The Man in The Shed

29th December – Back to North London

So another game already and another game in London ! Such have been the problems for Arsenal this season that I was struggling mentally to categorise them as still being a top six team. It was yet another game against a team who had just sacked a manager; I was hoping that the “new manager bounce” would not be in evidence today.

The Chelsea team was relatively unchanged yet again. You are mentally geared up for 4 or 5 changes each game over the festive period – a nightmare for all of us Fantasy Football players.

The main point of note today was tactical with the 3-4-3 formation again being set up.

The less said about the first half an hour of the game the better. Whilst the previous away game was all about dominating Spurs this was the exact opposite – with Arsenal seeming to have the upper hand. Yet again Lampard gave up on 3-4-3 to try to wrestle the game back. This meant sacrificing Emerson (who had not been poor, but not great either) to introduce Jorginho. Tomori switched to right back. The introduction of Jorginho as a leader as much as a holding midfielder seemed to give Chelsea a foothold in the game. Sadly by this point we were already a goal down (and yes Emerson was probably guilty of “losing his man”, Aubameyang for the goal).

In case we hadn’t noticed David Luiz reminded Chelsea fans he was playing for Arsenal by almost taking Kanté’s head off with a challenge. Mental note – more evidence of why we sold him.

The Arsenal defence was playing a very high line in this first half. Tactically this was perhaps why we’d been on the back foot although I would have hoped that it would have offered Abraham opportunities to run in behind.

So half time arrived and we’d probably “got away” with only being one goal behind. The introduction of Jorginho had stabilised a poor first half an hour. All of the TV analysis was on how we’d been overrun. It hadn’t felt like it when I’d watched it but having been told that Chelsea had committed the most fouls in a first half this season I had to reconsider.

The other observation was just how often Aubameyang had turned up in his own half to make defensive tackles and blocks. The current Arsenal captain was clearly setting an example.

So the second half definitely showed improvement from Chelsea. The introduction of another youngster (Lamptey) for Tomori galvanised our right side. The lad was clearly quick and feisty (despite his relative lack of height).

Yet the game slipped into the final ten minutes and there was still no sign of an equalising goal. We needed a break and got one when the Arsenal keeper missed a free kick and the ball almost bounced in off of the surprised Jorginho.

All of a sudden you could see the men in blue thinking the game was there for the taking. This was a new sense of belief considering the previous six games we’d gone behind we had lost them all.

A Chelsea break away, Abraham to Willian who motored into the box, squared it back to Abraham (at which point I’m thinking the chance was gone) a second later and the ball is in the net. Well played Abraham.

Somehow we’d stolen three points.

We’d definitely ridden our luck today. Should Jorginho have even been on the pitch to score his goal (having somehow avoided a second booking) ? The referee waved a yellow card and I assumed the worst only to realise it was to an Arsenal player for trying to get him sent off.

Wilian was more animated than I’d ever seen him before – actually pointing and telling other players what to do.

If only we could fix our home form we’d be quite a lot further ahead in fourth place.

So a whole three days off until the next game before the F A Cup journey begins.