Are Arsenal better than Chelsea?

Chelsea are on a six match winning streak and
looking very impressive. When this fact came up
over the weekend amongst my red and white
friends the first thing that got mentioned was that
not so long ago we soundly beat them 3-0. This is
obviously correct but truth be told we never beat
the current formation; the winning formula that
Conte has managed to find. On the subject of Conte
for a moment; there is an interesting comparison
going on out there between the Italian who clearly
does everything possible to encourage his players
and Mourinho who has no qualms about publiclly
berating his; fairly obvious which of those two
strategies is reaping more reward.
No, we may have beaten Chelsea but we did not
beat the current formula; I mean, if we were to beat
them next week then that would be a different story
we would and should crow about such a victory
from the roof tops.
The title of this post: Are Chelsea better than
Arsenal was a thought that sprang into my mind just
after they had beaten City; I didn’t watch the game
so the result of 1-3 away was all I had to go on
before the start of the West Ham – Arsenal game
and that score line was scarily impressive.
I continued pondering this while watching Oxlaide-
Chamberlain and Monreal wreak havoc down West
Ham’s flank and while Monreal may have an
excuse for not being able to deliver the killer pass,
Oxlaide-Chamberlain doesn’t. Alex was pants and
as hard as I tried I could not stop myself from
thinking Oxlaide-Chamberlain is no Hazard. The
Belgian can use both feet and he has excellent
close control. Then there is Walcott. Theo’s close
control is so bad that Sanchez and Ozil are playing
with a man short which although they are better
than anything Chelsea have they cannot do is all on
their own. In a nut shell Willian is so much better
than Walcott.
It was still nil nil at the Olympic Stadium and I was
thinking that over the length of a season those two
advantages that Chelsea have will surely make a
decisive difference.
I watched Match of the Day later that evening
wanting to see how good Chelsea were and to my
surprise I quickly realised how lucky they had been
to win the way they did. It was not the all
conquering performance that I feared. David Luis
should have been sent off and Debruyne should
have converted the sitter, not to mention the
umpteen other golden chances Man City had to put
that game out of Chelsea’s reach.
Fabregas was back and he sent one of his trade
mark majestic forty yards passes that found Henry
who used his body to shield himself from the
ineffectual Otamendi before firing home to level the
score. The only thing is of course is that it wasn’t
Henry it was Costa. Meanwhile Arsenal had gone
ahead at the Olympic Stadium with a Sanchez-Ozil
combo and the reassuring realisation hit me that
Chelsea can only win the title if the Elephant man
stays fit for the length of the campaign; it can
happen, the last time they won the league they had
hardly any injuries as was the same last year with
Leicester but these are rarities.
So the balance starts to swing back to the Good
Guys because although the loss of Sanchez would
be painful we still have Giroud, Welbeck, Perez and
even Walcott.
We have a better defence than they do and we have
more defensive back up. On that subject didn’t City
look pants at the back, very poor? Leicester may
have won the league with a lot of luck on the injury
front but their defence was rock solid; there is no
way that can be said of either City or Chelsea for
that matter.
Arsenal, although, having gone one up were not
dominating as they should have against a poor West
Ham side. Enter Ramsey exit Walcott and hay
presto we suddenly took complete control and as
you know we ended up thrashing West Ham 1-5.
As to whether Arsenal are better than Chelsea only
time will tell, the league does not lie. I know who my
money is on.