Key events
61 min Pedro Neto, who has been Chelsea’s best attacker from right wing-back, tees up Gusto on the edge of the area. He whips a first-time shot over the bar.
60 min: Double substitution for Chelsea Pep Chavarria and Malo Gusto replace Jorrel Hato and a visibly frustrated Romeo Lavia. Chelsea’s central midfielders are now Gusto and Reece James.
Updated at 12.53 EDT
59 min Oh go on then.
58 min Chelsea are having a decent spell of possession, perhaps their best of the match. A promising move ends when Acheampong’s cross is well claimed on the stretch by David Raya.
Arsenal break and Lacroix is booked for a foul on Tzolis. In fact, Tzolis has also been booked for waving an imaginary card.
56 min Palmer releases Rogers on the left. His heavy touch invites Konsa to make the kind of full-pelt lunging challenge that defenders love. He gets it spot on and the home crowd cheer lustily.
Updated at 12.50 EDT
54 min There’s another simple reason for Arsenal’s improved attacking play this season: after a couple of quiet seasons, Martin Odegaard is close to his bewildering best.
52 min That was pretty similar to Odegaard’s goal against Manchester City in the Community Shield. He didn’t walk it in this time, though; he just belted it nonchalantly over Martinez.
It’s probably too early to hail Arsenal 2.0 – but their attacking player is sharper this season and right now they look miles better than the rest of the league.
Tzolis angled a crisp pass into Havertz on the edge of the area. He ignored the ball so that it could run onto Odegaard, who surged into the gap and pinged the ball past Martinez. Havertz won’t get an assist but his dummy was a joy – and crucially it distracted Fofana just enough for the ball to reach Odegaard.
Updated at 12.48 EDT
GOAL! Arsenal 2-1 Chelsea (Odegaard 50)
Martin Odegaard gives Arsenal the lead with a brilliant goal!
Martin Odegaard of Arsenal scores his team’s second goal. Photograph: Justin Setterfield/Getty ImagesShare
Updated at 12.51 EDT
49 min It’s been a quieter start to the second half than the first. Saka plays a give-and-go with Havertz and hammers a shot from distance that is blocked by Lacroix.
46 min Peep peep! Martin Odegaard has the first kick of the second half; both XIs are unchanged.
“If things carry on this way,” begins Charles Antaki, “then I’ll be tempted to pine for the old days, when Arsenal were one ahead and it was a matter of unbearable suffering and anxiety as they played screw-down football till the end of time. This new entertaining stuff is all very well, but they are not actually winning, which is maybe significant.”
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Andy Hunter
Half-time reading
It would be putting it mildly to say Everton’s exhaustive search for a new right-back met an underwhelming response when it concluded with the signing of Ainsley Maitland-Niles on Monday. But there was an overwhelmingly positive reaction to the £4.3m recruit’s Everton debut as his stunning 25-yard strike rescued a point with virtually the final kick of the game against Manchester United.
Michael Carrick wiped his face in sheer disbelief after the former Arsenal player, 19 minutes into his first appearance for David Moyes’s side, found Senne Lammens’ top corner to send Hill Dickinson Stadium into raptures at the end of a troubled week. United were on the verge of victory following Benjamin Sesko’s 88th-minute header beyond Jordan Pickford but Everton, indignant and defiant after the shambles of transfer deadline day, twice fought back to preserve their unbeaten start to the season. A slow-burning contest erupted into a wildly entertaining second half.
Updated at 12.25 EDT
Half time: Arsenal 1-1 Chelsea
Lively stuff at the Emirates. Morgan Rogers volleyed Chelsea ahead after 77 seconds; Riccardo Calafiori has a goal disallowed before Kai Havertz sneaked a low shot past Emi Martinez. Arsenal dominated much of the half but Chelsea came closest to taking the lead when Pedro Neto hit a post in injury time.
Share45+3 min: Pedro Neto hits the post!
Joao Pedro plays a sensational long pass on the turn to release Pedro Neto. He cuts into the area from the right, shifts the ball away from Gabriel and shapes a seductive low shot that hits the far post and bounces away. Raya might have saved it but I wouldn’t put the farm on it.
Neto has been an excellent outball for Chelsea throughout the first half.
