Chelsea vs Arsenal

BPL 2018-19 – Chelsea vs Arsenal Match Preview

The top game of the weekend in the Premier League. THE LONDON DERBY between two biggest London clubs! It’s Chelsea and Arsenal at Stamford Bridge! Chelsea will look to make it two wins out of two and break the long duck of not beating their rivals Arsenal who will be looking to pick up their first points under Emery and as pressure looms it is a must draw/win game for Arsenal.

Chelsea

Chelsea started off their new “Sarri ball” era on the right foot as they picked up a comfortable win over relegation threatened Huddersfield away from home 0-3. It was a strange game because in the first half you could argue Chelsea were outplayed but they got two goals and pretty much killed the game and dominated the second half adding one more goal. Surprisingly, Kante and Jorginho both got on the scoresheet while Pedro added the other one after a darting run by Eden Hazard to set it up. It was a decent performance by Chelsea, they improved as the game went on it was nothing crazy just a professional performance by the blues. Although, they kept the clean sheet the backline was a little bit of a liability as Huddersfield came close a few times to connecting on crosses including the one instance where they hit the post and it nearly went back into the net. You would have to worry about Chelsea’s backline coming into this game because they are coming up against a much stronger attacking side and players like Luiz and Alonso who were exposed against Man City a week before the BPL started, must turn it up especially Luiz because he tends to switch off often and Alonso can’t allow Arsenal to expose his lack of pace on the flanks. The new keeper Kepa Arrizabalaga proved to be a success in the opening game, he was really comfortable and kept his first clean sheet. Midfield looks solid for Chelsea, it’s probably their main strength and against Huddersfield Kante stood out as usual, Jorginho was really good, Barkley was ok and Loftus-Cheek made an impact when he came off and of course up front Chelsea looked pretty good, Pedro got his goal, Willian got an assist and Eden Hazard coming off the bench in 14 minutes managed to get an assist and incredibly he completed more take ons than any other premier league player so far so he looks in form. Morata didn’t score but put in a good shift for the team.

Tactically, we can expect Chelsea to set up 4-3-3 again and they will be looking to dominate possession and try to attack Arsenal as the days of defensive football are gone with Sarri in charge. Looking at team news, Eden Hazard is questionable to start because of a possible lack of match fitness still so we may see Pedro and Willian start on the wings and Eden to come on as impact sub again. Kovacic is also in doubt to start so Barkley will most likely start alongside Kante and Jorginho as well. The team could very well be the same as last week as Sarri looks to win his first big game in charge as a Chelsea manager. The keys for Chelsea is obviously they must attack Arsenal’s suspect back line, they may have done decent against City but it doesn’t change the fact that long term it’s not a very good back 4 that Arsenal have and with players like Hazard, Jorginho, Willian, Pedro, Chelsea should absolutely get a couple of goals. Chelsea must dominate the midfield and can’t allow Arsenal to get out on rapid counter attacks, must contain Arsenal’s attacking pace especially Lacazette and Aubameyang.

Arsenal

It was not the best start for Arsenal under the new manager Unai Emery. You can say the schedule makers were pretty horrible to Arsenal making them face Man City in the opening game and now Chelsea in their second game but they have to deal with it. In the opening game, we didn’t see much difference from the Arsenal of the last few years. We saw Arsenal try to play it out from the back, but with Cech in goal it just didn’t work out, Man City were pressing them and it was causing Arsenal problems and they put themselves in some horrible situations. A few players did stand out however, the youngster Guenduozi had a impactful game albeit that he made some mistakes which is understandable for a 19 year old. Lacazette made a really good impact as a super sub and we may see him start in this game. The backline of Arsenal did relatively decent although they conceded two, it was against City’s high powered attack and they’ve done pretty well containing it, its just how good City are more than how bad Arsenal are. Another impressive figure was the new signing Lucas Torreira as he played some nice passes and in general made a good impact on the team and many fans have been saying he should start the next game and Lichtsteiner made a decent impact too. Pretty much, the new signings of Arsenal have put in good performances alongside Lacazette while the old faces were the ones who disappointed. Aubameyang was ghosting but you can also argue he had no supply of the ball as Arsenal were pretty dry going forward, Ozil and Mkhitaryan were non existent and Ramsey, Xhaka were poor. All of Arsenal’s first team creative players simply underperformed and it enabled City to have a comfortable afternoon at the Emirates as they won 0-2.

Coming into the game against Chelsea, we will probably see Arsenal on the backfoot trying to play counter attacking football in attempt to expose Chelsea’s lack of pace at the back. It’s a possibility that Arsenal will get Monreal back into the lineup for this game and he could slot in at LB for Maitland-Niles who is out with an injury. Worse case scenario Lichtsteiner plays LB if Monreal isn’t deemed fit to start. Kolasinac is also out. Cech is expected to still start over Leno in goal meanwhile Torreira and Lacazette are probable starters for this game displacing Guenduozi and out of form Ramsey or possibly Xhaka. We may see a switch in formation by Arsenal here in general to be more of a threat going forward because they didn’t do much until Lacazette really came on in the last game. The keys for Arsenal are they must put in another good defensive performance, can’t allow players such as Hazard, Willian to have freedom because they’ll punish you. Going forward there must be more life to Arsenal, Mkhitaryan and Ozil are going to be very important and they can’t ghost around like they did in the previous week. If they play to their capabilities then that will enable Aubameyang and Lacazette to get loose and they will have much better opportunities to score and we know they are fully capable of getting in behind any defence and punishing it. It’s a big game for Emery and Arsenal because if this turns into 2 losses out of 2, you could look at Arsenal as a bottom 3 team after 2 games and the pressure would really mount. They haven’t won at Stamford Bridge in 7 years and this would be the perfect time to finally end that drought. However, they have a good record over Chelsea in the past 2 years so maybe that mental edge does belong to Arsenal right now which could be key.

What to Expect

We can expect goals. Both sides have suspect backlines and very good attacking players. Both teams are expected to have an attacking mind coming into this game and it should definitely lead to an entertaining game. We have a lot of top talent going forward like Eden Hazard, Mesut Ozil, Willian, Aubameyang, Pedro, Lacazette etc. Both clubs are still pretty new to their system so it could go either way. If we were going to pick a winner it’d be Chelsea because they are playing at home, they do have an insanely good Stamford Bridge record over Arsenal in the past decade and the mood around Chelsea is simply better right now due to the opening day results. If we were going to bet then over 3.0 or even over 3.5 goals seem like value bets. Chelsea over 1.5 goals and Chelsea win are also what we would offer from this match. Expect a really entertaining game and we would say that Chelsea will win this game 3-1.

Match Odds (Tonybet)

Chelsea Win – 1.80

Draw – 4.00

Arsenal Win – 4.40

KICK OFF – 18th August 2018 – 5:30pm UK Time