10-man Chelsea struggling at half-time

HT Arsenal 1 Chelsea 0

Manchester United are within 45 minutes of being crowned Barclays Premiership champions as Arsenal led 10-man Chelsea 1-0 at half-time at Emirates Stadium.

The encounter had been scrappy, with chances few between before Khalid Boulahrouz was shown a red card for hauling down Julio Baptista after 42 minutes.

Gilberto converted the resulting penalty, and Chelsea were left with it all to do to keep alive their slim title hopes.

The home crowd were becoming increasingly frustrated with some of the decisions by referee Alan Wiley, which more often than not went against the Gunners.

As the half-hour mark approached, there had still not been a decent chance of any real note for either side. Too often both teams were guilty of choosing the wrong pass from what looked promising positions.

A stumble by Boulahrouz on the edge of his own box almost let in Adebayor, but fortunately for the Chelsea defender the ball bounced quickly through to goalkeeper Peter Cech.

After 30 minutes, John Obi Mikel was shown a yellow cad for going through the back of Fabregas’ legs.

At the other end, Toure’s slip as he tried to clear in the six-yard box saw the ball fall kindly for Joe Cole.

His low cross flashed across goal – just too far ahead of Frank Lampard.

With 10 minutes left to half-time, Arsenal right-back Emmanuel Eboue got to the goal-line and whipped the ball across – only for Terry to stick out a boot and deflect it away.

A fine exchange of passes on the edge of the Chelsea box then saw the ball worked brilliantly to Adebayor in space on the right.

However, the Togo striker’s scuffed first-time shot was too close to Cech, who saved with his legs.

With three minutes to go to half-time, Chelsea were reduced to 10 men. Julio Baptista chased a long through-ball and got ahead of the Dutch defender, who pulled him down.

Referee Wiley was seemingly left with little option but to produce a red card.

Gilberto stepped up to send Cech the wrong way and put his side ahead – with the cheers also no doubt erupting in the bars around Manchester.