5 Reasons Why Arsenal Got So Humiliated Against Chelsea

5. Wenger's Tactics

Arsenal started the match with an unusual, attacking-minded 4-1-4-1 formation, with captain Mikel Arteta taking up his position in front of the Gunner's familiar back-four. Alex Oxlade Chamberlain, who impressed greatly in recent weeks joined the in-form Tomáš Rosický, Santi Cazorla and Lukas Podolski in an attacking quartet, with the team's top scorer Olivier Giroud occupying the lone striker position. It wasn't horribly hard to realise that something was amiss. Playing at Stamford Bridge against a Chelsea side utilising a more fluid 4-2-3-1 position, Arsenal never stood a chance once the Blues got into their defending half. With Arteta terribly isolated in dealing with the lethal trio of André Schürrle, Oscar and Eden Hazard, Chelsea attackers were able to advance up the pitch in astonishing numbers and speed, resulting in Arsenal getting outnumbered numerous times throughout the match. The Gunners's midfield are not shorn of quality, but the way Arsene Wenger wanted to play them backfired in spectacular fashion as they were simply unable to defend with much efficiency from such advanced positions up the pitch. Furthermore, the attacking quartet mentioned earlier are not known for their defensive abilities. Rosický has averaged only one defensive actions per game, failing 61% of his tackling attempts. Chamberlain is an attacking-minded player, while Cazorla was too slow to be much of a threat to Chelsea's speedy attackers. Podolski, meanwhile, was quiet and missing from much of the match, and Arteta is more known for his passing prowess than his defensive abilities. This mismatch should have been rectified after Chelsea scored their first goal via Cameroonian Samuel Eto'o in the fifth minute, but Wenger waited till half-time to bring on Mathieu Flamini, who was easily Arsenal's best player by some margin despite playing only half the match. His physical presence and combative approach in breaking up play and making vital interceptions were sorely missed by his teammates, whose body language and movements more than suggested that they have no idea how to deal with Chelsea's constant bombardment of their penalty area. Besides, without possession, Arsenal's frontline were redundant, and a way more defensive approach would have help limited their bleeding wounds instead of inviting more pressure from Chelsea. By the time they changed to a 4-2-3-1 formation, it was way too late to save the game. Another substitution by Wenger saw Laurent Koscielny being replaced by Carl Jenkinson. With Jenkinson's experience, he did relatively well in containing the danger on the threats cancelling out some of Chelsea's most promising crossing opportunities, but why was Koscielny subbed off instead of Per Metersacker? The giant defender had no answer to Chelsea's fast counter attacks and ventures into their penalty area. With Gibbs sent off, both Branislav Ivanovi‡ and César Azpilicueta were given much freedom to storm down the flanks, and when Bacary Sagna couldn't recover in time, it was painful to watch Metersacker trying to cover for the Frenchman when the Chelsea fullbacks were blasting down the sides. It was like watching a turtle carrying another turtle racing against Usain Bolt who was lighter than the turtles. Despite having a jittery game filled with rustiness, Thomas Vermaelen should have been a better option than the German defender. Koscielny had a decent game under these unfortunate circumstances, and along with Vermaelen's quicker pace, Arsenal would have been able to successfully maintain position more often and launch more counter attacks, a rarity for the North London side in this derby. In short, the game was lost even before the referee blew for the kick-off.