Arsenal 0-2 Chelsea: Instant Reaction

Arsenal played well in patches, but it was only in the midfield and in front of Chelsea's penalty box, and couldn't create anything of note. Chelsea's first goal came from an Arsenal corner, but this time, Arsenal had enough numbers back. Carl Jenkinson's header back, though, was far, far too short and Cesar Azpilicueta nicked in and scored. Jenkinson's done that before; and made several other technical errors on the night. A sliced clearance led to the second Chelsea goal, put away by a fantastic strike from Juan Mata.

Arsenal had one real chance of note--Jack Wilshere danced through the Chelsea defence, and from a narrow angle, substitute Olivier Giroud's shot was parried by Petr Cech. Nacho Monreal, Aaron Ramsey and Santi Cazorla were all close with shots, but the shots were taken from difficult angles. For the third straight match, Arsenal's final pass was poor. That, along with the inability of Jenkinson to do simple technical tasks well, are the biggest issues from tonight. Chelsea have a better squad, and were able to start three players that cost over 20 million pounds. Arsenal, comparatively, brought on Park Ju-Young, who I assume is a trialist or fan competition winner. Yeah, a better squad would be nice, and it will come eventually, when Arsenal can throw away upwards of thirty million on a bench piece. But in the long run, the Capital One Cup doesn't really matter.