Thread by @MobyChe

Chelsea v Arsenal

How 10-men Chelsea came away with points against Arsenal.

Tactical Review

Thread

Lineups were interesting, Arsenal without Gabriel and Saliba, but strong backups in Mosquera and Hincapie; Maresca went with Neto on the left, Joao Pedro up top, and the rest of the team picked itself.

Arsenal built up in a 4-2 with Raya as an extra man on the ball; Joao Pedro was the man to mark him when Arsenal did that. Raya had options to play out, either long through the lines to Merino (which happened basically once), to the deeper midfielders to give a bounce pass to Mosquera (happened often) or just with a hopeful long ball

Chelsea pressed with Estevao on Hincapie, when he does that, Gusto goes to Calafiori, similar to what we explained for Burnley and Barcelona. then Joao Pedro is on Mosquera, Enzo on Zubimendi, Reece on Rice and so on...

But the Raya advantage , lots of movement between the lines from the Arsenal players and Merino dropping deep constantly meant Arsenal tried to bypass that; Mosquera did find those passes at times

Chelsea forced lots of this Arsenal buildup up through Mosquera and then tried to pin Arsenal to the flank. Now like I said, Merino did cause problems especially because Chalobah didnt go all the way to mark him all the time by dropping deep, but Arsenal couldnt use that cause they were sloppy.

An example of when Chalobah did follow Merino, he lost the ball and Chelsea won possession; other times Arsenal just lost the ball easily and Chelsea transitioned, but Chelsea's M2M press was still effective when put into play. The only issue is Chelsea not capitalizing on it.

So you can't just put Arsenal not playing out and making mistakes just on the execution of the players, as Chelsea's pressure and M2M chasing caused a lot of it. but here are some of Arsenal just losing the ball unprovoked

What Chelsea did well was to pass on markers so even though Arsenal players rotate, Chelsea didnt lose shape. That way, Arsenal could have space in the middle with Merino but will still have to get at Chelsea's backline. who had a +1 so you decide the space you give up

So why was it successful?

Because Chelsea allowed Arsenal only 2 touches in their box at halftime. So was Arsenal successful with their tactic or not, you tell me?

How Chelsea built up was the usual 4-2 shape, but when the ball was recycled back to Sanchez, like we see, we used that 4-2 that has Sanchez as the makeshift CB in play to have him as an extra man.

Chelsea used that to make Arsenal also press, and Arsenal also didn't go full M2M to have an extra man in the backline, but Chelsea actually executed their buildup and got the ball to the front line. They should have done much better with it.

Reece was dropping deep as a half-back to help progress play and drag Arsenal out to press, but Gusto then took up the space James left and became a midfielder, whilst Fofana went wide as a right back. Top rotation to disorganize Arsenal's press to progress the ball. Again Chelsea's forwards did do well to hold on to the ball and get into the box but not be decisive.

If Sanchez didn't go short, he went long to Joao Pedro to get the first ball, and the team got the 2nd ball, and we attacked. that created chances for Chelsea as well
which i hinted before the game can be used against Arsenal

Now, let's see how Chelsea handled Arsenal's set-piece threat, which was a huge threat as well.

First, the positioning of Sanchez was important; see where he's staying for an Arsenal long throw. if he cant get it, he retreats; this helps

Chelsea employed the tactic similar to Spurs to keep 3 Chelsea players high up to make sure Arsenal players mark them to de-congest the box so Sanchez has a free run at the corners. it worked a treat; if it wasnt that way,

Sanchez, caught it either way, with the way the Chelsea players worked to be physical against Arsenal in the box

Now Chelsea's set-piece threat was also clear from the Joao Pedro chance with Reece aiming for the back post

and with the similar tactic of Cucurella dropping for a short corner but then going back into the box and noticing Chalobah's movement from here. Chalobah gets the flick on for the ball into the net, and Chelsea scores.

On a red card, Maresca set Chelsea up to defend in a 4-4-1; the Chelsea wingers were massive, helping with the threat of the wide players and Arsenal fullbacks.

They forced Arsenal wide and stayed high with their box highline, making it hard for Arsenal to get into the box.

They did it by keeping a box highline at the edge of the box. It had its worries, but yesterday wasn't one of them. It helped Chelsea keep Arsenal out of their box, as Chelsea are much better at defending out of their box than in it. For example, Saka tried to cut in and cross here, but the highline pushed up and no one was in the box.

To show Chelsea struggle to defend their box as well without certain players , (Cowill, Tosin), Fofana was caught ball-watching here as Saka's top back post cross to Merino ended up as a goal.

Sanchez's aggressive positioning was so key on those box highlines, as when he caught the ball from them and set-pieces, he quickly released Chelsea for counterattacks, and that was a huge reason why Chelsea didnt allow them pin them back in the 2nd down to 10 men,

Keeping 3 attackers on the side meant that Chelsea had options to counter a lot of the time as well as Delap's ability to hold up play for when Chelsea went long.

Chelsea kept that counterattacking threat all game so it was hard for Arsenal to pin them back all game.

Both teams had to settle for a draw. Chelsea gave a good account of themselves, and if they had kept 11 men on the pitch, it could have been a more interesting game.

Maresca showed again he can compete with the elite again and again. The set of fixtures after this one is one that tests Chelsea because Chelsea have shown to compete against any team in the world , now to show enough consistency to be closer to Arsenal.

End of Thread

Likes, reposts, and Comments are duly appreciated as always

Thank you

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