Arsenal maintained their 100% start to the season as they comfortably beat an uninspiring Chelsea side 2-0.
Mikael Silvestre’s first appearance for the reserves this season was the only real surprise in Arsenal’s line up, as he looked to pick up some vital playing time. Chelsea were able to boast Joe Cole amongst their ranks, who had just returned to the Chelsea first team after a long lay off. There were some other notable names, such as goalkeeper Ross Turnbull, a summer recruit from Middlesbrough plus Sam Hutchinson and Fabio Borini, who have both made Premier League appearances this season, whilst summer signing Nemanja Matic also started.
Arsenal dominated the opening period, passing the ball around confidently with Barazite and Gilbert in particular linking up well and it was Gilbert who was handed Arsenals first real chance. Sanchez Watt was able to beat Ross Turnbull to a loose ball, and pass it to Gilbert who wasted a good opportunity by sending the ball over the crossbar. Arsenal were seeing a lot of the ball and getting in some decent positions, but it was the final ball that was letting them down.
Arsenal’s dominance was finally rewarded in the 22nd minute. After Borini miss controlled a pass from Jeffrey Bruma, Arsenal were able to catch Chelsea on the break. Some good work from Giles Sunu on the left who had been relatively quiet until then, crossed the ball for Eastmond who was able to slot home at his second attempt, and claim his second goal of the season.
Chelsea’s first effort on goal came in the 26th minute, when Bruma’s free kick whistled inches past James Shea’s post. Only a minute later, Arsenal should of doubled their lead as Randall won the ball in a dangerous position and was able to feed Barazite who could only send the ball wide when one on one with Turnbull.
Watt then had a chance after a wonderful passing move from Arsenal which ended in Sunu slotting Traore in who crossed in to the box, but Watt was unable to guide his volley home.
Chelsea were finally beginning to get in to the match, and Eastmond nearly scored at the wrong end of the pitch as his miss kick whistled past the Arsenal’s goal.
The beginning of the second half saw a familiar pattern as Arsenal were in total control of the game, but were unable to create any real clear cut chances. A few shots from long distance tested Turnbull but it was in the 65th minute when the Chelsea keeper was beaten for a second time. Arsenal forced the Chelsea midfield in to a mistake and Barazite was able to set up Watt who knocked the ball past a despairing Turnbulll.
Watt nearly got a second after a neat one two with Randall on the edge of Chelsea’s box, but Turnbull reacted well and closed down Watt’s shot.
Neil Banfield made two changes with just under 20 minutes to go, bringing on Murphy for Watt, and Frimpong for the impressive Eastmond. Murphy nearly made an instant impact, but Turnbull was able to close the Arsenal front man down and save his shot.
Despite an injury to James Shea in goal, Chelsea were unable to test the Arsenal goalie. Instead, Sunu nearly added a third in the dying minutes as Neil Banfield’s team strolled to their 5th straight victory.
Article By – Nick Love
FIRST!
Glad to see Murphy playing. I really rate him. The boys have grown to men. Thanks for an excellent report.
Murphy’s ability not to get in the starting line-up is of real concern.
how did randall performed???
Randall is probably my least favourite player, I must admit he had a very good game tonight. If he continues as he played tonight I might just rate him yet.
Mark Randall needs to go out on loan because he has gone stale playing in the Arsenal reserve team IMO.
Watt has been fantastic of late really rate him highly
Randall played extremly well today! Full of energy out there and always wanted the ball. Looked full of confidence!
good report! any chance you give us the line-up?
line up….shea, gilbert, silvestre, bartley, traore, eastmond (73), randall, coquelin, barazite, sunu, watt (73)
Subs….. ayling, evina, henderson, frimpong (73), murphy (73)
was at the game and him scoring has sort of muted my point, but I really dont get why sanchez watt is being pushed ahead of other players! Terrible 1st touch, poor link up play but he seems to have a lucky knanck of getting goals so i might be wrong
arrgh I forgot there was a reserve game tonight what an idiot..
It looks like Randall and Coquelin both had a good game. A shame Deacon wasn’t involved, I enjoy watching him play
Ratings?
