On the Whistle: Chelsea 2-2 Arsenal - “A game defined by errors”

It sounds like an easy job analysing football matches and then you get games like that and it becomes suddenly very difficult. What an odd football match. Do you know what, the very first thing that happened right at the start of the day, it was chucking down with rain here and as he came off the pitch the Chelsea mascot, poor little lad, slipped and fell over and that told you something about the conditions and it made you think maybe this is a game where mistakes will be critical and mistakes will be decisive and for a long time it looked as if it would be Arsenal's mistakes that decided the game. They found themselves 2-0 down, not performing well, some big errors at the back and seemingly headed towards a defeat. Somehow, from the jaws of victory, Chelsea managed to snatch a draw here. Listen, Arsenal absolutely deserve credit for plugging away, for improving as the game going on, I think Miquel Arteta's substitutions had a positive impact, but to my mind Chelsea chucked this. They absolutely chucked it and really the key moment in the game was that mistake from Sanchez in the Chelsea goal. He plays the ball straight out to Declan Rice who hits it first time, beautiful clipped finish into the far corner, showed good technique, good composure to take that on straight away and score with it and from that point on Arsenal grew and grew and Chelsea shrank and shrank. A lovely equaliser, Bukai Saka, who had a tough day all told against Cucurella and I think wasn't close to his best, no one in an Arsenal shirt was in fairness, but as is so often the case, even when he's not at his best, even when he's not at his level, he can provide a decisive moment, swings in a peach of a cross. I think if you're a Chelsea fan you're not happy with Sanchez being routed to his line at that particular point in time, but it's a beautiful, beautiful cross and Leandro Trossard is there to finish well and Trossard, you know, he is someone else who produces. When the big moments come, goals and assists are his trade and a big, big goal from him today. Honestly, for Arsenal to get a point here, for Arsenal to leave with the 2-2, I think they'll be over the moon because they didn't really show up today. This was not the Arsenal we saw against Man City, it's not the Arsenal we've seen for the best part of, I don't know, 15 months or so now, going back to the start of last season. Conditions, yes, but the conditions were the same for both teams and Arsenal couldn't get their passing game going, you know, in the first half Martin Odegaard was anonymous, Jorginho and Zinchenko were unusually sloppy. Now all that said, you could say about Chelsea's two goals, was there a slice of fortune involved? First one being a penalty, cross comes into the box, I think it was Raheem Sterling who was exploiting that space in behind Zinchenko, in comes the cross, Mudrick gets ahead to it and William Saliba, I'm not going to say he handles it, it hits his arm. Now, the law says something about if your body position makes your body unusually big, words to that effect, which makes it sound like he's eaten a mushroom in Super Mario. I think if a player took a shot from that position you'd say it was too close to the defender for him to react appropriately but because that rule exists about the position of the arm and because he did have his arms outstretched either side, I can also see why it would be given. So it's one of those where I think if you don't like it as a penalty it's probably the law that's an ass rather than the referees. Anyway, they get their second goal, Mikhailo Mudrick, no doubt that's a cross, we probably can't be too salty about it, Bukayo Saka scored a very similar goal against Chelsea, Boxing Day, what was it, 2020? At that time it was Saka's right foot dropping into the far corner, this time Mudrick's left foot, no chance in hell he meant that. I mean, look, David Raya's going to take stick as any goalkeeper will when a cross finds the net but I think his position is relatively reasonable there, we like that about him that he's got an aggressive position on crosses but it's certainly not pretty for him. I think you'd have more concerns about the fact that 10 minutes later he passed it straight to Cole Palmer, those are the mistakes that really will be concerning Arsenal fans and I did notice the away fans today singing Aaron Ramsdale's song, Aaron Ramsdale's not here of course because he and his wife have just welcomed a baby boy so congratulations to them. Arteta changed it at half time, he brought Zinchenko off for Tomi Asu, I will say a real bugbear of mine, the referee booked Zinchenko for a foul that Declan Rice made, not literally but a few minutes earlier Declan Rice made a foul, all the Chelsea players, all the Chelsea fans wanted a booking, the referee didn't give it, I don't think it was a booking but a few minutes later Zinchenko commits a challenge and because of the pressure around the Rice foul, the referee brings out a yellow card, I don't think what Zinchenko did was any worse than Rice, I don't think it was a yellow card, it's a case of a player basically being booked for an incident that happened with another player a few minutes before, I don't really like that as a piece of officiating and Zinchenko being on a booking was really hurtful to Arsenal, really costly because that was always going to be the channel where Chelsea's threat was going to be, Sterling is in form, he's got pace, he's a threat in behind, as Zinchenko, well in behind what? Zinchenko is not there half the time, so having him on a yellow card meant he had to come off at half time, I'm glad Arteta made that change, you can make that change when you've got a player of Tomi Asu's calibre to bring on and Tomi Asu won his first duel with Sterling in the game and I thought I had a good second half. These Premier League games I think changes are becoming increasingly important, obviously there's five subs available, Arsenal brought on the likes of Nketiah, Smith Rowe, Trossard, Tomi Asu I mentioned, Kai Havertz as well, who I thought had a decent cameo really as a sort of midfield target man, winning long balls, winning flick-ons, bringing it down, he helped change the dynamic a little bit, I think subs might be, if you're looking for an Arsenal story today, the story of the day, their capacity to bring a new energy, you know these games are exhausting, very few players can play the 90 minutes at the same intensity, Declan Rice has probably won but very few others, so the fresh blood becomes really interesting and really influential in how the match swings and from a tactical perspective I think they can just add a different dynamic, it's a goal from a substitute that's proved the equaliser today, but as I say there were mistakes all over the place, I've spoken about the goals from both teams' perspectives but there were countless other misplaced passes, mishits, players going to clear the ball and missing it, it was not a high quality game, Arsenal players just going through their warm down behind me, where are they, oh there they are, it was not a high quality game and if Arsenal had lost I think there wouldn't have been too many complaints, as I said there were too long of this game where they didn't show up, where they weren't at their level, but they come away with a draw still unbeaten, I mean listen you can spin it into whatever you like, mark a champions, what courage they've shown, what drive, what determination, they never give up, yeah sometimes I'll go for that, honestly today I just thought Chelsea absolutely gifted it to us and I'll take it, I'll always take it, listen I'll leave it there guys, thank you for watching as always, I'm heading out to Seville tomorrow, so I will speak to you all on Tuesday I imagine from Sevilla, but do subscribe for more videos, more analysis, I hope there'll be easier games to analyse than this one because it was mental, all right well let me know what you think in the comments below, take care guys, bye bye.