Arsenal goalkeeper Petr Cech has admitted that the Gunners must pick themselves up after suffering a disappointing defeat to his former club Chelsea at Stamford Bridge on Saturday afternoon.
The game was marred by poor officiating, which saw Gabriel Paulista sent off before half-time after an incident with Diego Costa, who should arguably have also been sent off – but Mike Dean opted to remove only the Brazilian defender from the game.
Shortly after the break, Chelsea had their goal, with Kurt Zouma meeting the well-taken set-piece by Cesc Fabregas and nodding the ball beyond Cech and into the back of the net.
Having picked a yellow card up in the first half, Santi Cazorla was made to tread on thin ice for the majority of the game and his attempt to steal the ball from the feet of Cesc Fabregas with a slide tackle was poor and the referee brandished a straight red card, whether that means he is to miss three games or just the one is something that will be found out over the next few days.
Very late into the game and with Arsenal down and out, Eden Hazard doubled Chelsea’s lead as his effort deflected in off the unlucky substitute Calum Chambers and into the back of the net.
Despite the poor result, Cech spoke to the media post-match and said that he was pleased on a personal note because of the ovation he received.
It was new for me but I was focused on the game and I had a great reception for the fans. That was amazing and I would like to thank them for that.
You come here to play football, you want to win a football match, and we didn’t win. That’s disappointing.
Speaking on the incident involving Costa and Gabriel, the 33-year-old said he did not see the incident initially but that it made a big difference to the final result.
After the first moment where the referee gave a yellow card to Gabriel and Diego Costa, I stopped following what was going on. I was putting the ball in place and was ready to kick-off again.
Obviously then I saw the red card, so it’s hard to comment because I didn’t see it.
This made a big difference in the game, going into half-time at 0-0 and we were playing well in the first half.
I thought that we were right in the game and we had a chance to win the game, but going into the second half with only 10 men and finishing with nine men made it hard to win the game.
Cech ended by rallying his teammates, saying that they must put the result behind them.
You have to pick yourselves up and continue.
That’s the only thing you can do because you don’t win or lose the league after five games.
You need to carry on until the last minute of the campaign. Obviously we need to keep going.
