Andre Marriner will be red-faced, but the real shameful sight was Arsenal's capitulation in their 'biggest game of the season'

 
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22 March 2014

Arsene Wenger hoped his 1000th game in charge of Arsenal was going to be one he’d never forget, but the Frenchman will now want to erase it from his mind as quickly as possible.

While Andre Marriner’s decision to wrongly send off Kieran Gibbs rather than Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain for a deliberate handball in the first half was an undoubted embarrassment for the match official, the real shameful sight was the manner of Arsenal's capitulation.

After all the accolades over the past few days from the media and the club, where Arsenal gave Wenger a commemorative trophy, his team simply imploded in humiliating fashion.

This was Wenger’s opportunity to prove that he isn’t a ‘specialist in failure’ as his fiercest adversary Jose Mourinho had accused him of being last month.

He had also not beaten Mourinho in 10 attempts and with Arsenal just four points behind their London rivals in the title race, it was an opportunity to make a major statement.

Wenger spoke about it being their biggest game of the season, instead it was another reality check for him and the Arsenal fans.

On two other occasions they had kicked off at Saturday lunchtime against one of their fellow challengers in the championship this season, they also lost emphatically.

Manchester City beat them 6-3 in December and Liverpool also took advantage of their lethargy to cruise to a 5-1 victory. Now it was Chelsea’s turn.

From the moment the game started, Chelsea looked like scoring every time they attacked. Wenger had chosen to employ Oxlade-Chamberlain, rather than Mathieu Flamini next to Mikel Arteta in central midfield like he did in the victory over Tottenham last week, but this time it backfired spectacularly.

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A fine save by Petr Cech from an Olivier Giroud shot in the fourth minute was as good as it got for the visitors. Samuel Eto’o curled a superb shot past Wojciech Szczesny less than 60 seconds later and the manner of the goal provided a template to the rest of the afternoon.

Arsenal were simply all over the place at the back and in midfield and a fired up Chelsea, no doubt still smarting from the 1-0 loss at Aston Villa last week, took full advantage.

Andre Schurrle put them two up inside seven minutes and the game was over as a contest following a bizarre incident. Eden Hazard’s shot was going wide of the post but Oxlade-Chamberlain dived full length to tip it further away with his hand.

Marriner rightfully awarded a penalty, but sent Gibbs off instead, despite being told by the left back, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Per Mertesacker and perhaps even Chelsea captain John Terry that he’d got the wrong man.

Arsenal will be able to appeal to the Football Association and get it switched so Oxlade-Chamberlain will serve the automatic one-game ban, but it will be of small consolation.

Hazard put away the subsequent spot kick and then it was just a question of how many goals Chelsea would get. Oscar (two) and a first strike for January signing Mohamed Salah rubbed salt into the wounds.

The only sour point for Chelsea on a great afternoon for them, which renjuvenated the title hopes and their goal difference, was the sight of Eto’o limping off shortly after scoring with a suspected hamstring strain in his right leg.

Yet his pain was nothing compared to Wenger’s, who sat in his seat throughout with arms folded and having to listen to chants from the home crowd urging him ‘to stay’ and labelling him, like Mourinho had, a ‘specialist in failure’.

With his contract still unsigned and this potentially telling blow to their Premier League bid, he will have to face a lot of awkward questions from a frustrated fanbase in the next few days.

For Mourinho though, it is just the injection of self-belief his team needed for the run-in as well as the psychological boost that every other member of the top 10 (as the table stood before the afternoon games kicked off) have now been to Stamford Bridge and left with no points. No wonder owner Roman Abramovich was smiling and applauding at the end.

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