Chelsea destroyed Arsenal, 6-0

LONDON (AFP) – Chelsea dealt a crushing blow to Arsenal’s Premier League
title hopes with a 6-0 victory on Saturday after one of the beaten team’s
players had been mistakenly sent off.
Chelsea were in no mood to allow Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger to celebrate
his 1,000th game in charge and raced into a two-goal lead inside the opening
seven minutes, courtesy of Samuel Eto’o and Andre Schurrle.
Despite the heavy defeat, the main talking point of this eagerly-anticipated
contest came in the 17th minute when Arsenal left back Kieran Gibbs was
incorrectly shown a red card by referee Andre Marriner.
The official pointed to the spot when a right-foot shot from Eden Hazard was
tipped around the post by the left hand of Arsenal midfielder Alex Oxlade-
Chamberlain.
Yet Marriner ordered Gibbs to leave the field, despite television replays showing
Oxlade-Chamberlain apparently telling the official, “Ref, it was me!”
Gibbs continued to protest his innocence as he walked off, before Hazard
slotted home the spot-kick.
Oscar added a brace of goals either side of half-time, before substitute
Mohamed Salah completed Chelsea’s most emphatic win over Arsenal with his
team’s sixth.
At half-time, fourth official Anthony Taylor confirmed to television broadcasters
that Gibbs’s red card had been a case of mistaken identity.
But regardless of the referee’s mistake, this was another shambolic defensive
performance by Wenger’s Arsenal, who had previously conceded six goals at
Manchester City and five at Liverpool this season.
- Slide-rule pass -
Arsenal have now let in 34 league goals this term, with half coming in just 270
minutes of football.
Yet it all could have been very different for the visitors had Arsenal striker
Olivier Giroud scored in the fourth minute.
Tomas Rosicky fed the Frenchman with a slide-rule pass, but Petr Cech
produced a neat save down to his left.
That started Arsenal’s problems as the ball did not go out of play and Chelsea
launched a lightning-quick counter-attack.
Schurrle exchanged passed with Hazard before threading a ball through to Eto’o
on the right-hand side of the penalty box.
The striker cut inside Oxlade-Chamberlain and expertly finished into the far
corner beyond Arsenal goalkeeper Wojciech Szczesny.
Worse was to follow for Wenger two minutes later as Schurrle doubled
Chelsea’s advantage when he received Nemanja Matic’s pass and fired a shot
through Laurent Koscielny’s legs that gave Szczesny no chance.
Chelsea then lost Eto’o to an apparent hamstring injury, with Fernando Torres
coming on, but by the time of Marriner’s blunder, the game already seemed
over.
To Chelsea’s credit, they went on to show a ruthless streak by ramming home
their dominance to put the pressure on title rivals Liverpool and City.
Oscar bagged his first goal four minutes before the break when the Brazilian
shot into the roof of the net following Torres’s cross from the right.
He completed his brace in the 66th minute with a shot from outside the box
that appeared to catch Szczesny by surprise, before Salah ran through fives
minutes later to score his first Chelsea goal.