45+1 min Ben White and Romeo Lavia have a bit of a row near the byline. White is an angry young chap, isn’t he. It started because Lavia thought White had dived.
45 min Four minutes of added time.
45 min Cole Palmer is booked for a cynical foul on Havertz. Arsenal were breaking from a Chelsea free-kick and he decided to take one for the team.
Palmer could have been booked earlier for a foul on Lewis-Skelly. Had that happened, he wouldn’t have fouled Havertz just now, so there’s no great controversy. It’s just a detail and you deserve to know it.
42 min This is the quietest spell of a pulsating first half. Arsenal are still on top but they know Chelsea can hurt them.
39 min “Mick Jagger is clearly a Spurs fan,” writes Simon McMahon. “How else can you explain 19th Nervous Breakdown, (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction and You Can’t Always Get What You Want?”
Also – and not a lot of people know this, mainly because it’s completely made up – I Think I’m Going Mad was written after watching Ossie Ardiles’s 4-1-5 formation in the autumn of 1994.
Updated at 12.14 EDT
36 min Joao Pedro has a pop from 40 yards, with Raya well off his line, but he chokes the shot and it fades well wide.
Cracking game, this.
36 min A good piece of analysis on Sky Sports shows that, for both goals, Raya and Martinez had their weight on the wrong foot. That’s why they couldn’t get across to shots they would save more often than not.
35 min “I’ve been slow to work this out,” writes Colum Farrelly, “but have concluded that Cole Palmer and Phil Foden were not chosen for the World Cup because of their woeful haircuts.”
Too soon, Colum: it’s only 20 years since I started going bald.
34 min Tzolis finds Lewis-Skelly, who thrashes a shot from the edge of the area. It takes a deflection, not seen by the referee, and flies over the bar.
32 min Havertz’s chipped cross is headed away bravely at the far post by Lavia, who was under serious pressure from behind.
31 min Rogers receives the ball on the left of the area, uses Konsa as a screen and whips a shot a few yards wide of the far post. For a player of his abundant class, that was a chance.
29 min Joao Pedro was booked for kicking the ball away,” writes* my colleague Jacob Steinberg at the Emirates. “It might be Chelsea’s first silly yellow of the season.”
* Well, he wrote it 10 minutes ago but there’s been so much going on that I’ve only just had chance to look at my inbox.
28 min I’m not sure Chelsea are ready for a game of basketball with a team as good as Arsenal. They need to establish a degree of control or it’ll just get nasty.
27 min “Not really the best look,” begins Paul Marshall, “for those Arsenal fans to march to the stadium dressed all in black with balaclavas, this weekend of all times – especially given the club’s proud history of inclusion and diverse fanbase.”
At first I wondered whether that picture might be AI slop; then I remembered it’s the year 2026.
Havertz received Rice’s quick pass on the right wing, marched infield with intent and drove a precise low shot from 18 yards that sneaked past Martinez at the near post. It was an admirably precise shot – but on reflection Martinez should have saved it. I think he got a slight touch and helped it into the corner of the net.
Updated at 11.59 EDT
GOAL! Arsenal 1-1 Chelsea (Havertz 25)
Kai Havertz scores a fabulous equaliser against his old club.
Kai Havertz of Arsenal scores his team’s first goal. Photograph: Ryan Pierse/Getty ImagesShare
Updated at 12.01 EDT
24 min This is becoming a basketball game. Calafiori marches infield, exchanges passes with Lewis-Skelly and belts a right-foot shot from 15 yards that is well blocked.
23 min A stinging long-range shot from James is pushed up in the air by Raya. Arsenal break and Odegaard’s shot on the run is crucially blocked 12 yards from goal. Chelsea counter the counter, with a cross from the right just evading Joao Pedro.
I can’t keep up with this. Anyone fancy doing to the second quarter?
21 min Chelsea leave three or four up and threaten to break from the Arsenal corner. The counter-attack is slowed down well by Arsenal. Eventually Palmer curls a shot from 25 yards that bounces awkwardly in front of Raya, who holds on as he falls to his right. He needed to because Joao Pedro was sniffing round like prime Ian Rush.
19 min Tzolis bursts down the left and screws an excellent low cross towards Havertz near the penalty spot. He whips a first-time shot that deflects behind off the lunging Fofana. Good defending.