Mourinho was firmly on the path he pursued. This year, Chelsea did not lose any key players. In addition, Robben, Drogba, Ferreira, and other players had adapted to the Premier League. Joe Cole, Lampard, and Terry, such as local players, had made significant progress. Their overall strength was stronger, and it was rumored that Chelsea was still trying to strengthen the midfield. They had their eye on the black and hard African midfielder, Essien.
Arsenal's situation could not be said to be completely opposite, but at least the main attack group composed of substitutes and new players performed badly in the first half of the game.
The collateral consequence was that the rear defensive line was almost collapsed.
The reason was simple. Henry, Pires, and Ljungberg would not easily lose the ball to Chelsea to counterattack. Chelsea counterattacked more, and the number of successful counterattacks naturally increased over the same period, not to mention the weakening of the defense due to Vieira's departure from Fàbregas.
Qin Xiong was not in a position to blame his teammates. He came to Fàbregas' side just to tell him a fact.
"If we want to defeat Chelsea in positional play, it's basically impossible in this game."
Fàbregas could not help but nod when he heard Qin Xiong's words.
Arsenal's offense advanced to Chelsea's danger zone and was immediately cut off by the opponent's offensive formation. The connection between the players became weak. If there was no strong tacit understanding, it would be difficult to play an effective offensive cooperation.
Therefore, it was almost impossible to break through Chelsea's defensive line in positional play.
"Now the only environment we need to be able to play an offense is a counterattack against Chelsea's counterattack! Do you understand what I mean? "
Fàbregas pondered for a moment and nodded again.
Positional play was more clean. Since there was no hope, they might as well give up and focus on defense. They would wait for Chelsea's counterattack to come, and then launch a sudden counterattack after blocking it with all their strength!
Wenger criticized the team's offensive performance after walking into the locker room, but he did not criticize Qin Xiong.
Qin Xiong was inconspicuous in the first half. Most of his passes were formulaic, and his pass success rate was over 90%. Those erroneous passes were mostly threatening passes, and no teammates could receive them. Of course, if it were a main player, maybe half of them would succeed.
Van Persie did not retreat, Fàbregas was getting further and further back due to the defensive pressure, and Qin Xiong was like an abandoned child facing Chelsea's three tough midfielders alone in the midfield area. What could he do?
It was irresponsible to pass a threatening ball and have no teammates to receive it.
Wenger could understand Qin Xiong's situation, so he did not say anything harsh to him.
Hleb, Reyes, and Robin van Persie were taught a lesson by Wenger. Wenger repeatedly emphasized the team's unity and cooperation in the offense, as well as the active movement. He then encouraged the team to try to improve their performance in the second half.
No one cared about the result of this match, but everyone cared about the process!
It was not an exaggeration to say that with Arsenal's performance in the first half, he would have to kneel every time he met Chelsea in the league or the cup!
When they returned to the field in the second half, the two sides changed sides and fought again.
Qin Xiong simply retreated to the central midfielder area and took the initiative to participate in the defense.
Anyway, he could see that in this game, he either had the ability to go forward and abuse Chelsea, or he did not waste his energy rushing forward and could not get the effective support of his teammates.
Chelsea was still patiently fighting back. In the 57th minute of the game, Chelsea once again launched a counterattack. Robben rushed forward from the right flank. He cut across the middle in front of Ashley Cole. Silva went forward to block, but Robben took a step back and bypassed Silva. When he was about to do a long shot, he attracted Fàbregas to fill in the position. Then Robben passed the ball to Lampard, who plugged in from behind.
When Lampard had just touched the ball forward, Qin Xiong decisively intercepted with his foot. Lampard hurriedly protected the ball, and Qin Xiong was entangled with him. The two of them fought physically, and no one retreated. In the end, Qin Xiong lost his balance and stabbed the ball from Lampard's foot.
But the football that was stabbed still rolled to Robben's foot. At this time, Robben directly hung the ball into the penalty area. Arsenal's defensive line, which originally thought that the defense was successful, was moving forward. They did not expect Chelsea's attack to come in again, and so directly!
Drogba, who was waiting for the opportunity, successfully reversed the offside position. Before Lehmann could do it, he headed the ball. The football changed direction and was headed into the bottom right corner of the goal.
Lehmann was mad!
He lost his composure and roared at every Arsenal player.
This kind of defense was simply too horrible to look at!
“3:0！ Chelsea destroyed Arsenal! Arsenal should regret it! They sold the player they should not have sold the most, Vieira! Look at their midfield defense. Fàbregas has a certain performance in the offensive organization and coordination, but he can't find the feeling in the defense at all! If they want to defend the Premier League title with this kind of performance, it is simply a fool's dream! Chelsea is preparing for the new season with a huge unwillingness from last season! "
Wenger wiped his face on the sidelines. Of course, he did not care about the outcome of this game. He did not care even if they lost 0: 5!
But he had to admit that he was very concerned about how they lost the game.
It was time to face reality!
Admit it!
It was impossible to rely on Robin van Persie, Reyes, and Hleb to make a difference in the new season!
Last season, Reyes and Robin van Persie's goal rate was around 0.25 on the field.
In other words, they could only score one goal in four games.
Even if the two of them played at the same time, it would take two games for one of them to score a goal.
Hleb himself was not a stable scorer in Stuttgart.
Indeed, Arsenal had to rely on Henry, Pires, and Ljungberg.
But the current situation was that players like Reyes and Robin van Persie could not even be considered as super substitutes, let alone compete for the main force.
Wenger, it's time to wake up!
The gap between the main force and the substitutes was huge.
Arsenal was still the same Arsenal who only had the strength to fight on one line!
Wenger's heart was calm. He knew what the reality was, and he could discover more.
The gap between the players' levels was not only a decline in the overall strength of the team, but also the impact of the players' individual strength.
For example, Qin Xiong could not play to his true strength in this game.
His threatening delivery could scare Chelsea's defenders into a cold sweat. In the end, it turned into a mistake because his teammates did not understand his intention. It only gave Chelsea a false alarm.
The first mistake, the second mistake, and the third mistake. Sorry, Qin Xiong did not try anymore. It was meaningless.
Qin Xiong could not go forward without his teammates taking the initiative to cover to give him more space to play. Going forward would give Chelsea a greater advantage in the midfield. He could only go back. But if he went back and then went forward, he would not get a positive response from his teammates. How could he play well by himself?
Wenger turned to the substitutes' bench and called Henry, Pires, and Ljungberg to warm up.
It was not to save face. This game was most likely lost. Wenger just wanted to cheer up Fàbregas and Qin Xiong because they were the absolute main force in the new season!
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