One Nil To The Arsenal as victorious Gunners prove London Is Red 

Arsenal close the gap on Liverpool to 12 points. 

Mikel Merino's first-half header at a corner earns Arsenal - find out who impressed with our Player Ratings 

Player Ratings:

David Raya: 7/10 - Narrowly avoided a ‘Sanchez’ moment, with the Arsenal keeper lucky when mishandling Cucurella’s shot, which trickled the wrong side of the post for Chelsea by a matter of inches

Jurrien Timber: 7/10 - Driving run into the box early early could have led to a penalty on another day after the floppy haired Cucurella appeared to handle

William Saliba: 7/10 - Calm and collected

Gabriel: 7/10 - Booked

Myles Lewis-Skelly: 7/10 - Chosen ahead of Riccardo Calafiori to start at left-back, to cap an excellent 34 hours, after new Three Lions boss put his faith in the precocious 18-year-old when selecting his first England squad

Declan Rice: 7.5/10 - Went close with a couple of fizzing drives

Thomas Partey: 7/10 - Solid. Booked

Martin Odegaard: 7/10 - Provided corner for Mikel Merino to cleverly run into space and meet perfectly to loop the ball over the hapless Sanchez in the Chelsea goal. Booked in the second half

Leandro Trossard: 6.5/10 - Lively but without influencing matters unduly

Mikel Merino: 7.5/10 - Scorer of a Steve Bould-esq headed flick on at the near post to bring joy to those of a certain vintage

Gabi Martinelli: 7/10 - Good to have the Brazilian attacker back in the starting line up and produced an excellent cross for Merino that saw Sanchez palm away. Subbed after a nasty kick in the back from Cucurella

Substitutes:

Ethan Nwaneri: 7/10 - Replaced Martinelli on 78 minutes

Kieran Tierney: N/A - Swapped with Odegaard with four minutes added time remaining 

Chelsea fan in the away end here at Arsenal recreating their 1989 Full Members Cup success pic.twitter.com/TX0os8USqG

— Layth (@laythy29) March 16, 2025