Arsenal’s resurrection took off with a wildly entertaining 5–3 win over Chelsea at Stamford Bridge on Saturday. Once again, Robin van Persie was the hero for the Gunners, scoring a hat trick in a wide-open game that’ll be remembered for some truly atrocious defending.
Arsenal has now won their last three Premier League matches (five in all competitions) and looks to be in line to compete for at least a Champions League spot once again.
Arsenal had started the season getting only seven points from its first seven games. Despite now sitting seventh in the table after 10 games, Arsenal still has a -1 goal differential, reflecting that 8–2 pounding at the hands of Manchester United.
“We knew we needed a win here and we kept going to win the game,” said Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger in his postgame press conference.
Being down 2–1 at halftime, Arsenal stepped up their game and put aside the defensive frailties that had cost them dearly in the first half.
“Straight away we came out in the second half with complete desire to go forward. In the second half, I felt that we were much better defensively than in the first half,” said Wenger.
The Gunners scored twice in the opening 10 minutes of the second half as Andre Santos and Theo Walcott got on the board.
Santos was left wide open as he cut in from the left flank to receive a pass and put one past Petr Cech. Walcott appeared to be stopped but found his footing and the ball and ripped a right-footer in the short side of the Chelsea goal. On both goals, Chelsea’s defense looked uncharacteristically weak.
“They [Chelsea] looked very secure defensively in all the games they played until now. Maybe it is our quality today that opened them up,” Wenger said.
The Blues did tie the match at 3–3 after Juan Mata’s terrific left-footed strike, which could well be the best goal of the match.
But then, a truly woeful moment for the Chelsea defense took place. Off a poor backpass from Florent Malouda, Chelsea captain John Terry, who has been in the news for all the wrong reasons, seemed to slip and van Persie was in alone with Cech.
Van Persie rounded Cech and scored giving Arsenal a 4–3 lead. He added his third off a rapid fire counter attack in injury time.
“He’s of course on fire,” Wenger said about van Persie.
“The intelligence of his movement around the box and the accuracy of his finishing is exceptional.”
Led by van Persie, Arsenal has resurrected their season. They now sit in seventh place in the Premier League, within reaching distance of fourth place and Champions League qualification.
In addition, the Gunners will host Manchester City in the Carling Cup quarterfinals and sit top of their Champions League group.
“Every win makes you stronger. We have to remain humble and keep focus and work very hard together,” Wenger said.
“We need to build complete unity in the way we want to play football.”
“Every one of us showed character today. It was a big, big win for us today,” added van Persie.
Follow Rahul on Twitter @RV_ETSports