Nick – How did Randall perform? Average or a good showing?
Kudos to entired team and am happy 4 both watt and murphy.i wish same goal magin against chelski first team next month.
Davo, Randall played very well! 8/10.
Randall was one of our better players (bout time too) but he still has this annoying knack of being over elaborate. Really needs to keep things simple when he should and go ‘hollywood’ when he should.
Sanchez was quite poor tbh but i like him. He’s still our best youth striker right now.
Barazite showed why AW is still holding him back. Great technique and skill but has the same problem as Randall. He just tries to do too much.
Overall, this wasn’t such a good performance but a great result. Keeps the lads’ momentum going.
On another note. Fran was quite poor for Spain today as they crashed out of the World Cup losing 3-1 to Italy.
Coquelin was without doubt the stand out man tonight. He was truly terrific. Although the overall standard of the team was high tonight, there wasn’t any other stand out players
the biggest question has to be: Why was Szczesny not in goal? Was he injured?
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Hey, do you know where we can see highlights of these reserves games? I used to watch them at the arsenal website, but as we’re in a recession, i had to cut back on my “luxuries.”
Szczesny is second choice keeper at the mo, i would imagine he wouldn’t play any reservce games until that change, in case he gets injured.
How did Bartley do?
Szczesny is second choice keeper at the mo, i would imagine he wouldn’t play any reservce games until that change, in case he gets injured.
OH! You’re my new favorite blogger fyi
you are probably right Jimmy. Seems a bit odd though with the International break already upon us and he traveling with the Poland U-21 squad.
@ TJ DA GOON, whats the point of having players that just plays square passes all the time, I would rather have players trying to cut-thru opposition with attempted forward passes than playing square especially when opposition pressing us.
Randall is only being held back bcuz the 2 guys ahead of him [Song and Denilson] have better ability for ball interception and bcuz MR is physically underdeveloped despite being 6ft tall
Super – Playing those killer passes is all good (he played some great passes to instigate some counter-attacks) when needed but when you should play it simple, then you play it simple……Simples. :)
The free-kick that Bruma guy took in the first half which clipped the outside of the post came about with MR having possession on the edge of their box, a simple pass to Barazite (i think) was the obvious/easy ball but he tried to be clever and nutmeg the Chelsea player, hence losing possession, the Chavs building an attack and culminating in MR conceding a silly free-kick on the edge of our box in his desperation to redeem himself. Now, that’s just one example of what i’m talking about, the worst example going by yesterdays game. We all know he can be annoying like that and until he eradicates these things from his game the sooner he’ll be back in with a shout of the first team because he has obvious talent.
He tried some passes yesterday that went just a bit off mark but i applauded the fact he had the vision for it and attempted the more direct option. That’s all good.
MR has been on the fringes of the first team for two years now. He has actually gone backwards in the pecking order (losing his spot to Ramsey and Merida) but it’s not because he is physically under-developed, it’s because Wenger knows he can be a liability at times (much like Diaby IMO).
Song and Denilson get a lot of criticism and they have a lot of improving to do still but they rarely have a rush of blood and give the ball away cheaply when an easy pass is on and possession can be kept. MR is also more of an aggressive player than Song and Denilson and in some ways, that is a big bonus in this league.
@ TJ DA GOON, you are missing the point, can his execution get better yes, Cesc in prior matches to Olympiacos & Blackburn gave the ball away alot, why bcuz he trying to play forward [thats fine by me]. Take someone like Obi Mikel who has very high pass success why bcuz he cant be bothered to pass forward thus Ancelotti dropped him bcuz he destroyed all their moves as they couldnt exploit 2v1 spaces like they did against Liverpool.
Going back to 06/07 i saw Alex Song against @ craven cottage, to think how poor the guy was and in reserve games he played as well, and then see the strides he has made then MR at the moment isnt that bad as people make-out
yes but when you are being outshone by 17 and 18 year olds you have to let the cream rise to the top and he just isn’t as good
I really aint missing the point mate. I understand where you’re coming from and i agree with what you say but what i’m getting at is he tries some bullshit when there’s an easy option on far too much. Coquelin does too but he gets away with it most of the time. MR, over the past year has put us in trouble by just not releasing the ball that split second earlier (like i said before, Diaby has this same problem).
