than us, i actually think we have the capabilities to win this game, they just played better as a team, and Wenger came out with the wrong starting 11 which he has only himself to blame for.
Ramsey and Gervinho should have not started for us. After the decent game he had last week, today Ramsey was horrible. Made so many mistakes in his passes, his crosses were bad, he looked sloppy like he has been for most of the end of last year and the beginning of this season. Gervinho scored a goal; DID pass the ball at least 2 times to an open teammate, and had one good run to help the defense in the 26th min. Other than that he was invincible. Continued with his clueless dribbling today as he always does; gave away the ball in the 64th min which gave Chelsea a great chance for a counter and we got lucky they didn't score a third. I still firmly believe he is not good enough to play against the good teams, not until he learns to play quicker and combine better with his teammates.
Which leads me to my next point. After the good performance Giroud, Walcott, Arshavin, and Chamberlain had against Coventry, at least two of them should have started. I would have liked for Theo to get a start and hopefully build on his good performance on Tuesday. Giroud up front would have also helped because he could bother Chelsea's defense with his size. The only change Wenger made, was Koscielny for Mertesacker and you could argue that it backfired a little bit in the sense that Koscielny didn't have a good day. I understand the rationale behind it because Mertesacker is a bit slower, but he would have given us some extra height for the set pieces.
Talking about set pieces, both goals we conceded today were from free kicks. For the first one, our
marking was terrible. I spoke about that in my last post and today again, we didn't mark man to man
in our box. Even if Torres had not scored, we had no one even close to Luiz on that cross. If the last
two Premier League games don't convince Bould and Wenger that we have to start marking man to man on set pieces, i don't know what will. Our defending today especially in the second half was all over the place but that can sum up our performance as a whole as well. Too many times we looked a bit unorganized; not pressing as a team; offensively people were not on the same page.
Jenkinson had another good game, i can't recall to many attack going through his side. He was also constantly going forward and had some good crosses in the box. Gibbs was a bit more vulnerable today but also had a decent game. Koscielny as i mentioned has had better days, he didn't look very comfortable out there. Vermaelen was ok, didn't make any mistakes but wasn't as influential as he normally is.
Cazorla had his worse game of the season. Nothing was working for him today, he missed a lot of passes, wasn't as sharp with his decision making as he normally is. A few times during the game i saw him getting frustrated and giving up on chasing people. He also, dived a bit for a penalty and even though there was contact, he definitely over reacted. I already mentioned that Ramsey and Gervinho were useless. Diaby didn't play long enough to be judged. Chamberlain had some good moments, he had a great assist for our goal; had some good runs on the right. But he also made a lot of mistakes with his passes, gave away the ball plenty of times. The one bright spot today was Arteta. That guy continues to do most of our dirty work, joins the attack when he gets a chance, covers a lot of ground and shows enormous desire for 90 minutes. Podolski is the same way as far as effort and desire. He didn't have any chances in the first half, 2nd half he played better, forced Chech into a
great save and had some good runs on the left. I have no clue why Wenger took him off instead of taking Gervinho out. You know that if Podolski gets a chance, there is a great chance he will score. You also know that he will be pushing hard for 90 minutes.
Theo and Giroud didn't do much after they came on. But to be honest, after we conceded the second goal we never found our fluency until the end of the game. Giroud had a good chance at the end but it didn't go in for him. Again. So today, i really think Wenger messed up the starting line up but i also give credit to Chelsea. They were very organized when they were defending, and they made better decisions with the ball than we did. We looked a bit edgy and nervious, and when we finally settled down and looked like we can win the game, we let in another goal and that's all she wrote. Hopefully, today's loss will help Wenger realize that he has to rotate the team and make sure he keeps the right players on the field, not subbing Podolski in the 65th minute and leaving Gervinho in for all 90. Time to move on and get ready for the Champions League. C'mon You Gunners!!!
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