Chelsea vs Arsenal: Player Ratings and Match Reaction

[HCZ_Reborn]

Raya: 2 - What does this guy have to do to be dropped?. Literally start throwing the ball into our own goal


White: 5 - Didn’t really have much opportunity to get forward as he normally does


Saliba: 6 - As I say I think the penalty was massively harsh but not a good performance, could not cope with the conditions or with players like Cole Palmer


Gabriel: 6 - Same as Saliba, largely static


Zinchenko: 3 - Can’t defend, doesn’t contribute to attack so even Arteta pulled him


Jorginho: 4 - Intimidated by Chelsea midfield into a lot of back passes


Rice: 8 - As a footballer doesn’t impress me, as a leader and someone who rolls their sleeves up he is unquestionably top of his game. That said finding the net from that that far out is no mean feat


Odegaard: 6 - Not going to harp on this goes missing in big games, because a) in reality this isn’t a big game anymore and b) he played some good passes into Jesus but if Jesus won’t make the runs what can you do


Saka: 5 - Doesn’t look match fit, and was bossed by Cucurella


Martinelli: 5 - Largely anonymous


Jesus: 3 - Utter joke, yes we know he’s not a goalscorer but he’s not even trying at the moment. Not making the runs…just not doing much of anything



Subs:

Tomiyasu - 6

Nketiah - 6

Smith Rowe - 6

Trossard - 7.5

Havertz - 6


Looking at this in the context of a single one off result, I’m satisfied…I think especially to come back from two nil down. But the performance was garbage, you can argue Arteta set us up the wrong way and I wouldn’t disagree with that, but even the players we normally depend on to be solid were flagging (the exception being Rice who I think despite his limited ability has almost never had a poor game in an Arsenal shirt). Yes it was raining but so what? There are too many games like this the season where the result has been far better than the performance, but I think this arguably was the worst we’ve played this season. I hope it’s not indicative of where we go from here.

The fact that we’ve lost only once in thirteen games (including the community shield) is for me nothing short of miraculous, maybe it speaks to a character the team has. And I don’t think character can denied coming back from 2-0 down away from home (which is something we haven’t done since August 2014) but for 75 minutes no-one here could have complained that the scoreline was harsh on us.