That’s one of the reasons Craig Eastmond has impressed so much this year. He never tries to over-elaborate. Sure, he hasn’t got MR’s vision or passing ability but i feel a lot more comfortable when he’s in possession cos i know he’ll play it simple to someone else who will ping that great pass.
I’m just saying that MR tries to turn out of difficult situations when he should really just lay it off and try that shit when he has the time and space. Overall, i was quite pleased with his performance yesterday though. Although, he has to improve, and fast, because when people like Coquelin, Frimpong, Ozyakup, etc bodies start maturing/gaining mass in the next couple of years MR could be bombed out as he’s at that stage now where he needs to be on another level to the 17 and 18 year old’s, like Dean above is alluding to, and isn’t.
@ Dean, outshown by who, i what games. Alot of the pretenders have played any 1st team games apart of Coquelin and he couldnt even hand Texeirra who ran the game for WBA [but thats not to mean Coq isnt a fabulous talent].
Yennaris, Frimpong & Eastmond have only performed U18s leagues and Reserves so people really need to dampen down their hype. You can never tell if they have the temperament to cope in big 1st team until they appeared in one. Randall has started 3 games for 1st team and has been brilliant in all them despite getting pushed off-the-ball against Burnley who should have been beaten out-of-sight on basis of our creativity. That creativity was mainly down to MR starting the attacks from deep [ala Pirlo, Alonso]
@ TJ DA GOON, you are being unrealistic by expecting his decision making to be effecient, that will only come with more maturity. Also bcuz of the nature of Barnet slope square passing isnt effective against teams pressing us hence why recently we have started hitting alot more diagonals
in the reserves. Watt was even dropped into midefield and randall pushed out to the right. he obviously has been outshone by coquelin hence him starting against wba. Im not saying randall isn’t talented because he is but like i said we need the cream coming to the top aka wilshere, not your randalls who are good, not good enough.
@ dean, stop being ignorant if dont know what you are talking about, players being moved around in U18s and reserves for development purposes so thats players are not one-dimensional especially if tactics needs to be changed on new formation is needed. Thus apart from Barcelona and may be Man Utd, no club could have changed formation so easily without losing effectiveness.
as us from changing from 4-4-2 to 4-3-3 [missing from above comment]
Lets all jump on the watt bandwagon….. not.
I dont see why arsene likes him hes everything wenger dosnt want in a player, poor control, not very good on the ball, poor technique and vision. Randalls looking quality atm however, definatly pushing for a start against liverpool in the cup.
good result,this should be reflected when the big boys play agaist them
It doesn’t matter what you say Super. You are very correct on a lot of your points and i respect your views but the fact of the matter is that MR needs to do a lot of improving if he’s to make the grade. This is something that i haven’t written off thus far as, like you say, he’s far too young for that but there’s a lot of great young talents coming through and he needs to pull his socks up.
no9 – Sanchez had a poor game by his standards last night but he’s a very good prospect. You’ll see it sooner or later.
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Good to know Arsenal Reserves maintained their winning streak.
Team to play liverpool.
Shea, Gilbert, Bartley, Senderos, Gibbs, Eastmond, Coqulin, Merida, Barazite, Watt, Sunnu.
Watt is the sort of raw prospect Wenger likes – tall, quick, decent finisher and good work ethic. Bit like Bendtner really, and Adebayor before him.
On MR, the problem with all of the reserves is their poor decision making. It is a lack of experience, and the sort of thing you expect them to learn on loan. Song is good because he knows his limits, and makes decisions based on them. If you gave Randall 30+ games in the Championship, he’d be the same. Hopefully, Lansbury and JET will come back in the same way.
Shea will definitely not play in that game and that won’t be the team mate.
@jazbo: THAT is your team against ‘pool in the CC? Get real! This will probably be it… Schzeszny, gilbert, silvestre, senderos, gibbs, coquelin, merida, ramsey/randall, wilshere, watt, vela